Towerhill Wood

Walking into Towerhill Wood feels like stepping back about fifty years. The trees are proper old-growth stuff - oak and beech mostly - and the canopy is thick enough that you lose the sky for stretches. It's the kind of place where the light comes down in those cathedral-window shafts and everything smells like soil and leaf mould. You won't find signage or facilities here. No café, no visitor centre, just woodland as it is.

This is walker territory. The paths are worn but not manicured, and you'll find yourself navigating by instinct as much as anything else. Families with younger kids might struggle a bit - there's no obvious loop or waymarked trail, so you need to know where you're going or be happy getting slightly lost. That said, if your children are the sort who enjoy scrambling over fallen logs and poking about in undergrowth, they'll have the time of their lives.

Allow two to three hours if you're exploring properly. The woodland isn't vast, but it rewards a slow pace. Come in spring for the bluebells or autumn when the light's golden and the ground's carpeted in leaves.

Basecamp at Trippenkennett Farm just 3.4 miles away works perfectly - it's rated highly and gives you a proper base for exploring this corner of Herefordshire. You could make a morning of Towerhill Wood, then head out to the other local parks like Doward Park for a change of scenery. It's an easy drive between them.