Melgra one

Slow Way not verified yet. Verify Melgra here.

This is a long walk, mostly on good tracks and quiet roads, but with a few less trodden sections, plenty of stiles and a few steps. I walked it on a wintry day, cold enough for snow but not for it to settle. Overall a pretty good route.

The Grantham meeting point is outside the railway station, Leaving it, we go a short distance down Station Road then go left through the pedestrian tunnels under the railway, then turn right down Huntingtower Road and left along Harlaxton Road. We follow the main road as far as the A1 bridge (the pavement on the left/south side is better). There is a pelican crossing beyond the A1 bridge opposite the path we take to the Grantham canal (which was severed by the A1 when its Grantham bypass was built). We follow the canal as far as The Drift, where we turn left (there is a short section without a pavement but the road is quiet). Once in Harlaxton there is a pavement. Harlaxton has a shop and a pub, but it seems a little early in such a walk for this to determine route selection and had I designed it I might have been tempted to use the path from further along the canal to Denton to avoid two crossings of the main road). We cross the A607 and go straight on down High Street. The footpath past the church starts with a couple of steps and also has a stile. We cross Rectory Lane and go straight on along West End, continuing on a well marked path to the A607. The stile on the far side is overgrown, perhaps because most of the locals seem to use the hole in the hedge a few yards further right. Another well marked field path takes us into Denton (the GPX plotting is a little wayward here).

We cross Main Street, go right a short distance and take the path left that leads to Park Lane, which we follow down to Church Street and slightly left to the unnamed road leading past the Welby Arms car park to the junction of Belvoir Road and Harston Road. Harston Road has no pavement but is quiet, and once beyond the grounds of Denton Hall there is a path in the fields parallel to the road on the south side. This path ends at the Drift, and from here we walk along the road or its wide verges into Harston. We go left down Croxton Lane, taking the steeper right branch where it forks, then following it up for some distance until the road turns right and we go straight up the hill, quite steeply and over a few stiles, then along the edge of the field at the top, then follow the footpath signs into Croxton Kerrial, where we cross Church Lane and go straight on along Thorpe Lane, where the church can be seen across fields to the right. At Middle Street we go left along the pavement, then cross the A617 and turn right, turning left up the Nook opposite the pub, then almost immediately half right.

A good path takes us along field edges, and eventually over a couple of open fields to reach a wooded track where we turn right, then left down Mary Lane for some distance before using a field path to move further right to the path that follows the left edge of the old racecourse and past Racecourse Farm towards a mast, where we go straight on along the access road then across the fields and down Mere Road and Burgins Lane to the High Street in Waltham-on-the-Wolds, where we emerge by the post office/village shop.

We go straight on up Mill Lane to the old windmill, where we go left of the house and across the field to pick up a farm lane. Note that beyond Manor House Farm the footpath has been slightly diverted to stay on the field edge where the right of way line goes straight across - this straight line is now blocked by fences. We continue across more fields towards the Waltham TV mast, going through a small wood and across a little bridge to reach the byway (a little muddy in places) where we go right to a T junction, then left along Freeby Lane and right along another unmarked byway which leads to the A607.

Here we turn left and follow the quiet Woodfold Lane for some distance, past a couple of farms to find the little used footpath that goes right towards a rather odd collection of old lorry trailers where the road goes sharp left. Fortunately, Leicestershire are quite good at marking their paths, and the gates and stiles all worked, though the route does cross a large field with no cut path, then across a couple of footbridges and across another field to reach the A607. Here we have to walk on the narrow verge for a few meters before the pavement starts in Thorpe Arnold.

Beyond the church the road heads right and we go straight on. The line across the field is not obvious, and crosses an old earthwork to reach a stile. The next field is arable and has a well marked path line that leads us through a few trees and along the edge of a recreation ground back to the A607, which we follow the rest of the way to the meeting point by the market place in Melton.

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