Over the years I have had one or two horses that did not object to rides in the dark, particularly on bright moonlight nights, and we have covered miles of the forest with nobody around, a very different experience to daytime riding.
Although when I say nobody about I refer to the living, for this is a place of ghosts. Every major historical story in this sceptered isle’s long history is inscribed on the face of this place between London and the sea. Iron Age remains are here, Roman roads from the time of invasion 2,000 years ago, and the kitchens for feeding thousands of soldiers still lie here in outline, William the Conqueror rearranged land rights drastically, Henry VIII’S hunting lodge once looked down on our valley, but is now buried among the roots of a pine copse known as King’s Standing.
The Napoleonic Wars left hammer pond holes in the earth as they searched for iron to make nails to hold the navy’s oak ships together. The Second World War left flying bomb craters, an emergency landing strip, a mass grave for crashed airmen and a secret underground communication centre for broadcasting propaganda to the Germans across the Channel. The trenches of the Canadian soldiers who camped here before the D Day landings in Normandy still offer horse falls just off the main paths among the grass, gorse and heather. Ghosts must surely call this forest home.
There is a definite excitement to leaving the stable yard in the dusk before moonrise and heading down the valley to the river bottom as the blue gloaming falls. All birdsong has ended but there are things in the air, bats that whizz past and owls starting their evening patrols. It is dark beneath the tree cover and every instinct is on high alert, both mine and the horse’s too. I can feel it in the way he moves, there is none of the slopping along one gets in the light. Now the horse is alert, collected, ready to run if need be. I keep him on a short rein as we jig-jog down the hill.
The river is a dim ripple of sound as we cross the two bridges. I look left into the woods to see if there are any young territorial soldiers from the army camp coming this way for night manoeuvres, but see none and head up the far side of the valley. I wonder if there are any anglers out night fishing on the lake to my right but the fringe of woodland between the lake and me prevents me seeing. It would be a good night for fishing I imagine, soft and warm.
In a hundred yards we clip clop past the lit windows of the Rotberg home and later the smallholding of Maurice and Julie. Their two bullocks are stabled for the night.
The vast fields of Kings Standing Farm are empty and still but for one or two pale horse shapes on the far slope. My horse notes them too.
There is a dim finger of light still on the western horizon as we reach the road and cross over quickly through Wood Reeves car park to the top of the forest. As always, when riding at night, my thoughts return to my dapple grey Irish Draught horse, Chancer, a great night horse, whom I would hold in the middle of the road just long enough for a car’s headlights to silhouette us, a naughty instinct that I hoped would provide a thrill to the driver and passengers and maybe start a rumour of a ghost rider on Ashdown. Heaven knows what Chancer and I would have done had we ever met such a rider ourselves?
Out on the forest proper we are free of tree cover and I look east to see the full majesty of the rising moon. Just now there is no place on earth that I would rather be. We walk on slowly and carefully. Night riding is not about speed but a slow meandering, breathing in the scents and enjoying the peace and quiet.
As the moon rises higher in the sky I see that we are not quite alone, a solitary walker is headed our way and I rein the horse over to the far side of the path to give him extra passing room. The horse’s ears have a lock on him. I greet him, but there is no reply, he just keeps walking. Maybe he is in greater need of silence and privacy than the horse this evening.
We ride on, heading south and cross the B2026 and descend into the ‘Big Bowl’. I am dimly aware of bats but nothing else as the moonlight gilds the gorse and the heather this summer night. At the bottom of the valley we cross the little bridge by the Garden of Eden and for once there are no dog walkers, picnickers or kids playing in the stream. Standing there silently I can hear the plashing of the little waterfall.
The liquid sound reminds me of the hipflask I have in my inside jacket pocket and reining the horse in I take a nip of whisky and feel its warmth coursing through me. Now definitely there is a spirit abroad on the forest, a Scottish one.
It is bright enough now to venture a slow collected trot on the level grassy section between the two splashes and we move along, covering ground. At the dip down into the splash below Friend’s Clump I bring the horse back to a walk and we sink into the dappled dark beneath the tree cover, emerging into bright moonlight again on the far side. We turn left and canter softly softly up the grass ride towards the car park by Ellison’s pond. I pull the horse up at the top of the rise and note there are still a couple of cars in the parking area.
The old rumour that this is Ashdown Dogging HQ crosses my mind and I am tempted to ride right up to the cars to give anyone involved an extra thrill, but think twice about that and keep going. It is none of my business. And I think back to my own courting days when a car was the only private place you had to meet a girl in. Peace, joy and pleasure to all involved.
Now we are once more under tree cover in the wooded tunnel that brings you to the two ponds and I keep my eyes open for the cows that like this place. I realize that the horse is doing the very same thing but on this evening there are no cattle and we cross the causeway silently.
