Walking the Thames Down Link - Overnight Summer Solstice Trek
Start: Box Hill & Westhumble Train Station, Westhumble Sreet, Westhumble, Dorking RH5 6BT
Finish: Kingston Bridge, Kingston upon Thames, KT1 1QN
Distance: 26.3 km (16.3 miles)
Elevation change: +202m /- 241m. Net -39m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): Mole Gap Trail, Ranmore SCC Circular, North Downs Way, Box Hill Hike, Chessington Countryside Walk, Hogsmill Valley Walk. London Loop, Thames Path
Other routes touched (cycle): NCN 22, 4
Pubs / Cafes on route: The Stepping Stones pub in Westhumble, William Bourne pub in Chessington, several in Berrylands and Kingston centres
Map: OS Explorer Map (146) Dorking, Box Hill and Reigate and OS Explorer Map (161) London South, Westminster, Greenwich, Croydon, Esher & Twickenham
Links: Thames Down Link, Westhumble, Box Hill and Westhumble Station, River Mole, Epsom Common, Horton Country Park, Bonesgate Stream, Epsom and Ewell, Hogsmill River, Berrylands, Kingston-upon-Thames
For the last 5 years, a dawn-to-dusk Winter Solstice walk has become a feature of my hiking calendar. It was half-way through our 2020 winter walk where the idea for a dusk-to-dawn Summer Solstice was formed. The idea was simple; find a point-to-point route that we can start at sunset and arrive at the end-point at sunrise.
In the planning stage the obvious route was the Avebury to Stonehenge route described in Andy Bull's Pilgrim Pathways book. At 27 miles it was too far for my walking friends. On hunting for a shorter walk I landed on the Thames Down Link. This is a 16 mile path connecting the North Downs Way at Westhumble to the Thames Path at Kingston-upon-Thames. I'd crossed a part of it recently on the Chessington Countryside walk and was keen to return.
So, on the closest Saturday night to the Summer Solstice, Brian and I arrived at Box Hill and Westhumble station and headed north. The first section was simple: a 50 metre walk to the Stepping Stones pub where we had a table booked at 20:00 for a pre-hike dinner. It was still light when we left the pub but fading fast and the 21:22 sunset arrived as we climbed up to Mickleham Downs.
The weather forecast for the evening looked grim, a continuation of a lot of rain through the previous week. We prepared for the worst but it turned out to be a dry evening where we were. My wife called at 22:30 to check we weren't already lost and soaked. It was chucking it down where she was but perfectly dry on the trail. The sky was clear but a lot of the trail was in narrow wooded paths so we were glad of the several torches that we took along.
The route follows mostly countryside paths with only a few busy roads to cross. If we had gone in the daytime I'm sure the photos would have been impressive, but we mostly only saw dark trees. Nonetheless, it was a quiet, safe route with fairly easy navigation, making it a good choice for a night hike.
The consequence of walking at night is a lack of open cafes and pubs to stop for a rest. We had taken enough food and water, but it did mean that we made a lot faster progress than a day-time trip where we would have stopped for longer. We arrived at the Thames at Kingston at 03:00, a full 1 hour and 44 minutes before sunrise. I had hoped to have taken a sunrise photo from the Thames bridge but neither of us were up for hanging around long enough for sunrise. Instead, we drove back to Westhumble to pick up my car and returned to our respective homes ready to see sunrise from the garden.
As a first Summer Solstice, it was everything we hoped for and it's likely that this will also be an annual event. Our main learning is that we'll need a longer one next time if we're going to arrive at sunrise. Stonehenge 2022?
