Hidden Wiltshire

from above and below, from near and far

The Temple of Aliens

There isn’t much hidden about Cley Hill. How many people travel past it every day and gaze up at this peculiar lump of a hill. Or maybe they don’t look at it all as it’s so familiar. I must admit every time I’ve driven past it I’ve thought that I really must go up there one day. So on this walk I had the opportunity to do just that.

St Katherine’s Savernake and its Billionaire Neighbours

Once again I am indebted to Louise Powell of Circular Wiltshire Walks for this route. Usually I adapt her routes but on this occasion I have followed it turn by turn as it was exactly what I was looking for. I’ve been meaning to visit St Katherine’s church for a long time and when I was asked to photograph it as part of a bigger project, Louise’s route was the perfect way to combine this with a walk in Savernake Forest.

Hidden Salisbury - Brutalist Bridges and Wyndham Whimsies

Salisbury doesn’t exactly meet the criteria for Hidden Wiltshire, and yet there are a number of pockets around the city that few visitors are aware of. These areas can contain unexpected hidden gems and history. So in this blog, I would like to introduce you to one such location and why, at the time of writing, getting to it by foot is on the minds of local residents.

The Curse of the Inaccessible Monuments

In the space of 8 miles/13 kms this walk includes a Neolithic causewayed enclosure, a little known stone circle, a windmill mound, three Medieval churches, (a pub), and the site of an abandoned Medieval village. It was a lot to cram in during the short daylight hours available to us.

A winter’s walk around Chilmark and the Monarch’s Way

This winter's walk around the village of Chilmark and the Monarch's Way had a profound effect on me. Perhaps it was due to the history of the place, its wonderful views and the fact that the stone used in the building of Salisbury Cathedral was quarried from this place. The area is well worth a visit.

A Prehistoric Landscape under Big Skies

This is an area we’ve covered several times before at Hidden Wiltshire and you will find links to earlier blogs below. But I wanted to focus more on the natural landscape and the Ridgeway in this blog. For that reason this will be a slightly shorter blog as there were no churches or historic buildings to crawl over.

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About

Hidden Wiltshire is an ongoing project to explore the county of Wiltshire, uncovering its richness and beauty and sharing this with fellow travellers.

It is all about finding the hidden places. Some of them may be known to locals, but most are not on the normal tourist trail.

We use good old fashioned writing to share information in the form of blog posts, punctuated by photography, the occasional video and a podcast.

Outside of the website we have an active social media presence, so if that is your thing, please click on the social links on the top bar to find us.

How did it all Begin?

Hidden Wiltshire is a project first conceived of in 2016. The Autumn colours in Biss Wood were outstanding that year, and the project founder, Glyn Coy, put his drone up and discovered a wonderful multi coloured vista that wasn't visible from the ground.

He shared the image on social media and it went viral, being seen all across the world. So he had an idea to look out for more hidden gems and started this website to record them.

We are all immensely proud to live in this ancient and beautiful county. In many ways all we capture with our photographs are moments in time. The landscape itself tells the story.

Site Navigation

The menu bar at the top provides some clues about what you can find here. All the blog posts can be viewed on this page. Pages numbers are listed at the bottom.

The Map page shows the location of all the posts on a map of Wiltshire, which can help you find something in a particular spot. There is also a Walks page for those of us who like a good stroll from time to time.

A Search option is on the top right of this page.

People

A lot of time and effort goes into creating the Hidden Wiltshire content, and we all volunteer our time for free.

The project was set up by Glyn Coy, but it has evolved into a mini community of contributors. Paul Timlett and Elaine Perkins provide a lot of the site content and help with project management. Others who have provided articles include Steve Dewey, Jon Grech, Fred Palmer, and Sara French.

Glyn is currently taking a break from Hidden Wiltshire, but Paul and Elaine are still actively updating the content.

Books and Online Shop

Although Hidden Wiltshire is run by volunteers there are some running costs to keep things going. So we occasionally sell Wiltshire themed items through the online shop, such as photographs and books.

We have self published two books so far, which are hardback and contain lots of photographs of Wiltshire. They can be bought through the online shop or in the real world, from Devizes Books or Wiltshire Museum.

Disclaimer

This website encourages people to get out there and explore Wiltshire for themselves. For the avoidance of doubt, all the walks follow established rights of way or open access land and do not involve trespassing.

While out there exploring yourself please follow the countryside code. Please don't stray on to private land without permission from the landowner.