Wanders in Wales - Even more dogs!

Last day and we are heading home - seemed a shame though not to take it gently and see what we could spot on the way. Approaching Barmouth  Cerrig Arthur appeared on the map. It looked reasonably close to the road and as all the walking gear was packed this was definitely a point in its favour. The road was narrow. Very narrow and very short of passing places. Mercifully we didn't meet anything as we wended our way up the mountain to the end of the line where there was plenty of room to park.

Hardly had we done so when a transit van appeared, followed quickly by another and a whole string of cars. Our remote deserted spot was suddenly busier than Piccadilly Circus. The mystery was soon revealed. The locals had arrived to exercise their dogs!

Very nice friendly people they guided us to our very destination and we spent some time chatting to them. Time very well spent as it happens as they mentioned a burial chamber nearby that we should visit... so we did. Back to the circle first though. Three conspicuous stones surrounded by others that may or may not be part of the circle.  In the background stands Cader Idris, claimed to be Arthur's seat.

Time to inch back down, again praying we didn't meet anything!  Lunch and then back to Dyffryn Ardudwy. This was another mind blowing location. Just off the busy main road it could have been in the middle of nowhere surrounded by mature oak trees and a thick carpet of acorns ( one or two of which just might have come home with me!)

Originally a stone covered mound  it now survives as two well preserved dolmens, one of which has some strange carved lines on one of the uprights.

Castlerigg, Birkrigg and St Anna

A rather unplanned trip to Cumbria this week to do some walking in the Lake District. All a bit last minute and as it is school holidays we couldn't be too choosy about where we went. In the end we found accomodation in Borrowdale and sallied forth.

Of course once I knew we were doing I couldn't resist a quick internet search for stone circles and of course Castlerigg came up.

It was busy. Very busy.  People having picnics, children climbing the stones and an idiot who thought carving his initials into the Sanctuary stones was a good thing. However I did manage to get a few pictures where it appears to be deserted!

This is a lovely location, the site is surrounded by some of the most famous peaks in the Lake District. It is believed to be an early circle- strictly speaking an oval rather than a circle with the rectangular "Sanctuary" added later.

It was too busy to really get much atmosphere so we decided to come back later when the crowds would have gone home to try and get some better pictures.

We were partially successful, one remaining family and a hyperactive 10 year old who was practicising his rock climbing skills on the stones as well as a couple of other photographers there to try and capture the sun set. However with some patience and a long wait I did get some nice pictures of the circle and we did eventually get it to ourselves.


Not all the Lake District is mountainous and to rest the legs we had a stroll near Cockermouth with the intention of finding the Holy Well of St Anna - also known as Stanger Spa.

The well is reputed to have health giving properties and the water was sold in Victorian times. The well itself is protected by a rusty iron grill and the water is definitely unappealling!


This was a short break and we decided to return home via Furness Abbey to take full advantage of the new English Heritage membership cards. Funny that there should be another circle on the route I chose - pure chance of course!

Birkrigg ( Druids Temple)   was a real challenge to find. It is on common land currently covered with waist deep bracken. If we had started from where we thought we were rather than where we acually were it would have been a lot easier but a little research confirmed that we are not the only ones to have worked hard to find this one, even if it is actually visible from the road!

This is a lovely little circle, actually two. There are two concentric rings here. The middle one is very clear but the outer one is not so well preserved. There is also evidence of vandalism in the form of traces of red paint on one of the stones. Why?

A Perfect Circle or two

After Skara Brae the next must see was of course the stone circle at Brodgar.

 I admit that despite being no stranger to stone circles I was unprepared for the sheer beauty and magic of this one.

The setting is magnificent, set on moorland between two lochs.  We were so lucky  that so early in the season other visitors were few and far between and we had the circle to ourselves for a few precious moments.

One visit was not enough and we came back at sunset.


 It was perhaps too much to hope that we were the only ones to have this idea and there were a couple of other visitors also taking pictures. Plenty of room for all though .







A few more shots. Two visits were not enough and we actually returned for a third visit before finally saying a sad goodbye to a magnificent place.

However one circle is never enough, incredibly a mile or so down the road is a second circle; that of Stenness. This is a much smaller circle  but the stones are still of imposing size.

Just to give you the scale, the chap in the picture is 6"tall

A Golden Day

So it's grey and raining, where do you go? Obvious - to the beach! Well not directly to the beach of course; me being me, we have to slot in a visit to an ancient site or two -so where to go?

A quick browse of the Megalithic Portal threw up some good possibilities and 9 Stone Circle it was. This is right on the A35 which meant it should be a quick drive-by on the way to Lyme Regis.

Drive -by is exactly what happened! I was keeping a sharp look out as I've been down that road many times and not realised there was a circle there.

 Having spotted it, (and it is right on the road) came the problem of where to stop. The A35 is horribly busy but luckily there is a very rough and muddy lay by between the circle and the Little Chef so a quick U turn and we were there.

This is a lovely little circle despite the proximity of the main road and the traffic noise. The ramsons were just starting to show, filling the air with the unmistakable scent of garlic. The woodland surrounding it lends an air of calm and it must have been quite idyllic before the invention of the internal  combustion engine.

There are 2 main stones and 7 much smaller ones. There was once a large beech tree but it has been largely removed by English Heritage on the basis that it was diseased.  The remains of the tree bears much graffiti and it is a sad sight.  


Having soaked up the ambience we decided to look for the "Broadstone" which was apparently close by but a little further along the A35. Finding this was far more challenging and despite have a detailed OS map and having programmed the co ordinates into the trusty GPS locator we had a number of trips up and down the same section of road before deciding  where it MUST be  even if we couldn't actually see anything.

And there it is! Yes rather small and inconspicuous. If you go to find it yourself, pull into the tarmac layby on the right hand side of the A35  ( travelling away from Winterbourne Abbas). If you peer through the hedge you can see a smallish stone lying prone in the field.

After that anticlimax it was Lyme Regis for lunch and a stroll in the now blazing sunshine along The Cobb   where they have a relaxed attitude to time!




Since the circle required no effort to visit and lunch had included large helpings of  Dorset Apple Cake  some exercise was definitely needed so the trip was rounded off by a 5 mile walk.

This was serious exercise. I can well believe that  Golden Cap  is the highest point on the South Coast and the walk which took in the ruined church of St Gabriel's had some steep climbs and descents. It was worth it though for the views ( I think!)

 

The Grey Mare & her Colts

The Grey Mare is the remains of a neolithic long barrow near Abbotsbury in Dorset. Now a rather disordered heap of stones it dates from around 3000BCE.

The capstone has slipped but it is still an impressive monument even if it is close to a field gate. At least there were no cows although they had left plenty of evidence of their presence!

This was a pleasant stroll from the Kingston  Russell Stone circle although it was further than we expected and a lot of peering through bushes occured in case we were walking past it on the wrong side of the hedge!. Once we were close enough though it was hard to miss.

The Kingston Russell circle itself was very hard to photograph and surrounded by a standing crop. There are certainly better pictures than mine available but for what it is worth - here is a bit of it

This is an English Heritage site and they had a helpful sign pointing in the right direction as the circle itself was almost completely obscured by the barley crop.