Walks you can reach from Landywood by train

Cannock Chase with rugged sandstone plateaus, steep dells, forest tracks, heathland and residential areas. Cannock Chase is UK's smallest Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty established 1958 as green lung for coal mining communities; Littleton Colliery closed December 1993.

Time: 4h30 (3h walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: Golf players on course; care of cars on quieter roads.

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Remarkable survivals (Pelsall and Pelsall North Common). Greenway paths, common land, woodland and field edges. Former mining country with industrial heritage; route follows McClean Way greenway on former South Staffordshire Railway.

Time: 5h30 (4h walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: Follows a busy road for a sixth of the walk. Barbed wire fencing; complicated road sections with M6 Toll crossing.

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Canal towpath (Worcester and Birmingham Canal). Kings Norton was site of a 1642 English Civil War battle.

Waterway: nine tenths along the Worcester & Birmingham Canal.

Birmingham Back to Backs (National Trust)

Time: 4h (2h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Canal towpath, urban paths and suburban streets. Walk along the Worcester-Birmingham Canal from city centre to Cadbury's model village.

Waterway: four fifths along the Worcester & Birmingham Canal.

Birmingham Back to Backs (National Trust)

Time: 3h30 (2h walking, 1h30 lunch)

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Canal towpaths throughout — rough track, grassy banks, tarmac sections — passing under multiple road and rail and motorway bridges. Follows the Ridgacre Branch Canal, joins the Walsall Canal, and finishes at the canal basin beside the New Art Gallery in Walsall town centre.

Waterway: almost all along the Walsall Canal.

Time: 5h (3h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: One dismantled footbridge requires a small detour via lockgate or road-bridge gap.

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Mostly towpath along the Birmingham branch of the Grand Union Canal. Canal authorized in 1793 connecting Digbeth to Warwick; modernized in 1930s; freight traffic ceased by 1970s.

Waterway: four fifths along the Grand Union Canal.

Time: 5h (3h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: Some low bridges requiring ducking; steep ramp at end.

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Towpaths and river banks. Urban walk tracing Birmingham's waterpower heritage from suburbs to city center.

Time: 4h30 (3h walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: Busy roads to cross; low bridges on canal sections.

Walk details: Walk Midlands (tips, photos and local insights).

Recommended: A place of quiet delight, and in autumn, a painter's palette spilled across the woodland floor; The Chase... is a place of enchantment. A tried-and-tested off-road walk through woodland nature parks, alongside a railway and brooks, over the open heath and forest of Cannock Chase, with brief, benign urban sections. Gentle climbs; no stiles, only gates and steps and bridges. A worn verge provides safe passage near Hazelmoor Farm. Crosses Cannock Chase, noted for its deer. Uses well-used local paths not marked on OS maps (look for Stookie's Alley and other unmarked turnings). A detour via Canrug-2 reaches the visitor centre.

Woodland: a quarter under tree cover.

Time: 4h30 (3h walking, 1h30 lunch)

Lunch: A choice of refreshment, a pub chain and a large supermarket in Hednesford mid-route, plus a detour to the Chase visitor centre.

Warnings: A sign on the Chase reports cattle as summer visitors.

Walk details: Slow Ways.

Recommended: Mostly good surfaces with a mix of recorded and unrecorded but well-surfaced tracks, crossing Cannock Chase access land and plus field paths at Bednall. Stiles and some flooding where the metalled path follows the Rising Brook; all road crossings are safe though not all have pedestrian control. A road-free alternative that misses the inn at Slitting Mill; follows the Heart of England Way to Springslade Lodge; a short detour reaches the Visitor Centre.

Woodland: a fifth under tree cover.

Time: 6h30 (5h walking, 1h30 lunch)

2 lunch spots: cannock-chase — the Cannock Chase Visitor Centre, or the Springslade Lodge

Warnings: Stiles and possible cattle on the field paths at Bednall; the path alongside the Rising Brook can be flooded; a short challenging section through the access land.

Walk details: Slow Ways.

Great views over the Staffordshire country side and moorland. An easy, level towpath section along the Trent and Mersey Canal followed by undulating field paths over Staffordshire countryside, with a short climb out of Longdon to a viewpoint and a gentle crossing of farmland and a golf course. The canal is firm and easy; the field paths can be muddy in places and are poorly waymarked, with several awkward and overgrown stiles.

Time: 6h (4h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Lunch: At Armitage a pub, café and supermarket sit just off the route; Longdon has the last pub before Lichfield.

Warnings: The middle field section is poorly waymarked with several awkward or overgrown stiles, and the possibility of cattle. Some paths are little-walked and hard to locate when crops are high. Refreshments are limited in the middle, so go prepared.

Walk details: Slow Ways.

A mix of residential streets, canal towpath and quiet country lanes and with a brief section of field. Mostly flat with a few stiles and steps. Largely surfaced underfoot. Briefly follows the Forest of Mercia Way.

Time: 4h (2h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Warnings: A fifth urban. A short stretch of country lane bends with a fair amount of traffic and no pavement.

Walk details: Slow Ways.

Time: 6h (4h30 walking, 1h30 lunch)

Walk details: Slow Ways.