Sat 20th March 2010 - Leg 9 : Shenley to Cuffley - 11.5 miles

Nine of us on this leg, David Izod, Lynda and Jonathan Berks, Liz Beardwell, Jim Webb, Guy Garfitt plus Ginny, Sandra Scott and yours truly (wearing the red hat!). David Beardwell had been due to join us but he wasn’t feeling well.



It was drizzling when we left Shenley Park and it was drizzling when we eventually reached Cuffley Station. For some reason, the gods looked down on us favourably when we reached The Sun at Northaw, the drizzle held back and we were able to eat our lunches in the pub garden and down a well earned pint.


As we left Shenley, someone shouted, “W. G. Grace used to play cricket over there” but we’d passed the gap in the hedge and missed it! The rain and mist hid the views across the Vale of St Albans so we missed seeing the Pastoral Centre, the tower of Napsbury Hospital and St Albans Abbey. We crossed a ploughed field which, mercifully, turned out to be less muddy and sticky than it looked.

Just over an hour into the walk we came to a monument at the bottom of someone’s garden. As you will see from the photo it is thought to have been erected by the Dudding family to celebrate their cousin, Admiral Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar. It also indicates that the Earl of Warwick’s death on the spot during the battle of Barnet in 1471 is probably a myth. Perhaps the monument was a figment of our imaginations! Immediately after the monument we entered a “kissing” gate which of course the Berks had to demonstrate.


We continued on to pass under the M25. Judging by the rubbish, the underpass looked as though it had been used by people sleeping rough. Shortly, we came to the village of South Mimms. Time for a break. Unfortunately the Black Horse pub was closed so refuge was sought at a picnic table in the children’s playground - it was just a pity about the rain. Refuelled, we set about finding the next part of our path. We found it hidden between two houses.

Our path took us along the side of the Catherine Bourne towards the A1(M). Another damp and dingy underpass and lots more rubbish. We walked on past Warrengate Farm and thence to the Cranbourne Industrial Estate and the railway line; through yet another underpass. More comments on the amount of rubbish to be seen in the bushes. After the railway, we crossed Potters Bar Golf Course following the course of a ditch. We pondered the existence of a pill-box in the middle of the course. The Golf Club’s website doesn’t say much about it other than during WW2 “Parts of the course were requisitioned by the army, a concrete "pill-box" still exists between the 11th green and 12th tee.”

As we entered into the outskirts of Potters Bar we remarked on the late flowering of the daffodils and wondered how many would be blooming in Thriplow during the forthcoming Daffodil Weekend. We walked down Quaker Lane, passing the Scout Hut and decided from its condition that it predated the surrounding housing estate. Liz’s phone rang. It was David looking for sympathy…he didn’t get much! At the end of the Lane we crossed the road and passed through a rickety iron kissing gate into sticky black mud. This path took us past a large house, Northaw Place (photo) and onto the village of Northaw.

We decided to have lunch at The Sun Inn. The rain had stopped and we were allowed to eat our sandwiches in the garden. An extremely welcoming waiter came out to take our order for beer and bowls of chips. It was probably just as well because our boots were, to say the least, muddy. We were all surprised to discover that we only had about 3 miles to go. Whilst lunching, we learnt that the village church that we could see was Victorian, the original having been burnt down in 1881.

We set off after lunch with renewed vigour, eventually we turned on to the Northaw Road into Cuffley. From here we thought it was just an easy walk to the railway station but, no, as usual, the Friends of Hertfordshire Way took us the long way round. We soon turned right off the road and under the railway line. Walking through the fields we came to a small commercial estate and turned left onto Station Road and in 50 yards into the station, where we waited for our lifts under a bus shelter, out of the rain.