100+ Country Walks Surrounding Bristol Now Available by Public Transport

Bristol-based travel writer Steve Melia has now completed over 100 walks around Bristol, entirely by public transport.  Maps, descriptions, photographs and gpx files (to follow on a mapping app) can all be found on his website: www.greentravelwriter.co.uk/bristol. 

A few of them walk out of the city, into the countryside, returning by train or bus.  Most of them start with a rail journey from Temple Meads, followed by a country walk between two railway stations.  They vary in length from 3 miles to 18 miles and cover much of rural Somerset, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and South Wales.  All of them are linear, finishing at a different place from the start.

Steve began recording his walks and putting them on his website and on Facebook two years ago.  Last year, he set up Railwalks.co.uk – a national organisation which aims to encourage walking by rail.  Following coverage in the Guardian, it now has 3000 members.  Greentravelwriter.co.uk is one of 60 websites listed on www.railwalks.co.uk, with information about walks from and between railway stations in each region and nation of Britain.

Steve said:

“In 2009, we moved from Dartmoor National Park to Bristol City Centre and got rid of the car.  I’d always enjoyed country walking, so I started taking trains and buses into the surrounding countryside.  At that stage, I had no idea that central Bristol was such a great starting place for country walking.  There wasn’t much information about it, so I just picked up a map, looked for places where I could start and finish, and headed out.  16 years later, I am still discovering new ones.

The sheer of range of walks available by public transport has astonished me.  I’ve climbed mountains and coastlines, followed rivers, visited ancient sites and spent whole mornings or afternoons alone with just the wildlife and the scenery.  All my walks are linear.  I always feel that walking from somewhere to somewhere else is more interesting than walking in a circle.  This is the biggest advantage of public transport over driving – you don’t have to finish where you started, so you can walk through a wider range of landscapes and places on any one day.

I often meet people who tell me they’d like to go walking by public transport, but don’t really know how, or where, to go about it.  I hope these webpages will help them.”

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