About

Gunpowder Park, Waltham Abbey

Another reminder of Waltham Abbey’s ‘explosive’ past, Gunpowder Park was formerly a Royal Ordnance site concerned with munitions testing. Now given over to wildlife, features of the original landscape have been retained and the entrance and graphics evoke its former life and the area’s connection with the manufacture of gunpowder and explosives. The park has been given a Green Flag Award.

As well as open space for recreation, outdoor pursuits, arts and entertainment, the park has fields, meadow and marsh to be enjoyed by walkers and cyclists throughout the year and horse riders  on the permissive bridleway in the summer.

The dynamic landscape of the park has been shaped into four bioregions:

Cob Fields (The Shock-Wave Galleries)

The Shock Wave Galleries rise between wildflower meadows that constantly change colour throughout the seasons. Bands of native trees and shrubs dissect the meadows mimicking shock waves which fan out from the centre of the ‘explosion’ near the park centre.

Cob Meadow (Blast Mound Plateau)

The Blast Mound Plateau is a popular nesting place for skylarks and their spiralling songs fill the air in the spring and summer.

Osier Marsh (The Salix)

Osier Marsh is a mysterious wet woodland and important wildlife refuge. Boardwalks and paths guide you through a tangled jungle of birch and willow carpeted with lichens and mosses.

Cob Fields (The Energy Fields)

Follow the signs to the Cob Fields viewpoint on the Meriden Line at the top of the hill and enjoy the views. For a more rural ramble continue on the grassy field margins along the public footpath between the arable fields.