Purwell Ninesprings – Update

Andy    July 26, 2019

It’s seems the stifling heat, and the imminent storm of Thursday night was too much for some of our members, however those who attended our Summer Event to Ninesprings were treated to a brilliant little nature reserve right on our door step.

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Sunset at Ninesprings

Having met at the far end of Purwell Lane, we had 3 options for which way to go;

  • Follow the Greenway towards Willian and the arboretum
  • Follow the paths and bridleways around Wymondly woods
  • Follow the track towards the Hitchin Road and visit the Ninesprings Nature Reserve

Parking
It’s worth noting there is a small parking area immediately at the beginning of the track, however there’s plenty of street parking nearby.

Map
Martin says… “Follow the red line!”

Approximately 200M down the track towards the Hitchin Road there’s a gate on the right hand side which leads into the Ninesprings boardwalk, where you can see across the reeds, into the small pond and across the meadows. After the boardwalk we followed the track for probably only 10M before running into the next section (shown on the site map as the red dotted line).

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Map of Purwell Ninesprings showing

This led us through the meadow area with some great views over the top of the grasses and then onto a wooded walk, where we saw evidence of the Woodpeckers described in the site map, various creepy crawlies and some stunning black and yellow caterpillars!

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Cinnabar Moth Caterpillar

A word of warning though… Wear long trousers! On our visit I discovered approximately 14 types of stinging nettles; those that get your ankles, those that get your knees, those that get your calves when you walk into them backwards, those which are thorns, those that get your elbows, those that ….etc.

Needless to say after our walk we adjourned to the Millstream on the Cambridge Road for a pleasant drink. By the way the food at the Mill stream is excellent, so it’s a great place to get some lunch or an evening meal. They also carry a good range of guest beers, and as Marcus will attest some very good whiskeys!

The Greenway and more…
If you’re looking for more information on this area, check out the map to the Greenway which can be downloaded from here https://www.greenway.org.uk/sites/default/files/Greenways_Leaflet_WEB.pdf. Our starting point for our visit to Ninesprings is marked as point (56).

Please find some of our photos from the evening;