Somewhere near Tarrant Gunville, in the rain

[puddleshark]

Well, that didn't go so well. Spent the morning getting lost, and forlornly following the margins of the biggest wheat field in Dorset...



Even the drive out didn't go to plan. It soon turned out that the main road to Blandford was closed, and I ended up having to take the back lanes along the Tarrant Valley - the narrow, twisty, very pot-holed back lanes - through all the little villages:

Tarrant Crawford
Tarrant Keyneston
Tarrant Rushton
Tarrant Rawston
Tarrant Monkton
Tarrant Launceston
Tarrant Hinton
and finally... Tarrant Gunville, the last of the Tarrants, where the river Tarrant rises.

Tarrant Gunville is not the most picturesque of the Tarrants, though there are some nice old brick-and-flint cottages. Rather a damp-looking village, with the river running in a channel between the houses and the road.




These look early 19th century. I wonder if the dressed stone in the walls came from nearby Eastbury House after it's demolition.



Behind the village, a classic car rusting in a field, with the grass growing round it.


The footpath skirts the edge of Eastbury Park, once, briefly, the home of the grandest country house in the county.


The house is long gone, but the sheep are still there, grazing the park.



Soon after this, I missed the true path, ended up following a farm track which led me about a bit, before abandoning me in the middle of the largest wheatfield in Dorset.





It's very quiet, this landscape. Just the sound of the wind in the trees and the grass. Wood pigeons cooing in the distance. Wrensong from the woods. No human noise. And on a grey day, maybe because the paths are little-travelled, it doesn't feel like the genius loci much cares for humans.




The wind got up. It began to rain. It wasn't supposed to rain. The Met Office website had said less than 5 per cent chance of rain. But luckily I always carry a plastic rain poncho in my camera bag, for those occasions when the Met Office lies. So I wandered about, lost, attractively wrapped in flapping blue plastic.


While lost, I accidentally got a good view of the old stable court, which is all that remains of Eastbury House, designed by Vanbrugh, and once rivalling Blenheim and Castle Howard for splendour.

The palatial residence of Eastbury was built on a new site at the centre of a new estate and was designed by the great architect, Vanburgh, for George Doddington, who had made a fortune when he was Paymaster of the Navy. Work started in 1718 and the project was inherited (along with the fortune) by George’s nephew, Bubb Doddington, in 1720. Bubb was the son of a Weymouth apothecary but also a courtier.

Bubb Doddington died in 1762: he had only been left a life interest in Eastbury and by his uncle’s will the house went to Earl Temple of Stowe, who didn’t want it and couldn’t find anyone to buy it. The elegant furniture was sold in 1763. Earl Temple offered an annuity of £200 a year to anyone who would live there, but still no takers. Demolition was the only answer, and it took several years and dynamite to get the great mansion down.

https://www.dorsetlife.co.uk/2007/10/a-lost-mansion-of-dorset/

Following the margins of an endless wheatfield, in the hope of finding a footpath.



I never did find a footpath, but I saw a stoat, two roe deer, and lots of arable-margin weeds, including some splendidly geometrical Sun Spurge.


Sun Spurge (Euphorbia helioscopia).



Eventually, having walked the entire margin of the biggest wheat field in Dorset without find any way out, I admitted defeat, and headed back the way I came. The rain grew heavier.


While trudging back towards the village, I found the path I missed, heading off into the fields. I shouldn't have followed that farm track. It's not the first time I've been led astray and abandoned by a farm track.

Maybe I'll try this walk again, when my ankles have recovered from walking flinty field margins.


Tarrant Gunville again. At least I found my way back.

Comments

[mallorys_camera]

Your escapade is fun to read about at any rate. 😀

[puddleshark]

I think it's good for me to get lost, every now and then. I get to see things and places I would never see otherwise.

[heleninwales]

At least your detour round the wheat field took you to see some wildlife and produced some good photos. It sounds like a more epic version of when we couldn't find the path down through the woods and had to retrace our steps. Though actually we did find the stile, it just didn't look very promising, so we went back the way we had come.

[puddleshark]

Yes. It's worse when you see a stile in the distance, and think you've found your way, only to find the stile leads you into marsh/Stinging Nettles/a wasteland of recently felled forest etc.