Ashclyst Forest

Ashclyst Forest is a natural woodland pasture with commercial conifer plantations, coppice coups and rare, wet woodland that spans 272 hectares. The forest is located around 20 minutes away from Exeter city centre and around 8 minutes away from Broadclyst. Public transport access is very limited but there is plenty of donation car parking available on site.

It is the perfect place to connect with nature and listen to some birdsong. Bluebells carpet the woodland floor in spring and deer can be spotted. Nesting birds fill the tree top canopy, with European Nightjars churring in summer evenings. Butterflies are the main wildlife attraction here - you can expect to see Orange-tip, Ringlet, Common Blue, Large Skipper, Gatekeeper, Speckled Wood, Marbled White and Freen-veined White too. As well as many, many other rarer species of butterfly.

This area can be muddy so make sure to bring suitable footwear. Our chosen walk is gently sloping, and may be suitable for some off-road pushchairs as there are no styles. 

Please note, although dogs are permitted off-lead, they must be kept under close-control due to ground nesting birds and livestock. 

Directions

This walk begins from the Forest Gate Car Park. From here there are a variety of length trails which can be taken, these are mapped on the sign in the car park. These colour coded paths differ in difficulty and length, for our walk we combined the red and purple paths to create one big loop.