White Horse & the Ridgeway
Three thousand years of chalk, stone, and sky along Britain's oldest road
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A 110-metre Bronze Age chalk figure cut into the hillside around 3,000 years ago — the oldest chalk hill figure in Britain. Below it lies Dragon Hill, a flat-topped mound where legend says Saint George slew the dragon.
Take the M4 west, then the A420. The car park is at the top of the hill — the horse is a short walk from there.
A Neolithic long barrow hidden in a beech grove beside the Ridgeway, around 5,500 years old. Legend says if you leave a horse and a silver coin overnight, the invisible smith Wayland will shoe it by morning.
A mile along the Ridgeway path from the White Horse. Walk it — the track is the oldest road in Britain.
A 17th-century Dutch-style hunting lodge built by the 1st Baron Craven, allegedly for Elizabeth of Bohemia — the Winter Queen — who died before it was finished. National Trust, guided tours only.
Guided tours only, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Check availability and pre-book — tours are small.
A Bronze and Iron Age cemetery on open downland — actually more than thirty burial mounds despite the name. No fences, no signs, just the barrows and the sky.
Park on the verge by the track. No facilities, no signs — just walk among the mounds.
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