Distance: 5.5 miles

Difficulty of the terrain: medium

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

Walk from the riverside town of Stourport-on-Severn, through the north Worcestershire countryside to Abberley, the village at the far end of the Abberley Hills. An impressive but overlooked 400million+ year old ridge.

The Story

The Walk

Getting Back

Malvern District’s Other Hills

Malvern Hills District stretching right along Worcestershire’s western boundary with Herefordshire is home to two impressive rocky ridges. The eponymous Malvern Hills in the south of the District – which everybody has heard of – and another impressive range to the north, which is rather less well known.

Rising to a 283 metre tall peak the Abberley Hills only four or five miles from Stourport-on-Severn are an imposing feature of the north Worcestershire landscape. However, they are significantly less famous than the Malverns, probably because they are some distance from a settlement of any size and despite a couple of A-roads running nearby are relatively tricky to get to. Especially by public transport as the villages of Great Witley and Abberley to the south and west of the hills are only visited by buses half a dozen times a day.

The Abberley Hills are made from Silurian rocks formed over 400 million years ago. This was a relatively short lived geological era – only around 30 million years… However, it is rocks from this era that make the landscapes of the western Midlands and parts of Wales distinctive. The geological event that forced the rocks comprising the Abberley Hills up out of the earth’s crust occured slightly more recently, around 360 to 250 million years ago.

This distinctiveness is recognised in the Abberley and Malvern Hills Geopark formed in 2003 which encompassed both sets of hills and other interesting geological features of the landscapes around them. The geopark is traversed by the Geopark Way which runs for 103 miles from Bridgnorth down to Gloucester. The Abberley Hills are encountered in the walk’s middle section.

Abberley village is a highly dispersed settlement of just over 800 people which feels very remote, despite being only four or five miles from Stourport-on-Severn and not all that far in the scheme of things from Kidderminster and the West Midlands conurbation beyond. It is known to have existed since the 12th or 13th Centuries. Great Witley, which lies just north of the impressive modern ruin of Witley Court lies just on the other side of the ridge.

In terms of amenities Abberley possesses an impressively sloping village green, a pub, a church and a large general store and post office which sells most things and which (supposedly) buses stop outside though anything resembling a sign is not apparent.

The Walk

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

I create the Walk Midlands routes via Ordnance Survey Maps Explorer enabling me to take them on my phone. Subscribe yourself via the banner above.

This walk to Abberley in north Worcestershire begins from Stourport-on-Severn High Street.

Stourport-on-Severn High Street is where buses from Kidderminster and elsewhere put down in the town centre.

Upon reaching High Street turn and begin walking downhill towards the River Severn.

On reaching the riverside at the bottom of High Street you come to a blue painted metal bridge.

Cross the bridge.

Then continue walking straight ahead along the pavement of the A451 road.

Presently you reach a junction, here keep on the right hand fork remaining on the A451.

Soon you reach the edge of Stourport-on-Severn.

Here on the horizon the hulking eastern end of the Abberley Hills rises up.

Keep on walking along the pavement beside the road. Soon you cross the boundary line between Wyre Forest where Stourport-on-Severn is situated, and the altogether more rural and remote seeming Malvern Hills District.

After walking through the countryside a little way you approach some houses near the edge of the scattered little village of Dunley.

On your right, just after an old red brick house there is a footpath running off to the right downhill across a field.

Turn right and follow the path downhill.

Once on the lane turn left and walk uphill a short distance towards a large farm house on top of a short steep hill.

Soon on your right there is a footpath leading off across some scrub land towards fields.

Turn right and cross this ground making for a stile out onto open fields.

Once onto the field follow the footpath up and around to the right.

Soon you come to a stile on the right which you cross.

Having crossed the stile turn left and keep walking uphill.

At the next field boundary take a slight left turn and continue walking uphill keeping close to the hedgerow on the right.

You reach the brow of a hill, and on the other side the eastern end of the Abberley range clearly rises in the middle distance.

Keep on following the path beside the hedgerow downhill until you emerge out onto a country lane.

Once on the lane you are at a junction, here take the fork to the left, continuing downhill.

