Above Beaminster

[puddleshark]

Took a walk up onto the downs above Beaminster. I hear the views are spectacular. It's just that every time I go there, it's foggy.

I had planned a circular walk, muddy paths permitting, and I did indeed complete a circular walk. Just a completely different circular walk from the one I was intending. I'm still not entirely sure where I went...





A mild grey morning. Halfhearted drizzle in the air. Set off from Beaminster, with its pretty cottages of peach-coloured stone.


Onto the track uphill to Meerhay. Water flowing in streams alongside the road, and culverts under the road, but mostly behaving itself and staying off the road itself.


Meerhay Manor.



Past Upper Meerhay Farm. A fancy new stable-block with a weathervane atop. The horses all turned out into their foggy paddocks, and the stable doors all open. The scent of fresh wood-shavings in the air. Brightly coloured feed buckets washed out and lined up in the yard.

Onwards and upwards, into the cloud.


In places the rain has washed away the soil, showing the chalk beneath.



It's a long old climb up from Beaminster onto the downs. Found a stone to sit on in a gateway, and rested a while. Drank coffee from the Thermos. Thought how nice it was to be sitting in the fog and the silence, and why didn't I just stay there.

But eventually the caffeine kicked in, and I set off to follow a short stretch of the Wessex Ridgeway long distance path.


First stretch of the path, along the fields margins. Very boggy fields. Yet behind the blackthorn hedge there were glimpses of a wide ditch which was perfectly dry. I wished I could be walking in the ditch. The Dorset countryside clearly has a sense of humour.


But the path soon joins a proper stone track.






Unfortunately, the proper stone track is flooded along several stretches. I managed to pick a way along the verge beside the fence in the section above, but further along there was a flooded gateway with no way of getting around. I may have taken a small sneaky detour under a fence and through a corner of a field.


Shatcombe. Let's not enquire into the etymology of that one.


The countryside around Beaminster has some splendidly sinister beeches.




Looking back down towards Beaminster, with the cloud starting to clear.



Walking down the lane to Langdon Farm, there was a pheasant shoot taking place, close enough and loud enough for me to wonder whether they would actually be shooting across a public bridleway. But before I could get really worried, the shooting finished, and I found myself following the shooting party down the lane: only a small group in their green or brown shooting gear, carrying guns over their shoulders, accompanied by a great pack of labradors and muddy spaniels.

They headed towards a very grand farmhouse, and, too intimidated to ask where the footpath to Beaminster was, I ended up taking another footpath. One that wandered round the valley back towards Shatcombe. It wasn't the footpath I wanted, but it was a very pleasant footpath anyway. If somewhat lonely.




Shatcombe Farm. Terrifyingly neat and desolate.


I found a way-marker on a gatepost for the Hardy Way long distance footpath. This would have been excellent news, if only my Ordnance Survey map were not twenty years old, predating the existence of that particular path. I turned to follow the Hardy Way anyway, figuring it would surely end up in Beaminster. Eventually. Probably.


But first I sat on a stile and drank coffee, keeping low company: brambles and stinging nettles.


Here comes the rain again...


I can report that the upper stretches of the Hardy Way are quite muddy. The lower stretches are very, very muddy indeed.


Through a newly planted wood of beech, hazel, and willow.


The boggy patch. The mud came up over the top of my boots, and the Pendulous Sedge said "Hur-hur-hur! Warned you it would be boggy!"

Pendulous Sedge is a thug.

Slipping and slithering and wading my way through the woods, I began to wonder whether there was anywhere in Beaminster where one could buy a nice new pair of dry socks.


Over a little footbridge...


...and out into a field which the farmer had helpfully ploughed, leaving almost no field margin to walk along.

The footpath emerged in a twentieth century housing estate on the edge of what I fervently hoped was Beaminster. I started to follow residential roads downhill.

Took a brief detour, following a footpath sign towards the sound of a running stream, and found a place where some washed-away steps led down to some submerged stepping stones. By clinging to a surviving handrail, managed to get down safely, and stood in the stream, trying to wash most of the accumulated mud from my boots and walking trousers.

Then it was back onto the road, which descended, and as it descended the houses became older, and it was clear that I was back in Beaminster.





There is a coffee shop in Beaminster, and it was open. But I could not go in. Though I had washed most of the mud off, my trousers were in no fit condition to enter.

Comments

[zenigotchas]

Poetry in prose, poetry in pictures.

[puddleshark]

Thank you!

Mud & fog - I love these things.

[asakiyume]

Called Wakanomori in to enjoy these photos with me ^_^

[puddleshark]

:-)

After all the rain Storm Conall dumped on us on Tuesday night, I can report that the streams of Beaminster are running well! Everywhere you go, the sound of running water...

[heleninwales]

That sounds like quite an adventure. From the pictures, it looks as though there would be a wonderful view if it hadn't been for the mist. Perhaps you'll get to see it one day?

[puddleshark]

It was far more adventurous than I was planning! And my poor boots will probably take all week to dry. But it was a really enjoyable walk.

Yes, one day I will manage a walk on those hills when the weather is clear. I mean, they cannot be permanently shrouded in fog. 😊