Brockenhurst
Brockenhurst is a
village situated in the
New Forest,
Hampshire,
England. The New Forest is a national park and Brockenhurst is therefore surrounded by woodland that attracts thousands of visitors all year around. The nearby villages surrounding Brockenhurst are
Lymington and
Lyndhurst.
Brockenhurst railway station is near the junction where a branch line to
Lymington connects to the mainline from
Weymouth and
Bournemouth to
Southampton and
London Waterloo with train services operated by
South West Trains. The
"Lymington Flyer" services connect with the ferry to
Yarmouth on the
Isle of Wight. The branch line is a
Heritage line running the last remaining slam door rolling stock, just as in 1967 it was the last standard-gauge branch line in the country to run a steam service.
The village was built mostly around the railway line, although some of the villages' cottages date back to the 17th century. The village Church, St Nicholas', is the oldest Church in the New Forest, and was recorded in the
Doomsday Book.
It is home to the New Forest and Hampshire
New Forest Show and
Brockenhurst College, and is surrounded by the New Forest, including local roving livestock.
There are two examples of old-style
fords (or "watersplash") crossing local streams, one of which has pipes installed to carry the flow of water in the winter in order to stop the main road from becoming frozen and impassable.
The village also holds one of the top 1O colleges in the UK, Brockenhurst College. In 2005 their 500 A level students achieved a record pass rate of 98%.
Brockenhurst is mentioned briefly in
Bill Bryson's book
Notes From a Small Island. In the book, Bryson decides to lie to a receptionist of a hotel near
Corfe Castle, answering (when asked if he had walked far) that he had come from Brockenhurst, a distance of 30 miles or so.
Brockenhurst is twinned with
Pont St. Martin, in
Loire-Atlantique,
France.
*Heritage line -
Lymington Flyer*
Brockenhurst College*
St Nicholas Church*
New Forest Show*
Brockenhurst railway station*
Village website*
Brockenhurst College
