Category: Guisborough
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Guisborough Wood
Took a trip up to Guisborough Woods to see for myself the devastating effect of Saturday’s fire. It covered an area of about 44 acres on an area of gorse and young spruce trees on the area known as “The Warren” above Cass Rock Quarry. Much was still smouldering but I suspect many of the…
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Guisborough Forest And Walkway Visitors Centre, Pinchinthorpe
I cycled the route of the old Middlesbrough and Guisborough Railway towards Nunthorpe in the hope of a nice photo of Roseberry from an unfamiliar angle but the dull weather dashed that idea. It was an out and back route along a well-maintained walkway. At the far end, a six-foot-high fence prevented all chance of…
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Roseberry Common
A glorious morning on Roseberry. The light overnight snow has highlighted the scars left by 19th century jet mining. The spoil still sterile after all these years. The hard black fossil of the Monkey Puzzle tree has been prized for jewellery since the Bronze Age but it was made fashionable by Queen Victoria after the…
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Belmont Ironstone Mine
Early morning. A good day beckons but Guisborough has not yet escaped the shadow of Highcliff Nab. Morning mist creeps up from the Cleveland valley. The range of buildings on the left was stables built for the Bolckow, Vaughan and Company’s Belmont Ironstone Mine when they drove a new drift to old workings which operated…
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Tocketts Ironstone Mine Ventilation Shaft
Hidden away on the steep wooded slopes of Tocketts Beck, a reminder of the Cleveland ironstone boom. A ventilation shaft with a tall, rather precarious looking chimney built to aid the updraft just above where a Public Footpath crosses the beck. The mine was a short-lived venture lasting for just nine years from 1880 although…
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The art of Kemplah Wood
I seized on an opportunity to be dropped off in Guisborough and run home and, as the weather was dire, decided to stick to the woods and go over my old training grounds. It’s almost thirty years since I lived in Guisborough but while the main forest tracks are the same much has changed under…
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Moorhen and chick
I don’t normally linger at ponds and wetlands. Usually, I’m too anxious to gain height onto the moors and fells. But I did dally a while at the small pond today at the Pinchinthorpe Walkway and was amazed at the amount of life there. This moorhen had two chicks, this one being fed by its…
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Xanthoria aureola
A splash of colour by the side of the Cleveland Way in the winter sunshine. Easily overlooked but deserving a closer inspection. Lichens fascinate me but I admit I am lost when it comes to naming and hesitate to put a name to this. Xanthoria aureola is a likely candidate, there are other contenders, same…
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Boulder, Potters Ridge
It always surprises me that this large flat boulder, on Potters Ridge around the back of Highcliff Nab is not named on any map. It is certainly significant and its location on a high point on the North York Moors escarpment only slightly lower than surrounding tops would have been a natural draw for prehistoric…
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Guisborough at night
A walk up to Highcliff Nab, looking down on a twinkling Guisborough. A sign of the season, lines of deep blue, the most disagreeable colour for Christmas lights, decorating eaves of houses. Top left, a row of red lights: the wind farm off Redcar, flickering as the blades rotate. A few ships out in the…