Dorset walk: Sturminster Newton and Hinton St Mary

On this town and country walk, beginning in Sturminster Newton, we will explore the woods of Twinwood Coppice, walk the Stour Valley’s riverside fields, and visit Cutt Mill which was devastated by fire over 20 years ago. The old, cobbled footbridge from Bagber, where Dorset dialect poet William Barnes was born in 1801, and ruined Cutt Mill are reflected in the placid Stour approaching the foaming weir. From there we stroll along quite lanes through pretty Hinton St Mary village.

River Stour railway arches viewed from Colber Bridge. (Image: Edward Griffiths) The Walk

1. From the car park, leave through the top-right corner opening. Noticing The Exchange and expansive residential development on your right, cross into Station Road. Past left, Poets Corner Café, walk up to the B3092 and turn left into Market Cross. Instantly, crossing to the right pavement and continue through Market Place where the old cattle market was held before it expanded to the huge site alongside the railway where The Exchange and many new homes now stand. Continue along the narrowing street. Past right Goughs Close, left market cross and the thatched Museum, take right Ricketts Lane. Arriving at the recreation ground, follow the path against the right hedge to the three-way signpost. Turn right, signed ‘Colber Bridge ½, Hinton St Mary 1½’.

‘Riverside Villa’ (Image: Edward Griffiths) 2. On the right, the second of the semi-detached houses, called ‘Riverside Villa’, is the house that Thomas Hardy and his first wife, Emma, rented from Robert Young (the Dorset dialect poet) from July 1876 to March 1878. During that time, Hardy wrote The Return of the Native at Riverside Villas and later recalled those 18 months as ‘our happiest time’. As you start descending the woodland path, heading north, the large white house above-right is ‘The Hive’, Young’s own house. Born in Sturminster in 1811, Young died here in 1908. With the Stour below left and passing a right fork, the path reduces across an open area. Reaching a staggered paths’ crossing with a broken signpost, left-right is arrowed Stour Valley Way (SVW). This is your route but, first, go left to visit Colmer Bridge over the Stour. Returning to the staggered paths’ crossing, continue north, arrowed SVW, through scattered trees to the sections of brick-built railway arches. Through the right arch, keep straight on and follow the boardwalk to the SVW kissing-gate.

3. Through into the sloping field, follow the long green path up towards the garden hedges, past the right footpath-gate, and down along the hedges again. Through the facing fence-gate, don’t fork left for SVW but keep straight on for White Hart Link (WHL) and footpath to Twinwood Coppice. Through the footpath kissing-gate and over the footbridge, walk through the wood to the WHL and footpath-arrow-post. Do not cross the field as directed by the arrows. Instead, turn right along the green track up along the wood’s edge and becoming farm track when the wood ends, then hedge-enclosed track to Wood Lane. Turn left and pass the right gated entrance. After the timber cottage, take the right ‘Cutt Mill ¾’ bridleway-signed gate. Through, follow the green track, hedge right, paddock left, to the facing paddock fence. Turn left down the grass track along the paddock fence. Pass a bridleway-post over to your left. Then, at the bottom with a fenced ‘gallop’ facing you, go right up along the paddock fence.

4. Reaching a bridleway-arrowed angled crossing, cross into the wide sloping field and keep straight on along the green track to the facing wood. Follow the wood’s edge up right, passing a left fork, to a right bend with left trees. Up the footpath, turn left at the Bridleway and Hardy Way arrow-post into the wood’s path. Past another Hardy Way post, continue to Cutt Mill Lane, bridleway-signed back ‘Wood Lane ¾’. Turn left down the lane, past the left SVW path and the thatched cottage. Go over the bridleway-signed ‘Bagber 1’ bridge with Cutt Mill right. Then return up the lane, past the right SVW and ‘Wood Lane ¾’ paths. Pass left farm-gates with fine views over Stour Valley and Stalbridge. After a footpath-signpost at left woods and around a right bend, continue along Marriage Lane to the B3092. Turn right along the white-lined path.

St Peter's Church and the tithe barn at Hinton St Mary. (Image: Edward Griffiths) 5. Just before the right garage, cross into the first-left lane, with elevated houses right. In 200 yards, take first right Castleman Lane. Pass a right footpath-gate on the left bend and, around a right bend with stone cottages left, pass another right footpath, overgrown. Continue to the T-junction with the Manor House’s high wall opposite. Turn right to White Horse Inn, then left onto the raised stone pavement to St Peter’s Church. The tower is late-15th century, but the rest was rebuilt in 1846. Follow the lane past the buttressed tithe barn to the open area in front of the Manor House’s stone-pillared wrought-iron gates with flanking storks/herons. Walk straight on into the long beech avenue with Sturminster and Hinton Cricket Club grounds right and long views through the trees on both sides.

Hinton St Mary Manor House. (Image: Edward Griffiths) 6. Follow the drive to the stone-pillared gateway and the B3092. Turn left and begin the gently descending stroll, soon with superb views left towards Cranborne Chase and right over the Stour Valley. After the left High School, Council’s buildings and old church, continue until the pavement ends, then cross to the right side and keep straight on. Past the fire station, cross back to the left side on the T-junction’s pedestrian crossing and cross Old Market Hill to Railway Gardens corner gateway. Pass the section of Somerset and Dorset Railway line which, although originally in a 30ft deep cutting at this point, is perfectly aligned with the railway’s route from Sturminster Newton Station to the railway arches you met earlier. Walk straight through and back to the car park where you started.