Circular Walks Outside London – The New York Times

When is walking in circles a good thing? When following a trail through villages, forests and fields using open-access paths that begin and end at the same train station.

Britain is known for being a country of walkers, with thousands of miles of footpaths and bridle ways open to the public (Scotland, for example, has a law commonly known as the right to roam). Even just watching other people stroll has become part of popular culture in Britain with prime-time television programs featuring lone celebrities capturing the rural landscape using a high-tech selfie camera or groups of them on religious pilgrimage hikes in Portugal or Spain.

But from London, opportunities abound if you just want to get out of town for a bit.

I found that I could easily escape the noise and crowds of the city to experience the poet William Blake’s “pleasant pastures seen” without needing to own or rent a car; drive on the left side of the road; or attempt to conquer complicated roundabouts.

I did it by following the maps and text in the lightweight guidebook “The Home Counties From London by Train: Outstanding Circular Walks” (£12.99, or about $16, Milestone Publishing).

Part of a series of paperbacks produced in a partnership between Pathfinder Guides and the Ordnance Survey, the British national mapping agency, the book details 27 walks of varying intensity levels and ranging in length from two to nearly 12 miles, each beginning after a relatively short train ride from one of London’s main stations. (While much of the terrain isn’t suitable for those with physical challenges, Pathfinder recently added its first roundup of accessible trails on harder surfaces in “Lake District and Cumbria: Accessible Walks for All,” outlining 38 itineraries, 20 of which are considered circular. )

“The footpath network exists,” said Kevin Freeborn, the editor of the guidebook series, “because people needed to get from one place to another, like from a farm to a village or from a village to a town. And obviously back in the day, walking was the way to do it. So, many of the path networks are based on rights of ways that have existed for a long, long time — hundreds of years.”

Each of the guidebook’s walks can be accomplished as a day trip or a more relaxing overnight jaunt. The time needed will depend on your own speed and whether you stop at a village pub for a pint or pause for a picnic on a riverside bench.

For example, a 70-minute train ride from Liverpool Street…