Surrey

Limpsfield Common and the Carpenters Arms walk

This walk around Limpsfield Common takes you past farmers' fields and through ancient woodland. Halfway round, take a break at the Carpenters Arms – a traditional country pub.

Near to

Limpsfield Common

Start point

Grub Street car park, RH8 0SL

Address
Grub Street car park, by the Limpsfield Chart Golf Club house, Limpsfield, Oxted, Surrey RH8 0SL.
Directions via Google Maps
By road
Exit the M25 at J6, then at the Godstone interchange roundabout take the A22, signposted Eastbourne. At the next roundabout take the A25, signposted Westerham, Oxted. Grub Street car park (National Trust) is on the right-hand side of the A25 by the junction with the B269 and by Limpsfield Chart Golf Club.
Total stages: 11
Total stages: 11
Start point
Grub Street car park, RH8 0SL
Stage 1
Cross Grub Street into the golf club car park and you'll see a path to your right through the holly trees. The path is marked as a bridleway. Follow this path with the golf course on your right-hand side, and houses to your left. Ignore the path that goes onto the golf course and carry on until the track meets with the golf course and you reach a junction where five paths meet.
Limpsfield Chart Golf Club
Limpsfield Chart Golf Club dates back to 1889 and is one of the oldest clubs in England, laid out on land owned by the Lord of the Manor, Granville William Gresham Leveson Gower. The club became very popular with local wealthy gentlemen and ladies and golfing Londoners. At weekends horse-drawn carriages were lined up at Oxted Station to convey golfers and their kit to the course. The clubhouse dates back to this Victorian period. Playing was not allowed on Sundays until 1948.
Stage 2
You should now be standing at a point where five paths meet. Turn immediately to your left and follow the path along the edge of the course with a hedge on your left.
Stage 3
You will come to the start of Ridlands Grove – a small woodland of broadleaf trees, including oaks and beeches. Look out for lovely views over the farmland to your left.
Stage 4
Turn left and go through the kissing gate. Follow the path alongside the hedge to your left. Turn right at the end of the hedge and walk across to the wood. Follow the footpath bearing left through the wood, and follow the path to the left. Come out of the wood and cross the corner of the field and enter the wood opposite. Go straight ahead along the bridlepath, keeping to the edge of the wood with the fence on your left. After 300 yards, turn sharp right at a kissing gate on your left. The path heads uphill and is marked the Vanguard Way.
Stage 5
Continue walking up the path through the woodland. In autumn this is a great place to look for fungi. You'll come to a row of huge beech trees by a fork. Take the left-hand path then follow the blue bridlepath marker. From here you'll spot some houses up ahead.
Stage 6
You'll come out of the woodland onto Stoneleigh Road, which then crosses Moorhouse Road. Walk alongside the houses, keeping the cricket pitch to your left. At the end of the houses turn right onto Tally Road and you'll see the Carpenters Arms ahead of you. The Carpenters Arms dates back to the 1800s and is a traditional countryside pub.
Stage 7
Turn right just past the pub down a track and then turn left following the Greensand Way. Cross over Ridlands Rise and the path will come out on Ridlands Road. Turn right alongside the road for 50 yards and then cross the road by a bus stop to follow the Greensand route through some scrubland. Follow the broad path past some houses, over a drive and ignoring a public footpath to your right. You'll come out at a point where four paths meet at Paston’s Cottage.
Stage 8
Turn right, still following the Greensand Way down a very broad road. At the end of a long trimmed beech hedge on your right you'll come to Oast Cottage. Turn right here and follow the narrow footpath down between the fences. The path ends at a road by Pains Hill Chapel.
Pains Hill Chapel
This chapel was established in 1823 to serve a local community of Protestant dissenters who had been meeting in the open air. The first priest was the Rev. SA Dubourg of the Surrey Missionary Society. It was a very simple building. The baptistry was filled with rainwater until 1903. Lighting was by oil lamps until the 1920s, with electric lighting only coming in the 1950s. Nevertheless the congregation have been very committed, with some attendees becoming overseas missionaries in China and Africa.
Stage 9
Cross the road and bear left and continue past a fingerpost. The path goes by a tee area for the golf club, and then dinks left through woodland by a fingerpost. In a short while you'll come to a road. Turn right and then in 100 yards you'll spot another fingerpost pointing left down Stoneswood Road. On the other side of Stoneswood Road is the path with a fingerpost.
Stage 10
Continue following the signs for the Greensand Way through woodland going down into Happy Valley. Ignore paths to the right and left, and keep straight ahead until you come up out of the valley at a road.
Stage 11
As you cross over the road, you'll see a bridlepath signpost. Just past here, there's a T-junction where you turn right along a small path, parallel to the road on your right-hand side. You'll see the New Road car park to your right. Carry on straight ahead and when you reach the road, cross over and walk along the verge with some posts to your right. You'll come to Kent Hatch Road near its junction with the A25. Cross over Kent Hatch Road and take the path round the back of the golf fairways. Continue past the No. 1 tee, and you'll see the car park ahead of you.
End point
Grub Street car park, RH8 0SL
Trail map
Map of the Limpsfield Common and the Carpenters Arms walk | © Crown copyright and database rights 2013 Ordnance Survey
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Limpsfield, Oxted, Surrey, RH8 0TW

01342843225

limpsfieldcommon@nationaltrust.org.uk

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