The best walks and hikes around Wilcot

What a lovely point of view

Lovely point of view on white horse

Lovely white horse x

It's an 87-mile (140 km) long waterway that links the River Avon at Bristol with the River Kennet at Newbury, which in turn connects to the River Thames at Reading. This effectively created an inland navigation route between Bristol and London, avoiding the potentially treacherous sea voyage around the tip of Cornwall. * While originally built for commercial purposes during the Industrial Revolution to transport goods and materials, it later declined with the advent of railways. Today, its primary purpose is for leisure activities such as boating, canoeing, fishing, walking, and cycling. It's also vital for wildlife conservation.

One of many along the enchanting Kennet and Avon Canal

Adam’s Grave on Walker's Hill in Alton, the most dramatically located Neolithic long barrow in Wiltshire and the site of battles in 592 and 715. The area surrounding Walker's Hill is pitted and speckled with barrows and ditches of many sizes and shapes.

A wonderful sweep of chalk downland located to the north of the Pewsey Vale and in the North Wessex Downs National Landscape. The reserve covers three hills and includes Alton Barnes White Horse cut into the chalk hillside. There are great opportunities for wildlife and landscape photography with views stretching across the Vale of Pewsey to Salisbury Plain. Pewsey Downs National Nature Reserve is also part of a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), recognising the range of chalk grassland plants and the associated butterflies (28 species). While you are there, also look out for the Sarsen stones, known locally as ‘Grey Weathers’.

The horse is 166ft high and 160ft in length. The disproportionate height is to prevent foreshortening when viewed from a distance. Over the years, elements of certain features of the horse have altered, and overall the horse is probably now slightly smaller than its original size. It requires regular periodic scouring and cleaning to prevent it being reclaimed by nature. The Alton Barnes White Horse is one of eight surviving White Horses in Wiltshire, the most recent being the horse carved on Roundway Hill, north of Devizes, to celebrate the Millennium. Robert Pile, or a namesake, was also responsible for the Pewsey White Horse carved in 1785; the original carving of this horse was lost and it was replaced by a new horse in 1938. None of the Wiltshire White Horses predates the 18th century. Most of them seem either to have celebrated an event or simply to have been the whim of a local landowner. The origin of the symbol of a white horse which has become totemic of Wiltshire is obscure. Perhaps inspiration came from the prehistoric White Horse at Uffington, Oxfordshire, which dates back to around 1,000 BC and is the only ancient White Horse in the United Kingdom, but the Uffington horse is not only much larger – 360ft in length – but its fluent elongated design is quite different from the more modern Wiltshire horses.