Continue along the lane for a short distance until you approach the grounds of a large house.

On your left immediately before you reach this property is a track across a field running parallel of the house’s boundary hedge.

Turn left and begin following this path across the field.

This leads down to a farm’s yard of sorts, which had piles of some kind of white fertiliser in it when I walked the route in late January 2023.

At this yard turn right and follow battered footpath signs into the adjacent field.

Upon entering the next field following a path running to the right along the hedgerow due right of where you have entered the field heading uphill.

Having reached the top of the hill there is a great view across the Abberley range.

Slightly to your left there is a stile – roughly made – looking like a fence which leads to a steep footpath down through woodland. There are some rotting, but still sturdy steps partway down.

Follow this path down a steep bank through the trees, then across a stream at the bottom of the dell and over a stile into the field beyond.

Walk up the grassy field beyond heading for a stile, which leads into a series of horse pastures.

On the far side of these horse pastures you follow the footpath into a thick tangle of trees known as Wordley Dingle.

The trees press in close to the path and you continue walking straight ahead heading down into the dingle.

Keep on walking straight once you reach the bottom of the dell and presently on your left there is an old concrete footbridge.

Cross the footbridge and then pick your way up the bank on the other side following an overgrown path to your right.

Near the top of the bank you come to a broken down footpath sign resting on a tree.

Here keep heading to the right passing through some thick undergrowth which obscures the path.

After a little way the path becomes a bit clearer and you follow it out of the woodland onto a field once more.

Upon entering the field the path seems less distinct, however, according to Ordnance Survey this is a bridleway.

Walk straight ahead across the field, taking a right turn at the line of the hedgerow.

Before walking straight again following the line of the hedge.

Here you are now more or less parallel with the Abberley Hills off to your left.

Soon you approach a barn on the edge of a farmyard ahead.

Follow the bridleway into the farmyard.

The bridleway ends at a gate out onto a country lane. This was secured with a when I walked the route, however, just behind you there is a gap in the fence, where a footpath forming part of the Worcestershire Way exits the farmland onto the road.

Once out on the lane turn left.

Follow the lane as it runs around to the right, in the direction of Abberley Village scattered in front of you.

Continue along the road for some distance.

Presently off to your right there is a wooden gate leading onto a field.

Head off to the road to the right into this field. Then follow the path uphill.

At the brow of the hill begin descending to the left, making for a second gate leading into another field.

Once in the field turn left and follow the path as it runs close to the fence line separating the field from woodland to your left.

After some distance the path runs into a thicket.

Amidst this thicket you cross a stile which leads down some steps and across a householder’s driveway, onto a lane beyond through a gate.

Walk down the lane for a short distance.

Soon you come to a stile leading out onto a field. Abberley Village is now clearly visible, fringed by the hills, right ahead of you.

Having crossed the stile follow the path across the field.

On the far side of the field you exit onto a lane.

Once on the lane turn right walking uphill.

The lane leads you through the centre of Abberley Village.

Upon reaching the far side of Abberley Village you pass the heavily sloping village green to your left with the church of St. Mary’s on the far side.

Just after passing the green to your left there is a footpath which runs off the road.

Turn left and follow this footpath uphill as it runs across the western most end of the Abberley range.

Keep on walking straight and presently the path reaches the edge of the newer part of Abberley situated along the A443.

The path comes out onto the side of a road.

This is where the walk ends. From here to get to where buses towards Worcester, Tenbury Wells and Cleobury Mortimer turn left and keep going until you reach the A443.

Getting Back

Abberley – at the time of writing in January 2023 – is served by a dozen buses along the A443 each day. The same services also serve the neighbouring village of Great Witley on the far side of the Abberley Hills. These services are the 758 (four times a day each way) which runs from Tenbury Wells to Worcester and the 824 (twice a day each way) from Cleobury Mortimer to Worcester Sixth Form College. Worcester is served by regular trains towards the West Midlands conurbation, as well as in the direction of Malvern, Hereford, Bristol and London. Cleobury Mortimer and Tenbury Wells both have limited local bus services serving Ludlow and Kidderminster.