Ramble from Worden Park

Walk Waypoints

1. 1 From the main car park off Worden Lane, head past the large information board and flagpole through the car park exit, following the tarmac pathway until it meets the main driveway through Worden Park. At this point, turn right, and follow the driveway with a small pond on your left, at the fingerpost sign just past the pond, turn left, and continue to walk down a tarmac path. Turn left again onto a stoned path leading down into the woods. When the path meets the stream, turn right, and proceed with stream on your left. Enter the woodland area (an old metal kissing gate has been bypassed at this point). Continue on the pathway, and cross the stream over s bridge. A few yards further on, cross back over the stream in front of a stone shelter, and proceed on a meandering pathway, which follows the stream. On the other side of the wooden bridge, turn sharply right to stay on the pathway, cross back over the stream, and continue until you meet white metal gates at the rear entrance to the park.
2. 2 Exit through the gates, and proceed on a small road with houses on your right. Cross the stream on a small roadbridge, turn sharply left, and cross the stile next to the gate into a field. Keep to the right of the field, and then enter a larger field, keeping the hedgeline on your right. Look for a stile by the old tree trunk on the right, and cross into the adjacent field (care is needed when climbing over the stile). Proceed with the hedge on your left, cross the open field, and find a stile in the hedge almost opposite. Cross the stile, and continue ahead with the hedgeline on the right after a tractor access point between the fields (the hedgeline is now dotted with mature oak trees). Find the gap in the hedge opposite, and proceed ahead, with the hedgeline on your right. Aim for the farm outbuildings ahead.
3. 3 Cross the stile next to the field gate, and turn left onto the tarmac road; follow this until you reach a gate with a stile on the right, approaching the farm buildings. Cross the stile, then immediately look for a stile on the left next to a gate; cross, and keep the hedge and farm buildings on your right (a nice view across the Lancashire plain can now be obtained).
4. 4 Cross the stile at the end of the corrugated fence, then proceed away from the farm buildings, directly across the field between four mature trees and the edge of the woodland. Head for a stile opposite the open field in view, at the edge of the distant woodland (you are now crossing the middle of the field). Cross the stile, and proceed with the fence line and woods on your left, and the open field to your right. Cross a stile, and continue to follow the fence line on the left that now bends around the bottom of the field. Shawbrook stream can now be seen below on the left. Find a gap in the corner of a mature hedgeline opposite, and descend into a ditch with the stream on your left. Then proceed up the other side, and continue, keeping the woods on your left and the field on your right, for about 50m. Then find a footbridge on the left before the main road.
5. 5 Cross over the footbridge, and you are back in Worden Park. Then bear right through the pine trees, cross a small track, and follow a well-walked path uphill opposite you (ignore the gate and house on your right). Proceed across the open field, with the wall and trees to your right, into a wooded area with a pathway. Approach the entrance gate to the park, and cross the roadway onto the limestone path opposite. Continue to follow the path with the wall on right, ignoring the path that goes through the woodland. Continue into an open field, and cross back to the car park (shielded by the trees opposite).