The New Forest: a guide to Hampshire's wild heart

The New Forest is the kind of place that sits right on the doorstep of Southampton and still manages to feel like another world. It covers 220 square miles of Hampshire, from the outskirts of the city down to the Solent coast, and it is best known for the animals that wander the roads and paths: ponies, horses, Highland cattle, donkeys, deer, pigs and sheep, all owned by the 'commoners' who have lived and worked here for generations. It was created as a royal hunting forest by William the Conqueror more than 900 years ago and was declared a National Park in 2005, and the landscape since then has remained a patchwork of ancient and ornamental woodland, open heathland, rivers, valley mires and a saltmarsh coast, home to over 20,000 different species.

If you are not sure where to start, the villages each have their own character. Lyndhurst is the capital of the forest, and Brockenhurst has been voted Britain's most beautiful place to live, with e-bike hire and the Lymington River running through it. Beaulieu gives you the National Motor Museum, Palace House and the ruins of Beaulieu Abbey, while Buckler's Hard is an 18th-century naval village with its own maritime museum and river walks. For a bit of wildlife, Bolderwood Deer Sanctuary and Lepe Country Park, with its beach and views over the Solent, are worth a look.

For a proper introduction, the New Forest Heritage Centre in the middle of Lyndhurst is a good first stop. It is run as an independent charitable trust and has been sharing the stories of the forest and its people since 1988, with a museum, visitor information centre, reference library, exhibition gallery, gift shop and café all under one roof. It sits next to the main pay-and-display car park behind the High Street, so it is easy to reach, and it stays open every day through 2026, with last admission to the museum at 4pm. If you are travelling with children, the New Forest Wildlife Park over in Ashurst is the other obvious choice, with more than 260 animals from 40 species, including giant otters, Scottish wild cats, lynx, deer and wallabies, and wolves back on site after a break since October 2024. Entry is £17.95 for adults and £13.95 for children aged 3 to 15, and it runs one-on-one keeper experiences if you want to get close to the animals.

And then there are the walks, which are really what the place is built for. There are more than 140 miles of paths and trails, with over 100 miles of signposted off-road cycling routes, so you can walk, cycle, ride or even come by boat or horse. The Tall Trees Trail takes you to some of the tallest and oldest trees in the country, and there are circular routes around Hatchet Pond, Wilverley Inclosure and Burley village if you want something you can loop back from. Kayaking and paddleboarding run along the Beaulieu River and the Solent, and there is a New Forest Water Park for a dip. If you are driving from Southampton, the easiest way in is off the M27 at Junction 1 at Cadnam and heading south, and from London, the train to Brockenhurst takes about two hours. It is a big park, so the trick is to pick one or two things and leave the rest for next time.