Bedlam Plantation

The name alone does something to you - Bedlam Plantation sounds like the sort of place where things have gone slightly feral, and that's rather the point. This is proper woodland on the edge of the Lincolnshire Wolds, a few miles south of Market Rasen, where the trees have been left to do what trees do best without too much manicuring.

It's the kind of forest walk that rewards you for getting lost in it. The paths wind through mixed woodland - oak, ash, and birch mostly - with decent undergrowth and the sort of atmospheric gloom you don't get in managed country estate forests. Walkers will find it genuinely engaging rather than just a quick circuit. You're looking at two to three hours if you explore properly, though shorter routes are possible.

The plantation works brilliantly as a break from the rolling wold landscape itself. If you're based at Into the Wild Glamping or Lindsey Trail Touring Park nearby, it's an easy detour for a morning ramble before heading towards Lincolnshire Wolds National Landscape for the bigger views. It's also the sort of place where kids either love the wildness or get bored within half an hour - depends entirely on the child.

Access appears to be free, though information online is thin on the ground. Come in autumn and the light through the canopy is genuinely worth the muddy walk. Spring's good too if you're lucky with the bluebells. Summer can feel a bit enclosed, to be honest.