There’s a national trust car park that’s free for members, charges for non members are in the pictures. The car park is quite hard to spot, the entrance is just past a sign for a bus stop.
Very hilly and lots of steps, you can park at the top though if you want a more relaxed walk! There are stepping stones at the start but can be avoided as there’s a bridge.
Lots of opportunities for swimming in the river, even Stella went in near the stepping stones! Watch out for fishermen further upstream though.
None on our walk although there may be some near the cafe.
There’s a viewpoint and cafe at the top of the hill, as well as some concrete world war 2 defences on the riverside walk.
From the car park there are two paths, take the one to the right for the stepping stones and the one to the left for the bridge then follow the path up the hill. This is a steep climb that takes at least 20 minutes. There’s a viewpoint at the top as well as a cafe and national trust shop along the road to the left. We then went down the hill from the viewpoint, bearing left before walking along a quiet lane and passing under the railway. We then walked along the river (signposted as the riverside walk).
There’s lots of possible routes here including some signposted by the national trust. We kept Stella on a long line but dogs could go off lead for a lot of this walk, some fields looked like they may have farm animals in them at times though so be aware of this. It was fairly busy when we went especially at the top with quite a few people picnicking so probably best to keep greedy dogs like Stella on lead around the viewpoint!