Tuesday 10 August, the second Tuesday of the month, it must be Trail-walker time again. Another glorious day beckons, the sun is out with just a few fluffy cumulus clouds dotting the sky, emphasising that the weather was likely to remain warm and pleasant.
This time, 12 of us are meeting at the Ickleford Sports & Recreation Club car park, the plan was to start walking at 10:00, around the HOOP. Chris Wheatley once again expertly guiding us round.
It’s always good to have an end goal to a warm walk, so some of us planned to adjourn to one of the local hostelries for a thorough post-walk analysis, involving a beer - somehow trail-walking, Pubs, beer, chatting and even future planning go together exceptionally well.
HOOP (Hitchin Outer Orbital Path is a 12 mile walk around and through the outskirts of Hitchin. It is a beautiful walk through our bucolic North Herts countryside.
HOOP was conceived by volunteers from the North Herts Ramblers Group. With the support of Countryside Management Service and North Herts District Council the path was waymarked and promoted. The HOOP has been very popular with walkers since it first opened in August 2010.
The walk takes in a series of our incredibly valuable and quite rare chalk streams (River Oughton, River Hiz, River Purwell and Ippolyts Brook). This sometimes provides lucky walkers with the flash of blue of a Kingfisher, or the ripples and fleeting glimpse of our native Brown Trout, rising to catch a fly, or maintaining station against the current of the stream. There’s all sorts of other late summer flora and fauna to catch, both wild and domesticated, which all add to the beauty and interest as the walk continues.
The Trail walkers group thoroughly enjoyed the day, some of us did retire to a local hostelry, very welcome it was too after a thoroughly enjoyable walk in great company.
We are looking forward to starting stage 1 of the Hertfordshire Way, (a total of 183 miles) in September.
HOOP walk map
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