Adventures around Hatfieldwith PlusBus
With one of England's most incredible stately homes right opposite the railway station, Hatfield makes a great car-free destination. You can wander through gold-ceilinged Jacobean halls and beautiful, flowering gardens. But Hatfield also has some more hidden gems: take the bus to see how flour is made in Mill Green or wander through a natural oasis on the course of a former railway. Here are just a few of the adventures you can have around Hatfield by bus. Ask for PlusBus when you buy your train ticket or at the station when you arrive and get unlimited bus travel all day across the town.
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1. Visit Mill Green Museum
In pretty Mill Green, a couple of miles from the railway station, there’s a working watermill that still produces great wholemeal flour and sells bags of it in the shop. In Mill Green Museum, there are two changing exhibition galleries with displays of art and local history. You can walk round the mill itself and see the waterwheel and all the original wooden mechanisms that have been restored and now work as well as ever. During the COVID pandemic, when flour was in short supply, the mill was working all the time to produce flour for the local community.
- How do I get to Mill Green by bus? Buses 301 or 653 both run regularly from outside Hatfield Railway station. Catch the bus to the stop called Mill Green (Museum), walk a few steps further on and follow the brown signs down Mill Green Lane and right to the museum (five mins walk).
- When you’ve had a look round, don’t miss the cafe, which is open at weekends and serves changing soups and legendary cakes. And there are lovely wholemeal scones made with the mill’s own flour. In summer, you can eat them in the riverside garden under roses and wisteria.
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2. Get Wild at the Galleria
Hatfield’s Galleria shopping complex has something for everyone. There are clothes shops and beauty salons, books, toys and places to eat. There is a cinema, some live performances at weekends, and the extensive entertainment for kids includes arcade machines and a Dino Ride.
- In the heart of the mall, Get Wild offers pre-bookable soft play with climbing, ropes, tunnels and curly slides. And it couldn’t be simpler to arrive by bus.
- How do I get to the Galleria by bus? Several buses come direct to the Galleria from the railway station, including bus 301 and bus 653. These are the same buses that pass Mill Green (see 1 above) so it’s very easy to do both activities in one day if you want.
- Look out of the bus window for some of the interesting buildings in Old Hatfield near the station and some of the newer ones later on. Get off, after about ten minutes, at the stop called Galleria. Simply walk down the leafy path nearby and through underpass. You’ve arrived!
- If you still have more energy after visiting the Galleria and Get Wild, go back under the underpass and follow the traffic-free cycleway/footpath for adventures in Hatfield’s delightful green fringes (see 3 below).
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3. Stroll the Ghost Railway to Smallford
The Alban Way, along the line of the old railway from Hatfield to St Albans, is now a wide traffic-free path for walkers and cyclists. With banks of summer cow parsley and may blossom and robins and other songbirds serenading the passers-by, this green corridor is a magical escape from the town. It’s also full of interesting relics from its former life as a railway line. Old station platforms punctuate the route and brick railway bridges arch overhead. Listen carefully and you might just hear the ghostly whistle of the old steam trains that once chugged along this line.
- Nast Hyde Halt is a disused railway station that has made the most of its status as a Ghost Station. The halt was opened in 1910, as the surrounding towns got busier, and closed again forty years later. But a few years ago local postman Mike Izzard decided to restore the station, which is now beautifully well kept, and improve the path as far as the junction known as Deadmans Crossing. Look out for bird boxes and quirky signs along the way.
- How do I get to Nast Hyde Halt by bus? The pleasantest way is to catch a bus to Galleria (see 2 above) and follow a green half-mile of paths. Don’t cross the road, but instead follow the cycle path, signed Ellenbrook, parallel with the A1(M). Soon the path forks right and continues through a tunnel under Comet Way. Keep straight through the houses to reach Nast Hyde Halt.
- The delightful mile of path beyond the old station, signed Smallford, makes a great further walk. To get back to Hatfield at the end, follow the sign right to Smallford when you reach an old brick railway bridge and keep on along the pavement of Station Road.
- Look right at the roundabout and you can see a bus stop over the road with regular buses back to Hatfield station. But first, you might like to detour a short way left to visit Smallford Farm Shop and cafe, packed with local produce.
- How do I get to Smallford Farm Shop by bus? If you want to get straight to the farm shop and cafe from Hatfield station, catch bus 301 and walk a few steps along the road or bus 653 and walk past the roundabout. Stock up with locally-grown produce and take home a feast.
- For more ideas about car-free adventures in the Hatfield area, see our Good Journey guide.
