Walk near Maidenhead, just over 4 miles

Saturday 3 November

Little walk with Ray on a pleasantly sunny Saturday afternoon. We only had a couple of hours as we were due for tea at his parents’ house. We parked at the ‘Butterfly Trail’ car park on Henley Road and crossed the footbridge over the A404(M) into Maidenhead Thicket.

An extension to the A404 (M) was put through one side of Maidenhead Thicket in the early 1990s - the road can be seen towards the top right of the route map below. SABRE mention the work here. The footbridge we crossed was put in at the same time (as otherwise the new dual carriageway would have cut off access to the Thicket). Digressing, the SABRE piece also mentions the former A4(M) Maidenhead bypass, part of which is now the A404(M) and part of which is now abandoned. I’d never noticed before, but the abandoned section is clearly visible on Google Maps, cut in half by the A308(M). Fascinating stuff.

Snip showing abandoned route of A4(M)

Returning to the walk. Ray was just musing on how the section we were walking through seemed much more open than formerly, when we came across a large area that had been cleared. There’s evidently a project ongoing to replace a former larch plantation with native trees (‘Native woodland regeneration at Maidenhead Thicket’).

Area of cleared ground

Thicketyness

We walked a way further through the thicket before bearing left to come out on the Bath Road. Crossed and walked down Cherry Garden Lane as far as the junction with the tiny Breadcroft Lane, which we took. This little road wends its way southeast, crossing over the M4, to come out on Cannon Lane in Woodlands Park, a southern suburb of Maidenhead. We turned left and headed north on Cannon Lane back towards Maidenhead. Just after passing under the M4 we turned right onto Altwood Road and then took the footpath just beyond the Thatched Cottage which leads behind houses through onto Sandisplatt Road. Came out onto the A4 and then turned up Newlands Drive and across the common back to the car park.

Map of our route: