Fantastic Walking Festival

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The Bedfordshire Festival of Autumn Walks 2024 ran from 7 to 15 September this year. The festival was a huge success with 55 walks attracting 850 walkers over the 9 days. The festival is hosted by the 4 Ramblers groups that make up Bedfordshire.

This year we reached out to other groups inviting them to come and run walks as part of the festival. We had support from our neighbouring Ramblers Groups – Wellingborough Ramblers, Hunts Ramblers and Stag Walkers, in addition we garnered support from local affiliated groups Bedford Rambling Club and Toddington Ramblers plus general walking groups The Northampton Shamblers and U3A. We should also mention the fantastic well being walks who contributed a number of shorter walks. We saw the return of the Greensand Ridge Challenge, covering 40 miles in two days. So we were able to offer walks from 1 mile to 21 miles across the 9 days! Something for everyone.

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The festival covered Friday 13th so we were delighted to host a Ghost, Murders and Mysteries walk. There was also a Bat walk in the evening with bat detectors. There were short town walks looking at industrial parts of Leighton Buzzard and the various industries associated with Luton. One of the benefits of town walking is that it allows accessibility for less mobile members of the public.

Fancy a nosey around a cemetery to see the history that is locked up in the gravestones? The two walks around the Victorian Cemetery in Bedford certainly sparked people’s interest.

St Mary's ClophillSt Mary's Clophill
St Mary's Clophill

Our dedicated webpage also attracted groups who contacted us to advertise their walks via this medium and Turvey, a north Bedfordshire Village, saw huge interest generated in their historical weekend. Then there were nature walks too – it’s the bird migration season.

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What about a walk and sail? We are privileged in Bedford to have the John Bunyan boat which enables us to offer a walk along the Great Ouse and sail back, it offers flexibility allowing people to choose how much of the walk they wish to do so opening up the experience to many more people.

Having lots of walks is no use without walkers so here is a big shout out to those who worked tirelessly behind the scenes ensuring that our dedicated web page had all the walks’ information available and the massive push we had through the Bedfordshire Festival of Autumn Walks Facebook page and other group and local Facebook pages to spread our message far and wide. Finally let’s not forget the foot soldiers who flooded the county with flyers and posters too. Thank you all for your hard work in ensuring our message went far and wide.

Bedfordshire Ramblers would like to extend our grateful thanks to all the leaders of the walks and to all those who attended one or more of the activities and also to all those behind the scenes – making 2024 such a success. See you all next year!

Sandra Kelsey – North Beds Ramblers on behalf of Bedfordshire Ramblers

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