Martin Down to Pentridge

[puddleshark]

Martin Down National Nature Reserve.




Summer lingering in among the yellow grasses on Martin Down. The grasshoppers still singing. Knapweed and Scabious and Harebells still in flower.





But the Wild Carrot is in its clenched-fist bird's-nest stage:





Pale blue sky, and sun glare as I set off. A hard horrible light. Not good for landscape photography. But as I walked, the cloud started to bubble up. By the time I reached Pentridge Down, white fluffy clouds - the landscape photographer's friend - were making their appearance.


The first stretch of the walk follows Bokerly Ditch or Dyke, a late Bronze Age / early Iron Age earthwork which snakes across the landscape for over three miles. Thought to mark a land boundary. In the ditch, wild marjoram still in flower.


Dogberries! And the dogwood leaves starting to turning purple.



Bokerly Dyke snaked on, but I parted company to join the Jubilee Trail.


FORDE ABBEY 90 MILES. This is the very start of the Jubilee Trail, a long distance footpath which runs across Dorset, from Bokerly Dyke on the Hampshire border, to Forde Abbey on the Somerset border.


The initial stretch of the Jubilee Trail is not glorious. A narrow grudging path along the side of a conifer brake, with barbed wire on one side, and brambles and nettles on the other, and plenty of tree roots to trip over.

But soon you emerge onto the downs. The way arrives at two gates, side by side, and I chose the gate on the right, which led me onto a cattle track. I should have chosen the gate on the left, and followed the field margins.


I know this because I met the farmer at the next gateway, and he advised me I was on the wrong side of the fence. But he was very pleasant about it, and even went back and opened the right gate for me (which was kind of him, because it was a very notional sort of a gate, leaning casually against the left-hand gatepost, and attached with two pieces of ancient frayed baler-twine to the right-hand gatepost).


On the right side of the fence, following the field margins.




Onto the bridleway which climbs onto Pentridge Down.


A gate between a dead and a dying Ash tree. Ash Dieback is changing the whole landscape.


Three buzzards circling. There were Red Kites as well, soaring over the fields, but I wasn't quick enough to get a picture today.


Along Pentridge Down. A lonely path, and peaceful. There's a distant noise of cars passing along the main road from Blandford to Salisbury on the other side of the valley, but it doesn't seem very important. A light aircraft was performing engine-stalling aerobatics high above the hills.

At the end of the ridge is Penbury Knoll, which is an uncompleted Iron Age hillfort, later damaged by gravel quarrying, and planted over with trees. It is just about possible to make out what might be an earthwork at the foot of the trees.




Down in the valley, the village of Pentridge, and the spire of Pentridge Church.




TRIANGULATION STATION. ORDNANCE SURVEY. The trig point on Penbury Knoll, hiding among the trees.



I caught a glimpse of someone a little further along, sitting looking out over the view, holding a notepad. Perhaps an artist sketching. Or the ghost of Edward Thomas, scribbling. But I didn't want to disturb them, so did not approach to find out. Walked on.

Where the Jubilee Trail cuts south-eastward towards Cranborne, I parted company with it, and took the bridleway down through the fields towards Pentridge.




I need to walk this path again in May, when the Cow Parsley is in flower.


A Red Kite above the fields. My best Red Kite shot of the day!



Down into the village of Pentridge, where most of the houses are hiding behind high tile-topped and stuccoed walls.




St Rumbold's Church. Chancel of 1815, the rest built in the 1850s. It's quite a pretty little church from the outside, thanks to the spire, but the interior is very plain.

Quite a rare dedication, St Rumbold.

Rumbold or Rumwold was a medieval infant saint in England, said to have lived for three days in 662. He is said to have been full of Christian piety despite his young age, and able to speak from the moment of his birth, professing his faith, requesting baptism, and delivering a sermon prior to his early death. Several churches were dedicated to him, of which at least four survive, one being at Pentridge in Dorset... Church dedications largely follow the missionary activity of Saint Wilfrid (c. 633 – 709 or 710), but once spread as far as North Yorkshire, Lincoln, Essex and Dorset.

Boxley Abbey in Kent had a famous statue of the saint. It was small and of a weight so small a child could lift it, but at times it supposedly became so heavy even strong people could not lift it. According to tradition, only those could lift it who had never sinned. Upon the Dissolution of the Monasteries in England, it was discovered that the statue was held or released by a wooden pin by an unseen person behind the statue.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rumbold_of_Buckingham

Interior. Very much the Victorian Barn School of Church Architecture. Not just an air of disuse, but an air of never having been much loved. It's not a church that invites you to sit and linger a while.




To the Memory of
ROBERT BROWNING
OF WOODYATES IN THIS PARISH, WHO DIED NOV 25TH 1746
AND IS THE FIRST KNOWN FOREFATHER OF
ROBERT BROWNING, THE POET.
HE MARRIED ELIZABETH PETHEBRIDGE
WHO DIED 1759, AND THEIR SON THOMAS
(BORN 1721) OF WOODYATES INN
WAS THE POET'S GREAT-GRANDFATHER.


In loving memory of Harry Williams, (Royal Marines) who went down in H.M.S. Victoria. June 22 1893. Aged 23.

The sinking of HMS Victoria took place at approximately 15:30 on 22 June 1893, after HMS Victoria, the flagship of the Royal Navy's Mediterranean Fleet, collided with HMS Camperdown while on fleet manoeuvres in the Eastern Mediterranean. The collision caused significant damage to Victoria's bow, with a large hole produced causing the ship to rapidly capsize. Victoria took approximately fifteen minutes to sink, with 358 members of the crew, including Vice-Admiral Sir George Tryon, lost in the disaster.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_HMS_Victoria

A particularly horrific wreck, caused by insanely dangerous orders, unthinkingly obeyed, and a whole concatenation of wrong decisions following.







Headstone dated 1777.

Sat for a while in the sunshine, cautiously, on a very rickety wooden bench just outside the churchyard, sipping coffee, and wondering whether I had overestimated my stamina when I planned the walk, and would I ever make it back to the car. But one cannot sit on a rickety bench forever. Sooner or later, it will collapse. Best to move on before that happens.

From Pentridge, onto a restricted byway that runs hidden between two hedges. "Restricted Byway" usually means that no motor vehicles are allowed to use it. But this restricted byway was so overgrown, it would have been impossible to follow on horseback. Or even on a Shetland pony. I spent a lot of time ducking under hazel branches.


Berries on the Wayfaring Tree.


The path filled with the astringent scent of ivy flowers, and the hum of wasps and bees and hoverflies.


Onto the bridleway back to Martin Down. Countless Red Admiral butterflies feeding on the ivy flowers. A few Commas and Painted Ladies also on the wing.

The bridleway ended, and I lost the path. But fortunately, a dog walker appeared. (Not the genius loci, I think, since she had a St Bernard with her). She explained that the footpath had been ploughed across and planted over, but if I headed straight across the field, I would see the gate on the other side.


Bokerly Dyke! Impossible to get lost, once you find Bokerly Dyke.




Back past the great earth banks of the disused rifle ranges.