JUST COMMON

Although I have driven past many times, I had not realised that, behind the woodland on the Rake road, is Chapel Common.  The woodland is just a screen from the main road and the common is 250 acres of managed open access land.  The woodland part is in fact my favourite type of walking environment.

I went there this morning with a local walking group.   Here we are emerging onto the heath.

Apart from the pleasant countryside, the reason I went is that we were guided by the ranger who pointed out all the details.

 

I would never have known for example that this is a rare valuable piece of heath, since heaths don't normally have grassland.

This is more usual - lots of heather.

And this is one of the main habitats of the rare silver studded blue.

It's too late for them now, so here's a pic from the Internet.

Then we retired to the Flying Bull, which you may remember we passed a year ago on the Sussex Border Path.

In fact the border passes (rather conveniently) right through the bar.