I’ve just given up on using a road which provides a roller coaster of an uncomfortable car journey along what may be the lumpiest road in the Forest. This is the unclassified road that connects Littledean to the A48 at Newnham. This will take you from Newnham through Littledean to join the A4151 to the central Forest plateau and Cinderford, for some rugby or to visit the wonderful new medical facilities. It will take you on a scenic journey with where you can stop for grand views back across the lower Severn valley, over to the Cotswolds, dominated by the mighty Severn, with the spectacular Arlington loop and the Javelin Park recycling building and Gloucester Cathedral standing out on the far side of the river.

I have given up on this road, quite possibly the most uncomfortable road in the Forest, which I had used to visit Cinderford’s sparklingly new NHS facilities, with its hospital and grand surgery replacing a couple of tired old hospitals and some rather run down village surgeries.

There’s unmarked collapsed tarmac, with impossible-to-avoid sudden drops into hidden crevices, fissures and cracks on this broken highway from Littledean to Newnham. You must concentrate on these monstrous obstacles to ensure a safe if not enjoyable and comfortable journey along the hilly road.

You have to avoid these deep potholes, which is often not possible. You have to choose the least vehicle wrecking pathway through a suspension-ruining, deeply uncomfortable expedition through the broken surfaces of this sadly neglected part of the local road system. But don’t worry, the road signs cheerfully advise that you can drive at 60mph there to get through this broken highway. Motorists are astonishingly courteous as they try to avoid each other safely.

My advice would be that, unless your destination is somewhere on the Littledean Road, perhaps the Grange, Pleasant Stile or

Blaize Bailey, don’t take this unclassified road. Blaize Bailey, along a short Forest walk has one of the great views of the River Severn. At least it was one of the best, until trees were planted to obscure some of the scenery below. And watch out for the horses.

You can travel from the A48 to Cinderford on the A4151, turn at Elton Corner, past The Greyhound, the sadly closed pub with dinosaur in the garden, which my wife and I used to visit on our way home from our working life in Gloucester and Cheltenham, and then past the curious and macabre Crime in Time exhibition at Littledean Jail, which I intend to visit some time.

No horses or potholes there, and you can pass motorists going in the opposite direction without resorting to lengthy negotiations.