Gold Hill

Shaftesbury sits on a greensand ridge two hundred metres above the Blackmore Vale, and Gold Hill drops off the edge of it: a steep cobbled lane with a massive buttressed retaining wall on one side, built to hold up the abbey precinct, and a row of tile-roofed cottages on the other, with the vale opening at the bottom. In 1973 Ridley Scott, then directing commercials, shot a Hovis advertisement here of a boy pushing a bicycle up the hill to a Dvorak brass arrangement; it was set in the north of England, filmed in Dorset, and voted the country's favourite advertisement more than once. The town above holds the ruins of Shaftesbury Abbey, founded by Alfred the Great in 888 with his daughter as first abbess, and dissolved in 1539.

Highlights

• The cobbled descent - a steep lane with cottages on one side and a buttressed wall on the other.
• The abbey wall - the medieval precinct retaining wall holding the hill.
• The vale view - the Blackmore Vale opening below the hill.
• Shaftesbury Abbey - foundations and a museum of Alfred's 888 foundation.

When to go

April to October for the best light and the abbey garden; the hill is walkable year-round but the cobbles are treacherous in wet or icy weather. Mornings avoid the coach parties.

Good to know

The cobbles are large, uneven and genuinely slippery, and the gradient is severe both ways. The cottages are private homes on a residential lane. The visit takes half an hour, and the town beyond is small.

Nearby

Shaftesbury Abbey museum is at the top; Stourhead lies north and Cranborne Chase south.

Key facts