Lower Berry Hill

Three Brooks Nature Reserve

Little Stoke · 18 miles

Spanning roughly 44 hectares, the Three Brooks reserve provides a network of blue-bell woodlands, ponds and a central lake within the suburb of Bradley Stoke, South Gloucestershire. The site takes its name from the Hortham, Patchway and Stoke Brooks that converge in the lake before continuing east beneath the M4 as Bradley Brook. Owned by South Gloucestershire Council, the reserve lies close to Little Stoke and incorporates the former woodlands of Webb’s, Savage’s and Sherbourne’s Brake, linked by grassland, hedgerows and water features. The surrounding town, largely built in the 1980s on former farmland, retained these natural fragments, many of which were historically managed for timber. Savage’s Wood survived as a nature reserve in the 1940s and ’50s under the stewardship of Howard Davis, a local farmer and co-founder of the Wildfowl Trust. Although Bradley Stoke Way later bisected the wood, a small remnant remains adjacent to a Tesco car park, and subsequent ash plantations were established as reparation. Today, the reserve supports reed buntings, skylarks, great crested newts, slowworms and a variety of moths, while the lake regularly attracts ducks, little grebes and mute swans; a 2014 Bio-Blitz recorded 617 species. Visitors can explore a well-surfaced system of footpaths and sign-posted cycle routes that circle the three woods and the community orchard. Recent upgrades, including stone-dust paths and a disabled gate behind the leisure centre, provide all-year access for walkers and mobility-scooter users, the latter requiring a Radar key. The Three Brooks Nature Conservation Group, open to the public, meets each first Saturday of the month to coordinate activities such as bat walks, coppicing and ditch-clearing, and the site also hosts a ‘green gym’ for volunteer work.

Babington Meadow

Redbrook · 3.7 miles

A place for the whole community

Ruspidge Recreational Ground

Sutton Baynham · 4.3 miles

Recreation area with playground for children and fitness equipment for adults. Also has a Multi Use Games Area (MUGA)

Monmouth Petanque Club terrain

Monmouth · 5 miles

Terrain, or playing area, for the game of petanque

Trellech Blast Furnace

Trellech · 6.8 miles

Remains of a blast furnace at which iron ore was smelted into pig iron. The furnace was blown by bellows, powered by a water-wheel fed by a stream running down the hillside.

Eagle's Nest

Lancaut · 8.7 miles

Views of River Wye, with both Severn Bridges in the distance