I listen to the few cars passing on the road to my right as we climb up to Camp Hill Clump. As we approach this circle of pines I hear voices and realise that a young couple are sitting on the bench by the clump. I greet them and they say a very surprised sounding hello, the horse slows thinking we are stopping to speak but I keep him going. Nights on the forest are private time, not for chatting. Instead I wave to them and go on my way downhill, being careful of the ruts.
As I ride in silence I realise how silent my inner world is too. My focus is so much in the present that all my internal chatter has stopped dead and I am just a man on a horse in a vast landscape focused on the path and the way ahead and on the horse and his mood. The inner dialogue has died away and that in itself is a great pleasure. No noises off.
As I reach our exit gate from the ‘Big Bowl, at its northern extremity, I decide on making the ride into a figure of eight and set off on a second loop even though the horse edges towards the paths that he knows would take him home. He is easily persuaded from them and I aim for the Enchanted Place, entering through the small car park just below it, next to the small quarry. At the top of this hidden car park there is a solitary car but I can see through its windows in the moonlight that it is empty.
The horse knows where we are headed and that he will get a breather there. We ride into the circle of the Enchanted Place and I dismount on the central stone which bears the bronze plague commemorating the Pooh Bear author, A.A. Milne and the book’s illustrator, E. H. Shepard. I stretch my legs, throw the stirrups up across the saddle to avoid them spooking the horse if he gets a fright here. I take one end of the reins and sit on the plaque stone and let my eyes adjust to the view before me, north and west.
A small movement on the grassy ride that circles this hill catches my eye, and I look up at the horse that I can see is also watching it. I focus hard and realise it’s a couple on a blanket making love. Probably it is their vehicle in the car park. As silently as possible I remount and we ghost our way out of there down the hill and then cross the B2026 and head into Hundred Acre Wood about a mile further on across the stream and into deep forest. Now it is much darker and we move slowly, the forest scents surround us and the soft sound of the slow sashay of the treetops in the lightest of breezes keep us company.
For once I am not concerned that I might be caught trespassing here, as it is now past 10pm and if the estate manager is in his Land rover I will see his lights well before he spots us, plenty of time for avoiding action, heading deeper into the wood. We stop at the pond and from the height at its eastern end I look down to the moonlit reflections on it. The moon is swimming down there among the tree shadows that cross its surface lattice like.
Now and then the horse stops of his own accord, sometimes I can hear movement in the woods sometimes not, but I can tell by his body language that he has heard something out there, deer, badger, fox or maybe the Sussex Puma? There is no knowing. With a gentle nudge or two from me he starts off again, his easy loping stride eating the miles.
I can hear an owl hunting the grassed rides through the wood. It is an eerie sound and I can’t help a slight prickling of my scalp. The horse senses my unease and tenses slightly. As usual I pat him and sing a line from an Afrikaans lullaby and he relaxes once more.
We ride ever deeper into the wood down towards what used to be the Half Moon Pub, now someone’s home. As we make the final loop through the wood heading for home at last the horse picks up his gait knowing his stable awaits. He and I are both thinking of home, so at first I don’t notice the smell of wood smoke but then there is no avoiding it.
Somewhere close by someone has a fire going. My first thought is that one of the hunters who cull the deer hereabouts has a friendly fire going to keep him company, but soon realise that this is the very last thing he would do. So urging the horse on quietly we approach the source of the fire. I can now see it and hear it crackling. It is some way back from the path but its light illuminates a small tent. I am amazed. There is someone camping out here or maybe this is a more permanent bivouac of a person living wild. The kind of thing one hears of in Wales where small communities have lasted for years in this way, deep in the woods. This is a path that I seldom take so it may well be that this secret camp has been here for a while.
I am unsure whether it is best to ride on or to retrace my steps to avoid going any closer and spooking the person tending the fire. But that would mean a detour and both horse and I want to get home now. We move forward cautiously and thanks to the grassy path, silently, until we’ve passed the area of the camp. I keep a lookout for anyone about who might be collecting firewood, but there is no one and all is silent but for the owl who continues its patrol.
At Church Hill car park we cross the B1288 onto our home turf. The car park stands empty and I look up at the twinkling lights of Crowborough on the ridge above us. We hit the path on the valley floor next to the river and follow it to the little stone bridge and the path up the hill to the stables. The horse is keen to have a canter up the hill and as the moonlight shows the way we do just that and soon enough I am dismounting once more. We’ve been gone for about two hours.
I settle the horse for the night with a brush down and check his hay and water. I give him a last pat and make my way home to bed. Ashdown after dark has not disappointed. There is more going on along its miles of trails than one might imagine on this bright moonlight night. I find myself smiling as I head for the cottage, happy to be the owner of a good night horse.