Beningbrough larch walk
Follow the blue way-markers and get close to nature listening out for the cheerful bird song on this short woodland walk. Not too far for little ones or too arduous, get everyone together for a blast of fresh air. A great weekday walk with the dog or an afternoon stroll with all the family.
Good to know
Please use the car park, even if you are only visiting the parkland. For everyone's safety, avoid parking in passing places, on embankments or close to neighbouring drives. For your safety and to protect the cattle and calves, please stay on the footpaths and avoid roaming across the fields. Livestock can be seen in the parkland for much of the year. They belong to the tenant farmer who also runs Home Farm Café. Take care when the cows are in the fields and please be aware the bull may be there too.
Map
Start:
Beningbrough Hall car park
1
Start in the car park, with your back to admissions, head diagonally across the car park towards the gate in the far-right hand corner. Go through the gate and follow the path towards the farm shop. With the farm shop on your right-hand side, carry along to your left along the tarmac road, leaving the farm shop behind you.
2
Cross over the main exit road and continue through the gate directly in front of you. Continue along the concrete path with views over Beningbrough’s parkland on your left-hand side.
Look out for the cattle, including prize winning Aberdeen Angus, farmed by the tenant farmers on the Beningbrough estate.
3
At the end of the concrete, before reaching the picnic area, look out for a gate on the right that leads through the woods. Enter through the gate following the bark mulch pathway that will lead you through the woods. Look out for the wooden frame which captures a perfect view across the parkland onto the hall.
Beautifully framed
Parkland has been a feature at Beningbrough for at least 750 years. The long continuity of parkland associated with Beningbrough is reflected in an unusually rich assemblage of species that are dependent on sites where there has been a long and unbroken history of open-grown trees.
4
If you want to extend your walk slightly then there’s the option here to branch off left for a circular walk around the pike ponds. The pike ponds date back to the medieval period when they were dug out, lined with clay and used to keep fish so there was a ready food supply. Alternatively keep the following the path round.
5
Carry on through the woods. At spring time the whole of this wooded area is covered in a carpet of bluebells. Follow the path until you reach the metal gate and the exit road once more. Here where the road intersects the two wooded areas, turn right and follow the road back towards the hall.
6
As you make your way back along the road, you’ll see a large dead tree on your left. Carry on until you reach the exit for Home Farm on your left. You have now done a full loop. Turn left and retrace your steps to the car park.
Conservation in action
This dead tree has been deliberately left as it supports important populations of rare invertebrates (including the nationally scarce Anisoxya fuscula (false darkling beetle); and British Red Data Book digger wasp, Argogorytes fargei) as well as fungus, bats and owls. Leaving dead wood in situ like this is part of our Dead Wood Policy and forms a vital part of our crucial conservation work.
End:
Beningbrough Hall car park
