Places to visit

The Blackmore Vale

The gentle rolling clay pastures of the Blackmore Vale, vividly depicted by Thomas Hardy, have traditionally been dairying country, hence the `patchwork quilt` fields, hedgerows and tucked-away villages. Bordered by the arc of high chalk hills which include Bulbarrow, Hambledon and Melbury Hills, this is quintessential rural England. The Vale is the fertile floodplain of the River Stour, which gives its name to many villages, some not even so close to the river: East Stour, Stour Row, Stour Provost and Milton on Stour among them.



Towards Sturminster Newton, Hinton St Mary, the original home to a Roman mosaic now residing the British Museum, offers some pretty riverside and watermeadow walks down to Cutt Mill, one of the many former working mills on the Stour. Neighbouring Marnhull, fictional home to Hardy`s Tess, is a pretty village with a selection of eateries.

Other charming villages include Fifehead Magdalen and Fifehead St Quintin, Kington Magna and the neighbouring hillfort villages of Child Okeford and Okeford Fitzpaine, each lying at the foot of a steep hill bordering the Vale.