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Ski holidays
Severe weather
A nature ramble through reconstructed peat marshland, including a brief walk on water.
Distance 4.8 miles (7.7km)
Minimum time 2hrs 15min
Ascent/gradient 250ft (80m)
Level of difficulty Medium
Paths Mostly smooth, level paths and tracks, 2 stiles
Landscape Reed beds and water-meadows
Suggested map aqua3 OS Explorer 141 Cheddar Gorge
Start/finish ST 456437
Dog friendliness On leads in reserve, can be free on drove tracks
Parking Free car park at Decoy Pool, signposted from public road
Public toilets None on route
To bypass rough part, follow lane between Points d and fWrite a review of this walk
© The Automobile Association 2008. © Crown Copyright Licence number 100021153
1 Head into the reserve on a broad track, with Decoy Pool hiding behind reeds on the left. At the end of the lake a kissing gate leads to the STNC hide, with a broad path continuing between high reedbeds. Ignore a gate on the left ('No Visitor Access') but go through a kissing gate 60yds (55m) further on.
2 A fenced track runs through peat ground, where birches are being felled to recreate blanket bog. The track turns right; now take a kissing gate on the left for a path through trees. At its end a new track leads back through the peat. At the end turn left to reach a gate on to the next of the 'droves' or raised trackways through the peatland.
3 Turn right, passing hides and crossing a bridge over the wide North Drain; the land on each side now comprises water-meadows. The track leads to a lane.
4 If you wish to omit the field paths above (which are rough, but give a splendid view over the reserve), simply turn right, going along the road for 650yds (594m) to a junction, Point 6. Otherwise turn right as far as a right-hand bend, and continue for 175yds (160m) to where gates are on both sides of the road. Go through the left-hand one (with a red-painted marker) and cross to a gate and bridge over a ditch. Follow the left edge of the next field to its corner. Turn left through a gate and follow field edges to a small orchard. Turn right, up to the end of a tarred lane.
5 Turn left along the road to an uphill path to the left of Moor View Cottage - this becomes overgrown and quite steep - to a stile on the right. Cross the tops of five fields. In the sixth field drop slightly to pass below farm buildings (there is a helpful signpost here). A gate leads into a small orchard, with a signposted gate on to Dagg's Lane just above. Turn down the lane to the road below.
6 Directly opposite Dagg's Lane is the track, Dagg's Lane Drove. This runs between meadows then re-enters the reserve, passing between pools left by peat extraction. Look out for a path on the left signposted to a hide. This leads out excitingly on stilts above the flooded mire. Return from the hide and rejoin the drove track, which quickly leads back to the car park.
At Westhay Moor the Somerset Trust for Nature Conservation (STNC) is carefully recreating the original peat wetland from a time before drainage and peat cuttings. This involves raising the water table with polythene barriers, and importing sphagnum moss and peatland plants from Cumbria. 'True blanket bog', one of their notices reminds us, 'should wobble when walked on...' And while these rehabilitated peat diggings are very good news for waterfowl and the nightjar, for rare spiders and the bog bush cricket, they are still a long way from the original Somerset moor.
'Moor' is the same as 'mire' or 'morass'; the Saxon word first occurs in the account of King Alfred taking refuge at Muchelney. For the Saxons the moor was a place of mystery and fear. About 1,500 years ago the monster Grendel was the original 'Thing from the Swamp' in the poem of Beowulf. Open water alternated with reed beds and mud. The inhabitants moved around by boat, or by wading, or on stilts. Even if you could see out over the reeds it rarely helped as the mist would come down. And, at nightfall, the will o' the wisp misled you into the unstable mud, just in case you hadn't been swallowed up in it already.
If you did ever get out on to firm land, you were quite likely to be infected with ague or marsh fever. Even the modern name, 'malaria', reflects its supposed origin in the misty airs of the wetlands. Actually it was transmitted by mosquitoes that bred in the stagnant water. Oliver Cromwell, a fenman from East Anglia, died of malaria. It persisted in the marshes of Essex into the 20th century and may return with global warming in the 21st.
For those who knew its ways, the moor was the safest of refuges. Iron Age tribes built a village on wooden piles near Glastonbury; the Romans complained of the way the tribesmen would hide with only their heads above the water. Alfred found safety from the Danes here, as did the monks of Glastonbury.
The moor was also, in its own way, wealthy. The less wet sections grew a rich summer pasture, fertilised by the silt of the winter floods. It's no coincidence that Britain's most famous cheese comes from the edge of the Levels. The deep, moist soil also grew heavy crops of hemp. Henry VIII made the growing of this useful plant compulsory, as it supplied cordage and sailcloth for the navy. Today, under its Latin name of Cannabis sativa, it is, of course, strictly forbidden. The wetter ground yielded osiers for baskets and reed for thatch; wildfowl and fish; and goosefeather quills for penmen. Fuel was peat, or willow poles from the pollarded trees whose roots supported the ditches. And the rent for this desirable property was often paid in live eels.
One rare bird of prey, the hobby, is worth looking out for on this walk. This small falcon is about the same size as a kestrel but looks a lot smaller because of its very fast and agile flight. It sometimes chases down small birds, but mostly it hunts dragonflies.
The Bird in Hand is an old-style country inn at Westhay Bridge over the River Brue. Well-behaved dogs are welcome.
The Peat Moors Centre at Westhay has reconstructions of the Glastonbury Lake Village and of the oldest road in Britain, the Sweet Track - built in the Stone Age 6,000 years ago. It also has a newly-hacked Stone Age log boat.
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