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Ramblings

Ghosts of the Farm with Nicola Chester

Ramblings

BBC

Nature, Places & Travel, Society & Culture, Science

4.5768 Ratings

🗓️ 29 January 2026

⏱️ 24 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Clare joins writer Nicola Chester for a circular walk from her home in the village of Inkpen in West Berkshire. Despite recently breaking her leg in an unfortunate tangle of dog zoomies, Nicola is back on her feet and eager to share the landscapes that have shaped both her life and her books. Their route takes them through Manor Farm, the setting for her latest work, and up towards Inkpen Beacon, a hill familiar to Clare from childhood climbs.

As they walk, Nicola reflects on her lifelong desire to farm, the barriers faced by women in agriculture, and the remarkable story of Miss Julia White, a pioneering farmer whose life she explores in her new book Ghosts of the Farm: Two Women’s Journeys Through Time, Land and Community.

Presenter: Clare Balding Producer: Karen Gregor

Transcript

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0:00.0

BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.

0:07.2

Savings, credit cards, car finance, reclaiming, insurance, investing, power of attorney, decision,

0:12.2

indecision, analysis, paralysis.

0:15.4

Don't panic.

0:16.4

The Martin Lewis podcast is twice weekly, helping you navigate our complex consumer world.

0:21.2

I'll walk you through a big money saving topic step by step.

0:24.5

Then in question time, you set the agenda and ask whatever's on your mind.

0:28.6

Would you rather be locked in an empty shopping centre with a thousand snakes or just one gorilla?

0:33.6

Within reason.

0:34.2

The Martin Lewis podcast, listen on BBC Sounds. I can hear the rushing the stream.

0:41.5

Yes. What is it? So it's a little brook, which is called the Ingle. So this is known as sheepwash.

0:48.9

It's not quite a winter warm, but it does dry up, you know, in the summer. Oh, it gives off a lot of noise for its size.

0:55.4

It's actually tiny, tiny little rivulet coming under a tree trunk that is leaning right across at a precarious angle.

1:04.0

And the river is rushing down from left to right in creating a foamy pool.

1:08.6

We're walking down a country lane in West Berkshire on the outskirts of a

1:14.7

village called Inkpen, which is not far away from where I grew up. It's about probably eight,

1:20.9

nine miles from Kingsclair. And Nicola Chester is alongside me. We're walking steadily, Nicola,

1:26.6

because you're carrying an injury. I am. So I broke my

1:31.1

leg at the very beginning of November. It was a case of the Zumi's. Not my Zumi's, but my young dog,

1:38.4

Mum's lovely big black Labrador, who's only a year old, met a whip hit in the woods,

1:43.1

and the Zumies happened. I remember turning to Mum whip hit in the woods, and the zoomies happened.

1:45.2

I remember turning to mum to say, watch out, and the next thing I was in the air, so I broke my leg just above the ankle.

...

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