Meriden North Circular

Dave and Sam Asbury

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Traditionally Meriden has always been considered the centre of England, even having a 500-year-old monument; in recent years this seems to have been disproved...

This easy walk is one of two from Meriden (the other being Walk 4125). The walk starts and ends at the Queen's Head pub, Meriden, Solihull. It begins on a quiet lane and soon changes to fields and joins the Heart of England Way. The walk continues and visits two different woods via a bridleway and quiet country lanes. What appears to be a paintball arena is passed through – although I've never seen it used. Then it's back to fields, where you get the chance for excellent views of Birmingham Airport. If you have them, bring binoculars, for plane spotting and at the right time of year, birds of prey. A great morning, afternoon, after-work or summer evening walk, created and submitted April 2007.

The Queen's Head is a small, friendly pub serving food; alternatively, there is the Bull's Head or the Toby Carvery at Stonebridge Island. For the adventurous there are several Indian Balti Houses about three miles down the A45 towards Birmingham (as well as a Harvester).

In the area is the NEC and the National Motorcycle Museum (A45 towards Birmingham – M42 junction) http://www.nationalmotorcyclemuseum.co.uk/

All waymarks were taken on location with my GPS and the distance is taken from the GPS (it's not as the crow flies). Although the walk is very easy to follow I would still recommend printing the map as a reference.

If you enjoyed this walk you may want to try our other local walks:
4125 Meriden South Circular;
3920 Hampton in Arden to Bull's Head, Barston;
3622 Baddesley Clinton and Haywood Circular;
3600 Berkswell Circular Pub Walk;

and some further afield:
3804 Broadway to Snowshill;
3539 Great Witcombe - Barrow Wake - Birdlip - Roman Villa.

England - Central England - Warwickshire - Countryside

Features

Ancient Monument, Birds, Flowers, Good for Kids, Great Views, Mostly Flat, Pub, Public Transport, Restaurant, Toilets, Wildlife, Woodland

5/12/2013 - Ruth Barlow

This walk has the most fabulous bluebell wood I've ever seen - solid blue as far as you can see. It's a private wood so you can only look, but on its own it was worth turning out for on a wet and gloomy May day. The rest of the walk is pleasant too - a couple of woods, some roadside walking and of course plenty of fields (but not too soggy). Take care at point 8 not to turn left too early - though we found an alternative route along a permissive footpath going up to the farm on the other side of the field from the wood.

4/11/2011 - Jan Holtham

My favourite walk to date with lots of different features. The walks through the various woods were lovely and had we done it in a couple of weeks the bluebells would have been fully out. Glorious.

4/5/2008 - Dave Miller

My first Walkingworld walk and very enjoyable it was too. Excellent instructions and an easy route to follow. There are a couple of changes though, that need to be made to the route description. In section 8, I couldn't see a tree with the "8" painted on it. I suspect that it has now gone. The correct path is obvious though. In section 11, there is a stile by the oak tree but the other two stiles mentioned have been replaced by new metal "kissing gates". In section 12, reference is made to crossing the road just after the Meriden sign towards two stiles. The stile on the right, which is the one to take for the walk, has also been replaced by a new metal "kissing gate".