Last week was half-term here. The kids were reluctant to go out, but we persisted in our efforts to drag them with us.
Beacon Hill Country Park was the venue for Thursday's walk. It's an interesting place - at 245m (802 feet) Beacon Hill is the second highest point in Leicestershire and the site of a Bronze Age hill fort. The walk up from the Lower Car Park is through pleasant wooded areas with good access, and there are many opportunities for geologising. Add in a few wonky trees, some interesting fungi and some weird moss, and it's a good day out.
As you will see from some of the pics, the kids didn't enjoy it at all...
Cones
Catkins
Through the woods
Searching for sticks
Bracket fungi
Mushrooms?
The Den
Bracket #1
Bracket #2
The Old Man
Rocks near the summit
The Old Man again
Layers
Rockhoppers
Chris at the trig point
More layers
Chris on the rocks
Anna and the little people
Dip and strike
Panorama - full view
Panorama in a scrolly-thing
Anna #1
Anna #2
Ella
Anna #3
3 of a kind
One up, two down
Bedding planes #1
Bedding planes #2
Toposcopy
The Great Unwashed... washed!
Stone Angels
On edge #1
On edge #2
Bedrock
A herd of moss
Wonky trees #1
Wonky trees #2
Wonky trees #3
Holey tree
Fungi?
Another bracket
Not a bad day out, I reckon we'll be going there again.
THE SMALL(ish) PRINT... (updated 23/07/2016)
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What a great day out. Wonderful trees fungi and geology. Terrific photographs, too difficult to pick the best one.
What wonderful photographs of wonderful landscape! I laughed out loud when I saw 'bedrock' - very clever!
Panorama in a scrolly-thing
wonderful i shall have to investigate further
Cheers, folks.
Bruce - you can nab the code for the scrolly-thing at http://www.myspacegens.com/han.....ollboxpics
Yes - the scrolly thing is very clever.
This is pretty much where I learned to love open spaces, along with Bradgate Park (really enjoyed the atmospheric photos from there too) and Swithland Woods. Actually, what sticks in my mind about Beacon Hill is playing hide and seek amonst rhododendron bushes - are they still there, or perhaps I've remembered wrong?
So does this mean that you are a flatlander in exile, Mark? You'll be telling me next that you used to live down the road from us
Either way, your memory serves you well - Rhododendron bushes are still there, they've used some of them to make a labyrinth near the lower car park.
Really great article with loads of brilliant photos - it must have taken you ages to upload them all!
I started my own walking blog 6 weeks ago: http://walksandwalking.com/
Cheers for that, David.
Had a look at your blog earlier - good stuff - that pic of you on the Llanberis path is a cracker 🙂