By: Blonde Two

Although we couldn’t be together to walk on Dartmoor or anywhere else during lockdown, Blonde One and I are now getting pretty good at meeting up for local, socially distanced walks (two metres definitely isn’t enough to stop us nattering!) We’re lucky to have plenty of beautiful Devon green lanes between my town (Torquay) and her town (Newton Abbot). Some of these we already know well from DofE expeditions (we’ve given them our own names such as ‘Nettle Lane’ and ‘Chocolate River‘) but we’ve been having fun filling in the missing gaps in our local routes knowledge.

If exploring on foot is your kind of walking, green lanes might be just what you’re looking for. They’re almost always useful routes that join up towns, farms and villages, and can take you quickly away from the roads into the type of countryside you might usually associate with being in the middle of a national park. If you’re exploring green lanes you’re likely to be walking amongst and across agricultural land. This means leaving gates as you find them, keeping your dog under control and, of course, taking your rubbish home, are super important. You can read the Countryside Code here if you want to share the message with your followers.

Last week during our explorations we came across a green lane that’s obviously been particularly loved during lockdown. The neighbourhood children had been having fun setting trails for each other and getting involved with nature. It has to be said that we failed miserably at the fairy trail on the way up the lane because we were nattering too much. However on the way back down we encountered two fairies as well as some stone bees, ladybirds and an insect house.

I wonder how many children wandered up that lane for the first time during lockdown. I hope it had the same kind of magical impact that Devon green lanes have on us Blondes. If you have never walked along one, we recommend it. Deep and dappled, these secret ways are indeed the stuff of which fairy tales are made.