Imber Range Perimeter Path (IRPP)

I had imagined I would be walking beside barbed wire,  along a featureless track,  through a nondescript landscape.  In fact this 30 mile long distance path which skirts the eastern fringes of Warminster produces some breathtaking scenery as it follows  grassy footpaths beside fields, open gravel tracks or sunken byways. Its route is well signed with the IRPP logo.

On its journey around the western section of Salisbury Plain Training Area it visits the villages of Chitterne and Tilshead, climbs the slopes of Iron Age hill forts and passes archaeological sites of communities long gone.  It also bypasses the strange empty buildings once known as the German village.

Although I passed herds of grazing cattle and flocks of wandering sheep there were few fellow walkers to share this unpopulated countryside.  The Plain is the largest area of unimproved grassland in Europe and massive skies spread over rolling hills which stretched away to distant horizons.

I set out to walk the path in sections and last week completed the last one.  Now I want to do it all again, only this time walking in the opposite direction.

For no particular reason I had chosen to walk clockwise beginning at the section above Bratton on the Plain's northern boundary.  I had walked in all weathers and all seasons taking short sections on seven different occasions.  I had seen buzzards soaring, heard larks singing and last week watched wheatears bobbing on fence posts and swallows diving low over the grass. 

Besides birdsong there was often gunfire and sometimes kestrels hovered  below helicopters.  Military restrictions have allowed rare species to survive on this protected area and from roe deer to the red flags, which fly when guns are firing, its contrasting uses are always evident. 

 

The IRPP is on Warminster's doorstep.  It is worth a visit, even if to  only walk one section,  but completing the whole circuit brings a great sense of satisfaction.

For more information visit http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/63EFCE20-1035-41D6-B6C6-CBDED007B17D/0/SalisburyPlain.pdf">http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/63EFCE20-1035-41D6-B6C6-CBDED007B17D/0/SalisburyPlain.pdf

Photos show:

A view across the Plain east of Upton Scudamore

The red flag flies when guns are firing

The IRPP logo marks the route.