Begin your journey along the Historic Ridgeway

DATE WRITTEN: 26/03/2026
READING TIME: 2 minutes
AUTHORS: Hannah Kennedy (Illustration Manager)

With longer days and spring colouring the landscape, Easter is the perfect time to step outside and explore one of Britain’s oldest routes.

The Ridgeway National Trail winds across the high chalk downs of southern England – a path travelled for thousands of years. Now, a new interactive story-map lets you discover its remarkable landmarks, trace the footsteps of the past, and plan your own archaeological adventure across the North Wessex Downs.

Landscape shot of earth terraces on the side of hill AKA Lynchets, at Uffington with scenic woodlands under a partly cloudy sky with patches of sunlight, distant treeline visible. — Lynchets, Uffington ©Hedley Thorne

Bringing the past to life

Aerial view map of The Ridgeway National Trail with the Atomic Energy Research Establishment (AERE) in 1954 featuring visible runways and a green overlay showing the trail's path with landmark locations like Uffington Castle, Wantage, and RAF Harwell. — Part of the interpretation panel for RAF Harwell

A team of our Heritage Consultants and Geomaticians have worked with the Historic Ridgeway Project to design the interactive map, detailing how people lived, worked, and travelled along the ancient routeway.

Alongside the map, interpretation panels are being installed at featured sites along the Ridgeway, starting with Streatley Warren, where visitors can explore ancient field systems and the wildlife-rich chalk grasslands that protect them. Further panels will appear across the North Wessex Downs, offering new insights and experiences at every step of the trail.

Explore the stories of the Ridgeway

Often called Britain’s oldest road, the Ridgeway has carried people, livestock, and goods for more than 5,000 years. Along its route, the past is writ large in the landscape, as travellers pass:

Aerial view of an ancient stone monument, framed by lush green trees, featuring a long mound of grass leading to a stone entrance. The chamber is flanked by large upright stones. Surrounding the chamber is a grassy area surrounded by a path and lush vegetation with dense, green foliage and dappled sunlight, creating a bright and inviting atmosphere. — Waylands Smithy ©Hedley Thorne

- Prehistoric burial mounds

- Iron Age hillforts

- ancient field systems

- Saxon meeting places

- medieval trackways

Using the story-map, you’ll discover historical earthworks, explore the remains of hillforts, or learn of hilltops where people gathered millennia ago. Some sites even reveal more recent history – including wartime airfields – showing how ongoing generations have shaped this landscape.

Ancient landscapes preserved

The Ridgeway passes through the North Wessex Downs National Landscape, where ancient field systems survive as lynchets along the hillsides, and iconic landmarks such as the Uffington White Horse remain etched into the chalk. As you walk the route, these features allow you to envisage the land as it was, before modern maps and roads.

Aerial view of the Uffington White Horse, a large chalk hill figure of a stylized horse, on a green hillside overlooking farmland and a distant landscape under a cloudy sky. — Uffington White Horse ©Hedley Thorne

Because many areas were grazed rather than ploughed, the historic landscape has been preserved beneath grassland. Sites like Streatley Warren, now a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), demonstrate how the careful management of ancient places not only protects archaeology but also supports some of the UK’s rarest wildlife and most biodiverse habitats – a living landscape where history and nature thrive side by side.

Start your journey this Easter

Many locations are accessible via public rights of way and offer spectacular views across the downs – whether you’re planning a countryside walk, a family day out, or a new adventure, the story-map can be your guide. Discover the sites, learn about the history beneath your feet, and plan the next stage of your own journey.

Illustration of an Iron Age settlement, aerial view, depicting a circular, fortified village with thatched-roof houses, animal pens, and pathways, encircled by a wooden palisade, set in a lush green landscape with distant rolling hills and smoke rising from dwellings. — A reconstruction of Segsbury Camp ©Jennie Anderson

Spring is a particularly special time to explore: skylarks sing above the hills, wildflowers bloom in the chalk grassland, and clear ridge-top paths stretching for miles with wide horizons in every direction.

View the story map full screen here.