Mitchell's Fold

Up on the Powys moorland, about 10 miles south of Shrewsbury, stands a Bronze Age stone circle that's genuinely worth the detour if you're in the area. Mitchell's Fold consists of roughly 30 stones arranged in a near-perfect ring - not as showy as the famous sites down south, but there's something rather moving about finding it out here on the hill with barely another soul around.

The walk up takes about 20 minutes from the car park, and it's properly windswept once you get there. Historians still debate what it was for - burial rite, ritual gathering, territorial marker - and that's half the appeal. You can walk the circuit, run your hands over stones that have sat here for 4,000 years, and try to imagine what mattered enough to haul them into place.

This is one for walkers and history types rather than fidgety kids, though teenagers with an interest in archaeology might find it genuinely intriguing. Allow an hour including the walk. It's free and accessible year-round, though winter mud can make it sticky underfoot.

If you're based at Sunrise Pods or Camlad Valley Luxury Pods nearby, it's easily combined with a wider ramble across the moorland or a visit to Bishops Castle's bookshops and pubs. The landscape here is bleak and quiet - exactly the point. Not Instagram-friendly, but real.