Ranscombe Camp

Mount Caburn is one of the highest points on the South Downs overlooking Lewes. The Caburn is an isolated chalk peak separated from the rest of the Downs by the river Ouse on the west and Glynde Reach on the east. I like to come up here at least once a week. It was the location of an Iron Age hill fort much excavated by Augustus Pitt Rivers - indeed its said to be the most excavated place in Britain. The hill fort is surrounded by ramparts and a deep ditch cut into the chalk, the banks of which are covered in wild flowers. Between the Caburn and Lewes lies another great ditch and bank marking the edge of Ranscombe Camp, another (incomplete) Iron Age fort. Although referred to as a hill fort the Caburn itself is believed to have been a religious site and it contains over a hundred burial pits on the walk up you pass a series of burial mounds before you reach the Caburn itself which feels like the top of the world.