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Sunday 10 July 2011

All Kinds of Rangering around County Durham

shacklesboro from goldsboro

I’ve been resisting posting a post for each one of my recent rangering things, on account of the fact that you’d be bored from your panties, which is not what we want.

So here’s a round-up of rangering so far.

There’s a bit more to do and then I’ll be free to go up a proper hill.

weld

We did the Crook around the compass (South) walk. Three peeps turned up in a threatening thunderstorm that did no more than threaten. Jennie was the steward. She’s a full-time DCC ranger-type employee. We found lots of flowers – including, on a patch of industrial wasteland, a patch of “Weld”. I’ve never seen Weld before. My dad did a fair amountmof welding for blue streak rockets at Rolls Royce Barlick. No connection, obviously.

rangering1 008 rookhope beef

Then, I’d had some email correspondence with a lass by the name of “Cheviot Stroller” or “Yvonne” – about some paths around Rookhope. I have a winter walk planned for Rookhope from Westgate, so I went for a look. I found all kinds of rights-of-way naughtiness including, mainly, duff stiles and recumbant marker posts which I attempted to put up again. All very useful, though.

signal box

I have twelve walks planned for the DCC winter walks programme and each one needs at least one reccy and some need two. So I reccied one at Barnard Castle which was a bit muddy in parts, and heaving with black fly, but otherwise quite nice – including the pic of the redundant signal box on the Bishop Auckland- Tebay line wot’s not there any more.

graffiti erratic

And another reccy today up Baldersdale including the very lovely gritstone outcrop of Goldsborough. Goldsborough is supposed to have some cup and ring marks on some rocks but I couldn’t find any. I did find some 1964 graffiti and an erratic pink granite boulder amongst all the gritstone. This has come a long, long way.  Is it from the Cheviots or the Cairngorms??. Its out of place anyway.

The other point about the reccy was the reservoir-side paths. Do they go all the way from hannah’s Meadow to the car park? They don’t on the map, but they do in reality. This means that the walk works.

yellow rattle

Incidentally, the yellow rattle is running to seed and is nearly rattling. I’d give it another week, the its the end for the flowers in the meadows. Go now or it’ll al be stubble.

A lot more rangering to come (we’re full o’ busy) , then its a walk down the Pennines. And I really must climb up a proper Lake-District –type hill….

 

5 comments:

Al said...

Just a thought, and I'm no geographer or indeed geoligist? Or any good at spelling by the look of that! But could the boulder have come over from Shap? The old signal box looks great.

Mike Knipe said...

Ah yes, Shap - It could indeed be from Shap. I must check the local geology websites.

QDanT said...

Cup and Ring rock NY 958 178

"When Denmark's raven soared high,
Triumphant through Northumbrian sky,
Till, hovering near, her fatal croak
Bade Reged's Britons dread the yoke;
and the broad shadow of her wing
Blackened each cateract and spring,
Where Tees in tumult leaves his source,
Thundering o'er Caldron and High Force;
Beneath the shadow the Northmen came,
Fixed on each vale a runic name,
Reared high their altar's rugged stone,
And gave their Gods the land they won.
Then Balder, one beak garth was thine,
And one sweet brooklet's silver line;
And Woden's croft did little gain
From the stern father of the slain."
Walter Scott's "Rokeby"
good eh?
cheers Danny

Mike Knipe said...

Seems I was 500 metres away from the ring marks. I will go back...
Is that Walter Scott? he spent sometime at Barney writing a pome about the civil war.
Clever bugger....

4 Winds said...

You can't beat a spot of rangering!
We've got a couple of cup-marked stones down here on Dartmoor - one of which was used for a house number and is now set in a boundary wall. Strange things they are.

Windy