Winchcombe and Sudeley Castle

The Winchcombe and Sudeley Castle walk is a 2-mile (3.2km) circular walk from Back Lane car park in Winchcombe along the drive through the grounds of Sudeley Castle, where Katherine Parr is buried. It is easy and stile free and takes about an hour. The White Hart Inn is on the High Street on the way back.

It is the first of the National Landscape's Cotswold Gateway walks from the town. The route page allows an hour to an hour and a half and describes unsurfaced paths that need a basic level of fitness. The walk comes back either by a surfaced path beside the River Isbourne or along Broadway Road, which keeps you on a hard surface all the way.

Vineyard Street and the Dents

The way out to Sudeley is down Vineyard Street, past the almshouses and over the bridge the Dents of Sudeley built. Along Abbey Terrace, before you turn down Vineyard Street, is Dent's Terrace: ten almshouses of 1865 designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott and J. Drayton Wyatt in cream, yellow and pink limestone, with the date and the letter D in their porch gables. Its listing calls the row a good example of the generosity of John Coucher Dent and his wife Emma, then the owners of Sudeley, and grades it II.

Vineyard Street, the leaflet says, was also known as Duck Street. Vineyard Bridge, at the bottom of the street, was built in 1891 by J. Drayton Wyatt, his last work in Winchcombe, with John Oakey, a mason who worked for Emma Dent. Its listing describes it as the way from the main street of Winchcombe to one of Sudeley's principal gatehouse entrances. It crosses the River Isbourne, which the leaflet says rises from a spring on Cleeve Common and joins the Avon, and is said to be the only river in England to flow north for its whole length.

Through the castle grounds

The walk follows the castle drive through the grounds, past the lake, without going into the castle or its gardens. From the entrance the drive passes Almsbury Lodge, which the leaflet calls unusual, and runs down an avenue of lime trees to a bridge over the lake. Beyond it are a children's play fort and the castle car park.

Sudeley Castle

Sudeley Castle, a Grade I castle of the fifteenth century, is still the home of the Dent family's descendants. It was built for Ralph Boteler, altered for Lord Chandos around 1572 and slighted on Parliament's orders in 1649. John and William Dent, glove makers from Worcester, bought it in 1837, and the leaflet says the family restored much of the castle in the Victorian period.

Katherine Parr, the sixth wife of Henry VIII, is buried in the chapel of St Mary, which holds her marble tomb. She died on 5 September 1548, a week after the birth of her daughter. The castle's own history records that the chapel was damaged by Parliamentary troops in 1643 and restored by George Gilbert Scott in the 1850s, and that Elizabeth I visited Sudeley three times. Our guide to famous Cotswold people has more on Katherine Parr, and our guide to Cotswold houses and castles puts Sudeley among the rest.

The castle and its gardens charge for entry. In 2026 they opened daily from 14 March to 1 November, from 10am, with last admission at 3pm; check the castle’s website for the 2027 season. Sudeley's own page says pet dogs are not allowed in the castle or its grounds, though they are welcome at the visitor centre and the Pavilion café, so if you are bringing a dog, check with the castle first.

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Rushley Lane and the river

The way back runs round the valley on Rushley Lane, then gives you a choice of the riverside path or Broadway Road into town. Past the gatehouse, Rushley Lane runs by Laundry Cottage, with views across the valley to Winchcombe. Watch for traffic on the lane. It meets Stancombe Lane and turns down to Broadway Road. From there, the leaflet's first option is the surfaced path beside the river, through three fields and an alley between cottages to Castle Street. The second stays on Broadway Road, which the leaflet notes for its houses in a variety of styles.

Food, parking and toilets

The places to eat are in the town, and the White Hart is on the way back to the car park. The White Hart Inn on the High Street has a restaurant and bar open to non-residents, and the Lion Inn on North Street welcomes dogs in the pub. At Sudeley, the Pavilion café is by the visitor centre.

The walk starts at Back Lane car park, where charges apply, and there are public toilets near the library by the car park. To stay longer, Sudeley Castle Cottages are holiday cottages on the estate, and our places to stay in Winchcombe has more.

Paths and gates

There are no stiles. The drive through the castle grounds is the main path, with gates at the car park and on the riverside path. Rushley Lane and the crossings of the main street need care with traffic. The leaflet grades the walk easy, and Broadway Road gives a hard-surfaced way back.

Longer walks from Winchcombe

The next step up from this walk is the walk to Belas Knap, which climbs the Cotswold Way to a Neolithic long barrow and comes home along the Old Brockhampton Road to the same entrance to Sudeley. For a full day, the loop by Belas Knap and Cleeve Common goes on to the open top of the hill. The walk from Hailes to Beckbury Camp starts at Hayles Fruit Farm, about 2 miles from the town, and the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway is about a kilometre from the route.