A Short Walk from Myers Farm.
Start. Myers Farm.
Route. Myers Farm - Storrs Lane - Red Bridge Lane, Silverdale Golf Course - The Row - Dogslack Well - The Row - Red Bridge Lane - Waterslack - Challan Hall - Gate Barrows - Hawes Water - Moss Lane - Red Bridge - Trowbarrow - The Trough - Storrs Lane - Myers Farm.
Notes. Wind, rain and more of the same, a warning for hill goers, walking on the high fells may be impossible. There I was on my day off sitting in the house, musing over maps kidding myself the sun might shine, “sod it” I decided to brave the elements. I keep a mental note, a short list of wet weather walks, this was the last one I was about to slide to the bottom of the mental page. Myers Farm better known as Leighton Moss Nature Reserve Visitors Centre marked my starting point. A walk through modern history and the epic scale of geological time. I wasn't out two hours but it was time better spent on foot than in doors.
To the affairs of the day. From the large car park at Myers Farm it was a short hop along Storrs Lane to it's junction with Red Bridge Lane, I turned right wandered passed Silverdale Golf Club and Railway Station to access a foot-path cutting across the close cropped greens of the golf links. This path ejected me into The Row, the narrow tarmac lane that leads through The Row. A short wander along the lane lead to a path running behind housing, this path passed Dogslack Well, I know this because a finger-post at the start of the path told me so. After passing the well a step stile allowed access to a small cops, I wandered through the wood into, you guessed it The Row.
With housing to my right and the grassland of The Park my left I strolled north, on reaching Eaves Wood car park I accessed Red Bridge Lane once more. A friendly finger-post invited me to Challan Hall, I say friendly because the cows in the field weren't, a young bullock was trying to mount everything in site, I kept near the wall, one eye on my exit point the other on the inexperienced randy bullock. Once out of harms way I crossed the railway line to be confronted by a field of horses, about twenty of them, strange they all looked exactly the same, even after studying them a while. I passed into the next field, beast free, wandered behind Challan Hall to access Gait Barrows. I keep meaning to explore this unique nature reserve but today wasn't the day. Wet slippery limestone and tree roots equals bruised ego, best wait until it's dry.
Around Hawes Water I wandered, duck board paths eased my traverse of wet ground, once in Moss Lane the tarmac surface ushered me between dry stone walls to Red Bridge and the entrance to Trowbarrow. For a 100 years an industrial corner of Silverdale, the industry has long gone but the legacy it leaves remains, reverberating through the centuries, for this is the place Tar macadam was invented, originally marketed as “Quarrite”-the new dustless paving. It makes you wonder, did they not realise the importance of the material they'd invented.
I entered the quarry via the incline plane, every so often the original wooden sleepers would break the present day surface, after a short exploration of the quarry I entered The Trough, a natural trench formed by the erosion of soft sediments. Between the limestone walls of The Trough I wandered, when the walls fell away revealing woodland and the golf course I stepped into Storrs Lane a short distance from Myres Farm. As I'd willingly used their car park it seemed only right I spend some money in the shop, the café does very good food, up the stairs I climbed.
Seen over the manicured greens of the Silverdale Golf Club, the cliffs of Trowbarrow.
En route to Dogslack Well.
Dogslack Well, mains water didn't arrive in Silverdale until 1936, the villagers depended on supplies like this one, water still flows below, although the hand pump is a recent embellishment.
Traversing fields grazed by horses, about twenty of them, they obviously dislike Buttercups.
Looking to Hawes Water and the woodland of Gait Barrows
Bleached by the sun a skeleton of a long dead tree near Challan Hall.
Striding out through the woodland of Gait Barrows.
This old mill is hidden in the woods a few yards off the path, I can't find any record of it's former use but it's not very far from a locally named feature christened clay pits, clay from these pits was used by potters in the middle ages.
Hawes Water a shy lake hidden my trees and reed beds, every so often you get views over its grey waters.
Guarded by woodland and reed beds, Hawes Waters eastern shore.
A small pool in the woods with a liberal covering of lilies.
Viewing Challan Hall from the boardwalk path along the eastern shore.
I took this because I liked the colours, my route into Trowbarrow.
The incline plane, limestone from the quarry would be loaded into carts, sent down this slope to the lime works at the bottom, it worked on a counter balance system where the loaded carts would pull the empty ones back up.
The shelter stone, is what it says, before the days of health and safety quarrymen would use this boulder as cover while blasting was underway.
Give a few Lancashire men some dynamite, a pick, hammer and chisel and over a hundred years they'll dig their way through half of Trowbarrow Hill, it's now a nature reserve and climbing mecca.
Imagine a landscape very different from today, 350 million years ago limestone sediments were laid down, layer upon layer of tiny corpses pile up on the sea bed of a sub-tropical ocean forming fossil rich Carboniferous Limestone, a massive flood washes millions of tons of soft sediments from the land, in turn they are covered, forming a kind of sandwich. Pressure over millions of years solidifies the mix. when landmasses move around the globe (plate-tectonics) collisions create unbelievable pressures forcing the land to turn on end leaving the soft sediments open to the elements, they wash away leaving this fascinating feature running across this small limestone peninsula, The Trough.
The Trough looking towards John Mabsons Gate.