Stunning hunting

A day with the Radnor and West Herefordshire lives up to. all expectations with spectacular views and-great-sport

- BEANIE STURGIS

Kington, Herefords

"SO if you feel a little glum, To Hergest Ridge you should come.

In summer, winter, rain or sun, It's good to be on horseback." Mike Oldfield certainly had the right idea when he released his song On Horseback in 1975. It was written after his successful debut album Tubular Bells and alludes to the joy he got from being in this spectacular part of the country, where he still lives, astride a horse. He properly hit the nail on the head. The views and vastness of the landscape laid out before us were truly spectacular.

From the top of the ridge, you can look out a full 360 degrees and all the immediate views were of the Radnor and West Herefordshire country. Looking to the further horizons, it is possible to see six counties, with the Black Mountains at one limit and the Malvern Hills at the other.

Changing perspective and peering down into the valleys, one saw a wonderful patchwork of tidy grass fields and farmsteads, which then veer up to form a sharp line from verdant green to the orange, almost tan, line of bracken.

Each hill appears to be individually iced like massive birthday cakes. Among the citrus icing are the forbidding black, dense patches of gorse.

A bit like going motorway hunting, it would be impossible to pass through this area and not look up to the hills and just know a good day's sport could be had. Open tops, sheltered little gutters, thick gorse banks, no roads and only a few hardy, usually local, walkers.

A LOVELY MEET

THE Banks family gave a lovely meet at their beautiful Hergest Croft Gardens just outside the market town of Kington, which lies 20 miles north-west of Hereford on the River Arrow.