Home Outdoors A Walk From Overton to Trench (via Lightwood Green)

A Walk From Overton to Trench (via Lightwood Green)

by Love Wrexham Magazine
Overton Walk

This month’s walk goes from Overton to Trench via Lightwood Green and covers about five miles (eight kilometres).

Fully Waymarked

This walk from Overton to Trench is a pleasant, easy, circular route through fields and the occasional wood. It also includes some historic parts of the Overton area. The path, like all others in Overton, is comprehensively waymarked. Follow the directional yellow arrows to find the next stile or gate.

This route is not suitable for wheelchairs, buggies and small children.

There is a good bus service to Overton. Information: 01978 266 166.

Electricity House

From the car park adjacent to Overton church, turn right (onto Church Road) and then left at the crossroads onto the main road (A539 Wrexham-Whitchurch). Immediately cross this road and go along the signposted gravel drive. Walkthrough the garden of Electricity House, keeping the house to your right. Enter the field over a low stile. Walk straight ahead across the fields over six more stiles.

Go ahead and climb the next stile where the waymarked path divides. Turn half-right. After 100 metres, cross the stile and head for the large circular concrete cattle-trough in the middle of the field. Beyond this, the path descends to a small area of woody scrub. Cross the stream, turn right along the concrete farm track and then left at the road (Musley Lane).

Follow Musley Lane to descend a dip and go over a small bridge. Take the stile on your right after walking past the small gate, also on your right. Walk along the right of the field and go over the stile adjacent to the house in the corner of the field. Cross the tarmac road and continue along the gravel drive opposite. Walk past Mayfield on your right and then turn left to pass in front of Meadowside.

Lightwood Kennels and Cattery

Continue along the bridleway. At the next junction, ignore the bridleway on your left and continue straight on. At the entrance to Lightwood Kennels and Cattery, follow the tarmac road to the left. Continue walking past the old brickworks pond on your left and, on your right, a large, white house (Station House) where Overton-on-Dee station once stood.

Cross the old railway bridge and turn right at the public footpath sign where the tarmac road bears left (at Oakleigh Cottage). Walk to the end of the lane through the right-hand gate and walk alongside the hedge on your left. Follow this hedge to Trench Farm, whose twin silos can be seen half-right on the skyline.

At the field corner, cross the stile and follow the path to the left. After 20 metres, go over the stile and continue straight on to cross the next stile by the fishpond. You have now rejoined the track of the former Ellesmere Railway, now sadly dismantled. Once over the stile, bear right around the pond to cross the next stile. Walk across the field, keeping to the hedge with the farm on your right.

Cross the stile adjacent to a water trough, go over the stile amongst the conifers and onto the house drive. At the end of the drive, turn right onto the road. After just 30 metres, go through a metal field gate on the right. Follow the path, bearing right, around the garden edge to a stile opposite former pigsties.

Old Sheep Dip

Keep the farm buildings on your right and follow the waymarkers to the farm track running away from the farm. Turn left, walk along the farm track and over the bridge. Next, turn half-right, go past the pond and across the field to traverse the gap in the hedge by the water trough. Once through the hedge, turn half-left and walk alongside the hedgerow on the left.

Walk to the corner of the field. Cross the stile and turn sharp left past the pond. Follow the hedgerow on the left to a group of five gates by an old sheep-dip. Go ahead through two more gates and bear half-right across the field.

Pass a pond, cross the stile in the corner of the wood and follow the path over a bridge and up the slope, leaving the wood through the bridle gate at the top. Walk along the hedge on your right on the stone path.

Go through two gates and leave the third field by a stile onto the road. Turn left and follow the road past Musley Farm.

MOD Bunker

Go over the stile on the left opposite the farm gates, turn half-right and continue to the next stile approximately 100 metres away. Go straight across to the next stile and bridge and then turn half-left up the slope. Bear to the left of the trees on the brow. Walk to the right of the former MOD bunker to a stile. Continue straight on towards the bungalow to reach a stile to the left of a gate.

Walk across the field towards the bungalow. Pause at, but do not cross, the stile* leading onto the A528 and admire the best view in Overton before turning right of the pond on your left to follow the hedge back to Musley Lane.

At the stile, turn left onto Musley Lane. At the end of the lane, turn right onto Salop Road. Go straight ahead at the crossroads and return to the car park.

* During World War II, the Overton branch of the Observer Corps had its headquarters by this stile, where it kept nightly vigil for enemy planes heading for Liverpool. The extensive views over the Dee towards Wrexham and Chester make it obvious why they chose this spot.

Groundwork Wrexham

Groundwork Wrexham and Flintshire produced this Overton to Trench walk with help from Ken Farrell and Gordon Emery and grant aid from Countryside Council for Wales.

Wrexham County Council updated the directions in 2006.

Please report any problems to rightsofway@wrexham.gov.uk or 0978 292 057.

FOLLOW THE COUNTRYSIDE CODE

RESPECT – PROTECT – ENJOY

Be safe – plan ahead and follow any signs. Leave gates and property as you find them. Protect plants and animals and take your litter home. Keep dogs under close control. Consider other people.

Many thanks to Wrexham County Borough Council for supplying us with this walk. Please visit wrexham.gov.uk and look for ‘self-guided walks’.

We hope you enjoyed our article about “Overton to Trench Walk (via Lightwood Green)“. For more of our features on local walks, please click here.

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