Sunday 3rd July I apologise for not having written in the blog for a long time. I will post about a few walks but they will be out of date order. This weekend we had been quite busy installing wardrobes and so didn't have much time for walking but we did have just a short stroll to find a few geocaches. We parked in Conkers and then walked across the road and joined the Rawdon Colliery trail. We had a pleasant walk around the fishing lake and then followed the trail through the new plantation. The colliery here had been closed in 1990 and is has since been turned into a nature reserve - there were loads of wildflowers growing beside the path. After finding a few caches we then crossed some fields, the first had ripe barley, the second had wheat and then after walking through a small woodland we reached the fields where the farmers were baling hay. We found another cache and walked through to Blackfordby, we then had to return the way we had come. It had been a pleasant Sunday afternoon stroll. We had found 5 caches and not found 1.
Saturday 23 April 2011 Another beautiful day and so we decided on a trip to Westerham with Dad to enjoy the bluebells. We parked at Chartwell, Winston Churchill's home and then set off up the steep hill towards French Street. Halfway up we headed off through the woods and then after getting a bit lost on the trails in the woods and finding a few geocaches we finally emerged on Hosey Hill lane and crossed the A25 into more woodland. We were very grateful of the shade today as it was so warm. We followed a forestry trail past a derelict tower which was so covered with ivy that at first we thought it was a large tree and then emerged onto a large grassy bank which we climbed to get good views across Westerham and the Downs. Having walked through the very pretty town of Westerham, we stopped to have an ice-cream. We were surprised that among all the tea-shops and Antique shops there were no nice icecream parlours, so we had to make do with an ice-cream from the newsagents. We left westerham by walking up Mill lane, where we passed a lady who was cooling herself with the waters from the clear stream we were walking beside. There was a choice of footpaths here, a nice flat one beside the stream, or a steep uphill section. Our route followed the steep section! We climbed through the grounds of Squerryes Court but could not see the house as it was behind the trees. As we walked through the woodland of Goodley Stock we were treated to carpets of bluebells with amazing scent. We emerged onto the A25 but only had to walk a short distance before taking another footpath back into the woods. The woods were criss-crossed with footpaths and it was quite difficult to work out which path we needed but after a bit of back tracking we emerged at the top of the hill leading down towards Chartwell. We had been finding caches throughout and started to hunt for the last one when thunder started to rumble around. So as the cache was appearing elusive we decided to head back to the car before we got soaked. We enjoyed a welcome cup of tea in the NT teashop ad then headed back home to dad's. As we left Westerham the rain started and was very heavy for a while, but as we got towards Maidstone the skies cleared and there was no sign of rain, so it had just been an isolated heavy shower.
Oh dear, I realise I have been very remiss in updating my blog. We have been out for walks but I never seemed to have the time to write anything or I had forgotten the camera so there were no pictures to post. John now has a new GPS with camera o hopefully we will be able to record our walks as we go. Sunday 17 April 2011 It was another lovely day and so we set off for a walk at Market Bosworth. We parked at Sutton Cheyney and walked down the road to the gated lane that led to Market Bosworth. We were following a caching trail that had been set out with several caches on a circular walk. It was very pleasant walking along the gated lane with views across the fields to the surrounding villages, and after about 2 miles we arrived in the town. A cache had been hidden near to a tea shop so as we sat on the bench wondering where it was hidden, we decided a cup of tea and ice-cream was in order. A couple were looking at us a bit strangely and then came over and said “We know what you are looking for but we won't spoil it”. We then had quite a chat about GPS as they were about to buy a new one and wanted to see what John thought about his new toy. We enjoyed our cup of tea and then after finding the cache under the eyes of all the other teashop patrons set off on our walk again. We arrived at Bosworth country park where we found some more caches in the butterfly garden, the bird feeding area and the arboretum – where some of the trees had eyes painted on which was quite unusual. We met the other cachers a few more times before heading off along the Leicestershire Round and back towards Sutton Cheyney. The walk was just over 6 miles and 12 caches were found, one not found and had been very pleasant in the sunshine. To see our route and the photos taken along the way click on the following link.
Tuesday 4 January 2011 It snowed again this morning and so we had a lazy morning before deciding to go out for a walk. We drove to Repton and parked near the centre and then walked through the village. Repton turned out to be a lovely place; the ancient capitol of Mercia and home of Repton public school, whose lovely buildings were scattered around the village. We headed off along the edge of the school playing field and then up onto Parsons Hills. We had lovely views across the Trent and although the path was narrow and on a slope, it was frozen so was not as slippery as it could have been.
We crossed some fields towards Newton Solney, again, luckily the field was frozen as the cows had churned it up quite a bit. Having arrived in Newton Solney we walked through the village and then onto a footpath heading back through the fields back towards Repton. We had been finding caches along the way and having found the last of a series we had to do some complicated maths to find the bonus cache. We had not really left early enough and so by the time we were searching for the bonus it was dark. We could not find it so decided to return to the car and come back tomorrow for the bonus. When we got to the car we spotted a mistake in our sums and realised the cache was only 100m away so headed back with torches to get the last cache. It had been a lovely walk in an area we had not visited before.
