The Ridgeway National Trail travels for 87 miles (139km) through the North Wessex Downs and the Chilterns Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in southeast England

Section 6: Wendover to Ivinghoe Beacon

Pitstone Hill with Ivinghoe Beacon in the distance © Jos Joslin

For those interested in prehistoric sites, there are round barrows, an Iron Age fort, and sections of Grim's Ditch to seek out. 

Round Barrows

For those skilled at finding them, Bronze Age round barrows exist in several places and are marked on Ordnance Survey maps often simply as 'Tumuli', but the most obvious are the two situated to the north of the minor road as you start up the last long slope to Ivinghoe Beacon.

Grim's Ditch

On Pitstone Hill as you emerge from the woodland of Aldbury Nowers, for a while you walk on the edge of a section of Grim's Ditch. This one, unlike that west of Nuffield in section 4, is in the open surrounded by chalk grassland.

Iron Age Fort

View from Ivinghoe Beacon

Once you reach your journey's end at the top of Beacon Hill itself, fittingly The Ridgeway terminates within a final Iron Age Fort from where on fine days there are tremendous views of the Vale of Aylesbury.