Try Rutland and East Northants…

COMMONLY KNOWN FACTS about Rutland? It’s the smallest county in England and… well, that’s about it. Yet far from being an area you pass through fleetingly on the A1, this small, green county, along with neighbouring East Northants, is astonishingly walker-friendly. You’ll notice it has more than passing resemblance to Cotswolds, with its rolling hills and honey-hued buildings. That’s down to the fact they’re on the very same seam of stone, which slashes across the nation in a straight diagonal from Bath to Stamford.

Despite its diminutive size (18 miles by 17 miles at its greatest length), Rutland proudly invites outdoor lovers with its Latin motto Multum in Parvo, or ‘much in little’. Nowhere is this truer than around Rutland Water, one of Europe’s largest artificial lakes. It provides one of the country’s best places to see birdlife, including the unmissable Rutland ospreys.

The Hambleton peninsula (formerly a hill that was drowned by the creation of the reservoir) is divine, while villages like Barrowden, Exton and Empingham could easily pass as stand-ins for Bourton-on-theWater or Chipping Campden (except when it comes to visitor hordes).

Around the reservoir, and crossing the county as a whole, there are dozens of walking routes, notably the 64-mile Rutland Round.

If you fancy a bigger challenge, the Uppingham Round clocks in at 80 miles, touching down in Leicestershire, South Northamptonshire and East Northamptonshire as it goes.