Yare Valley Walks

Picture: Gate to Marston Marsh – Jack Gentle

Guide to the Yare Valley Walk

Take a walk in the Valley. Get a copy of the latest edition of the Guide: The Yare Valley Walk:

The third edition of this popular Guide to the riverside walk on the west fringes of the city of Norwich, from Bowthorpe Southern Park to Harford Bridge, is now available.

The first new edition for almost eight years, it has been fully updated and redesigned with new photographs, original drawings, and notes on local history and wildlife. It has 16 pages including large scale maps in a laminated cover.

Copies are £2 each: please send cheques payable to the Yare Valley Society with a stamped, self addressed envelope (16 cm X 22 cm minimum, with standard first or second class stamp affixed) to:

John Thurman, Editor
Yare Valley Publishers
20 Bluebell Road
Norwich
NR4 7LF

During the Covid19 pandemic we are making the guide available online. A limited number of paper copies are still available from the above address.

Guide Updates and Corrections

Page 10 The “Strawberry Field” is now open to the public. It will be managed as a meadow. It is adjacent to the Bluebell Road and lies between the donkey fields and the McCarthy and Stone Development Site. The path along its southern edge is shown on page 10, but another path has been created along its northern and eastern edges. There are also mown paths across the meadow.

Page 13 The “Bridge of Dreams” over the Yare in Bowthorpe Southern Park is now open. It links the walk with Colney Village and Church on the Watton Road and completes the line of an ancient track-way (now a cycle-way in residential Bowthorpe section).

Page 13 The walk is shown as reaching the second roundabout on the LHS of the map. At present the walk stops at the first roundabout.

Page 14 Halfway down the page, should read “…and the new housing of Three Score on the right…”

Map of the Yare Valley Walk

A thank you to Peter Chamberlin who has produced his interpretation of the walk using OpenStreetMap. You can find the map here.

The Norwich Fringe Health Walks

A colourful booklet describing some of the walks in the Valley is available to  download here.

Of the 15 graded walks in the booklet, no less than 4 are in the Yare Valley Green Corridor:

Walk 7: River Yare and Earlham Park

Walk 8: Earlham Millennium Green and Earlham Marsh

Walk 9: River Yare and Marston Marsh

Walk 11: River Yare and University Broad

Stay green and healthy by accessing these walks by foot or cycle from Norwich, Keswick, Cringleford, Colney, and beyond.

Norwich Local Nature Reserves

There are eight Norwich Local Nature Reserves. Five of them are in the Yare Valley, and all have public access. Going downstream the Yare Valley reserves are:

Bowthorpe Marsh (5.7ha)

Earlham Park (Violet Grove and the Heronry (7.8ha))

Eaton Common (6.2ha)

Marston Marsh (26ha)

Danby Wood (3.4ha)

(1 hectare is 10 000 square metre, or 2.47 acre.)

University of East Anglia Campus Trails

Nature Trails

There are several nature trails including a tree trail.

Maps and details are here.

Sainsbury Centre Sculpture Park and Trail

A thought-provoking trail for adults and children alike. Maps and other resources are here

Goodwood Steps in UEA Sculpture Park