Dunham on the Hill¹ is a tiny farming village on the Cheshire Edge in the north west of England. The village is found on the A56 between Chester (about 7 miles) and Warrington (about 14 miles). Nearby villages include Helsby, Elton, Alvanley and Barrow.

The original name of the village, 'Dunham', meaning 'settlement on a hill', has changed over the years to become 'Dunham on the Hill', giving the village the rather peculiar name which literally means 'settlement on a hill on the hill'.

Tourists

Dunham Hill is in no way a tourist area, however it does attract visitors from nearby towns to its biggest business - the Wheatsheaf Inn. The Wheatsheaf² is a family-friendly pub with indoor and outdoor children's play areas and is frequently used for children's parties.

Dunham Hill also has a Caravan Club Site. However, this is a members-only attraction.

Facilities for Locals

There are few in the way of facilities for locals in Dunham Hill. A small Post Office (in a villager's house!) is open 9am - 1pm on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays and sells cards as well as the stamps etc usually found in a Post Office. For food and other amenities it is necessary to take a trip to another nearby village.

The village has a regular bus service³ which runs every half hour. The buses are numbers X30 and 21 (running alternately). X30s run from Warrington, through Dunham to Chester, while 21s run from Runcorn through Dunham to Chester. The buses are run by various different companies but you will usually find that you can get a return ticket to Chester for about £3. The bus services have come to an agreement to accept each other's return tickets.

Also in the village is a small Anglican church named St Luke's. There are weekly services on Sundays, alternating between morning and evening⁴. Details of which Sunday is which can be found on the notice board at the end of the drive. There is also a Sunday School for children aged 3-14 which meets every Sunday from 9.30am - 10.30am.

The other major facility for locals in Dunham Hill is the small primary school. It has about 50 children between the ages of 4 and 11 and the children are taught sometimes in two classes and sometimes in three. Older children travel by school bus to Helsby High School, about three miles away. Due to laws which allow children living three miles from secondary school free transport, some inhabitants of this small village get free travel; a fact which is resented by inhabitants just a few metres away who are forced to pay to travel on this service.

Public Events

Details of public events can be found on the village notice board outside the post office. These are usually things such as the School Fair or the Village Fête.

School Fairs happen approximately once every year, but not necessarily at the same time. The Village Fête is held annually, at some point during the month of June. Other events are either (or both) less frequent and/or more irregular than these.

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¹ Shortened to Dunham Hill or Dunham but not to be confused with another Cheshire village called Dunham Massey.
² Many pubs in the Cheshire area have this name because the Cheshire symbol is the wheatsheaf.
³ There are other services but these are very infrequent. For example on one day of the week there is a bus to Ellesmere Port (a local town).
⁴ Morning services are at 9.30, afternoons vary according to the time of year.