Jenny Wind walk - circular
This is an enjoyable stroll through green lanes with wonderful views. You will walk past disused quarries and unimproved meadows and see limestone loving plants.
Map
Start:
Much Wenlock National Trust car park
1
Follow the path from the car park and turn left up Blakeway Hollow
2
Field maple, buckthorn and honeysuckle edge the track as it ascends the dip slope to wooded Wenlock Edge. On either side are overgrown quarries where the top layer of purer limestone has been stripped away.
3
At the junction of pathways, just inside the trees on the crest of the Edge, curve right, downhill to Harley Bank where there is a viewpoint on the left called Granham's Mount. 200 metres on, turn right, uphill through Edge Wood. Among the lime -loving plants here, look out for herb paris and tutsan.
4
Notice the shallow bed of the old 'Jenny Wind' dropping down slope. Ignore the next junction and continue uphill where the path opens in to a large coppiced area. Continue straight on at the next junction and take the path to the right, up through Smokeyhole Quarry.
Jenny Wind
The winched tramway once lowered limestone from the Wenlock Edge Quarry above to a bank of limekilns beside the main road below.
5
Two excavated pot kilns sit beside the trail. Look for spurge laurel and twayblade orchids nearby. When a winding path emerges 1/3 mile later, passing a large disused quarry on the right, go up some steps and over a stile and turn left along the field edge, crossing a minor road past Stokes Barn.
6
Take the way-marked path on the right down. Turn left into Blakeway Hollow and then right into the car park.
It descends over unimproved meadows where cowslips, common spotted, pyramidal orchids spangle the limestone grassland.
End:
Much Wenlock National Trust car park