Worcestershire's share of the Cotswolds may be small, but it's enormously popular: Broadway is always thronged with visitors.

Only relatively few explore the surrounding countryside, however, and most of those use the Cotswold Way, and the paths which branch off it, heading towards Broadway Tower or the villages of Buckland, Laverton, Stanton, Stanway and Snowshill.

This walk takes you in the opposite direction, north through sheep pasture and cherry orchards to the villages of Saintbury and Willersey. Saintbury is a tiny place, beautifully sited on a slope with far-reaching views across the Vale of Evesham.

There are particularly good views from St Nicholas's church, which has an elegant spire and is famous for its Anglo-Saxon mass dial - a sort of primitive sundial.

Mass dials aren't especially rare, but the one at Saintbury is notable for being older, larger and more skilfully carved than most. You'll find it on the south wall, above a blocked Norman doorway.

Willersey is a much larger place, complete with village green, duck pond, pub, shop and beautiful houses. Successive Abbots of Evesham used to spend part of each year in the area, as they had a summer palace at Broadway and possibly one at Willersey too.

They devoted considerable funds to enlarging Willersey church in the 14th and 15th centuries, adorning it with an impressive array of battlements, pinnacles and gargoyles.

Something you'll see a lot of during this walk is "ridge-and-furrow." This is the undulating, wave-like pattern created in fields which were ploughed repeatedly by teams of oxen in the Middle Ages when people farmed strips of land within the open-field system, which peaked about 1350.

The fields were later enclosed, mostly between the 16th and 18th centuries, and used for grazing instead.

Where ridge-and-furrow still survives it's a sign that the field has been grazed continuously since it was enclosed, because modern ploughing would destroy it.

History

The presence of so much ridge-and-furrow tells us something about the history of land used around Broadway, because it is most common in areas where the trees were cleared for farming very early on; in the Iron Age, for instance.

Where woodland still predominated, medieval people tended to clear individual sites for their own use rather than join in a communal open-field system.

Broadway stands on the London road and for many years it was an important coaching town, though Fish Hill was considered so steep that a change of horses was required before it could be attempted.

Coaching inns provided accommodation, stabling and horses for hire and at its peak Broadway had about 30 inns to cater for travellers.

At the end of this walk you return to Broadway along a delightful enclosed lane called Bell Yard, which presumably was once the stableyard of a coaching inn called the Bell.

As you emerge from Bell Yard on to High Street you'll notice a milestone inscribed "shut off two horses here."

Directions

Walk up the High Street until you can turn left on Bibsworth Lane (signposted "public bridleway to Willersey and Saintbury church").

It soon goes under the bypass then climbs up a bank to a gate. Leave the bridleway at this point and join a footpath, which crosses a stile just ahead.

The well-trodden path runs through pasture and cherry orchards to arrive at a junction with another path.

Continue in the same direction, passing to the right of a pond then through a gap in the hedge so that you pass to the right of the Cotswold Conference Centre.

Go through the car park and along the access road, guided by frequent waymarkers. Proceed to Campden Lane and cross to a footpath opposite.

Turn right through a cherry orchard then across sheep pasture towards Saintbury church. As you approach the church you will see waymarkers on a fence to your left.

If you are going to visit the church you will need to come back to this point. If you're not going to the church turn left now, going downhill by the field edge.

Keep going down through the next field. Ignore a path on the right and go right to the bottom of the field, over a stile, through the next field, then left towards Willersey (the path is waymarked and very easy to follow).

Go through the churchyard and along Church Street to the main road. Turn right, then left on Collin Lane (the Childswickham Road), and soon left on Colin Close.

Use the footway on the right-hand side and after passing West Winds turn right on a footpath which leads to a field.

Follow a well-trodden path round its edge then through a patch of woodland, along the edge of another field, over a bridge into another and straight on until you can turn left towards a line of pollarded willows.

Cross a footbridge just before the willows but continue in the same direction towards a tunnel under the bypass.

On the far side, cross a field to a footbridge to find a choice of two paths - take the right-hand one which goes straight across fields, past a housing development and finally through Bell Yard to High Street.

FACTFILE

Start: High Street, Broadway GR095375.

Length: 4.5 miles/7.2km.

Maps: OS Explorer OL45, OS Landranger 150.

Terrain: gentle; mostly orchard, pasture and arable.

Stiles: 16.

Parking: choice of car parks off High Street.

Public transport: daily services by bus or train to Evesham, then by bus to Broadway; Traveline 0870 608 2608.

Refreshments: Bell Inn and village shop at Willersey, reasonable choice at Broadway.

DISCLAIMER

This walk has been carefully checked and the directions are believed to be correct at the time of publication. No responsibility is accepted by either the author or publisher for errors or omissions, or for any loss or injury, however caused.