North Downs

The North Downs are a range of hills in the southeast of England, which belong to the southern English chalk formation. It separates the more rural regions of southern England from the urbanised conurbation of Greater London.

It stretches for 160 km from Hampshire through Surrey and Kent. In Surrey, part of the North Downs is also known as the Hog's Back. The hills are bisected by the rivers Wey, Mole, Darent, Medway, and Stour. The Mole crosses the North Downs between Dorking and Leatherhead in what is known as Mole Gap, which is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) of European significance.

The North Downs form the northern part of a Weald, the southern part of which is the South Downs, which are the mirror image of the North Downs. The highest elevation of Surrey is the 294 m high Leith Hill south of Dorking in Surrey, which is not part of the North Downs. In Kent, the North Downs reach a height of 252 m with Westerham Hill.

On or near the North Downs are the towns and villages of Basingstoke in Hampshire; Farnham, Guildford, Dorking, Reigate and Redhill in Surrey; and Sevenoaks, Maidstone, Ashford and Dover in Kent. At the point where the North Downs meet the English Channel, they form the famous white chalk cliffs of Dover.

As the chalk bedrock of the North Downs is very porous and therefore holds little water, a predominantly treeless landscape has developed. On the south side of the North Downs there are often steep slopes intersected by wooded anticlinal valleys. These are dry valleys typical of the landscape and contain small settlements and winding roads.

Within the North Downs, two areas are designated as Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). These are the Surrey Hills and the Kent Downs.

A tourist attraction is the North Downs Way, a long-distance footpath along steep slopes, which in many places follows a historic pilgrimage route called Pilgrims' Way.

The predominant landscape type on the North Downs is called downland. It is characterised by a particularly high proportion of grassland, formerly used for grazing sheep. In reference to the names of similarly shaped and used landscapes, one breed of sheep each is called South Down and Hampshire Down. These designations prevailed, although both breeds of sheep once grazed on the North Downs. For a long time, grazing sheep kept the grass short on the North Downs. However, as the number of grazing sheep has significantly reduced in recent decades and, in addition, a myxomatosis outbreak in 1953 decimated the rabbit population, there has been an increasing scrub encroachment on the landscape. The recovery of the rabbit population that has begun in recent years has not been able to have much influence on this development, as the scrubland has already expanded over too wide an area.