Pennine Pals
The weather has been up and down here in rarely sunny Lancashire this week, but between the downpours I've managed to get out a couple of times with my cameras.
1. Anglezarke Moor
The first excursion was a pleasant evening wander onto Anglezarke moor. Starting near the Neolithic ruins of Pikestones, I made my way up Rushy Brow and onto the summit of Hurst Hill. There then followed a brisk half mile trudge across the soggy moor to the Bronze age bowl barrow known as Round Loaf. After sitting there for 20 minutes enjoying a nice meat pie, contemplating life and wondering why I didn't pack warmer clothes I headed back via Devil's Ditch and Lead Mines Clough to my car parked at Jepson's Gate.
Many of my recent walks have involved tripods, multiple lenses and a heavy backpack to carry all of this stuff, but feedback from my lower back is encouraging me to simplify my kit for a while, at least for potentially longer walks such as this, so I decided to keep it simple and just carried the GFX100S + 45-100 f/4.0 on a sling strap with a pack of filters in one jacket pocket and my GPS and small water bottle in the other. This worked quite well in this particular instance and I didn't really find myself needing anything wider or longer. Perhaps the images aren't quite as sharp at the pixel level as they would have been on a tripod, but they still look pretty good (just to qualify that, they are sharp and detailed, but I seem to find I can squeeze a tiny bit more out of this camera by using a tripod). For a while at least the light was nice too and I felt this combo made the most of it.
Pikestones
As mentioned above, Pikestones is a Neolithic ruin. The remains of a burial cairn, long since looted and damaged, it sits on the edge of Anglezarke moor enjoying extensive views to the coast and beyond. Finding a good angle here is tricky as it's also surrounded by ugly barbed wire fences on two sides, so this view looking roughly Southwest is probably about as good as it gets.
Winter Hill and Rivington Pike
Taken from Rushy Brow, this view shows the looming bulk of Winter Hill, with the television mast perched at its summit and the woods of Rivington Terraced Gardens adding texture at the opposite end. The minor bump in the middle is Noon Hill, allegedly patrolled by a headless horseman. The woods in the foreground is known as The Flat. I guess that name was assigned by someone viewing it from this angle as it is indeed pretty flat.
The Tiny Tarn
I don't know if this pool has a name, but it's a consistent landmark on the largely barren moors. Here, I'm looking across Anglezarke moor to Great Hill in the distance and just beneath where the ridge of Great Hill meets the rising mass of the moors you can make out the brown splodge that is Round Loaf.
Winter Hill from The Tiny Tarn
Same tarn, different direction. In this case I'm lookng towards Winter Hill.
The Nab
As I made my way to the summit of Hurst Hill I was treated to this view of Healey Nab. Hurst Hill's lower cairn is visible just left of centre, silhouetted against the rising bulk of The Nab.
Rivington Pike
As the evening wore on, the light improved, getting softer and more coloured. Sadly, this didn't last until sunset, but while it persisted it was glorious.
Random Farm Stuff at Sunset
Not quite sunset, but pretty much as near as it got before the sun disappeared into the murky Irish Sea Perma Fog. While I did bracket this, I wish I'd paid a bit more attention to the blown area around the sun as the highlight blowout is a bit ugly. The colours here have also been nudged quite a bit from what reality was throwing at me at the time.
A Pair of Lone Trees
Taken a little further across the field from the previous shot. Again, I wish I'd paid more attention to the highlights when exposing this. I've intentionally left the foreground as dark as it is. There's plenty of latitude to lift it further, but I didn't feel it added anything to the image when I tried it. The distant tree sits alone in a field surrounded by a short piece of dry stone wall on either side and makes a interesting subject in its own right when viewed close up.
2. Longridge Fell
For my second outing, I wanted to explore a new location, but couldn't be bothered travelling any great distance, so after a bit of a poke around on OSMaps I decided to visit Longridge Fell, which is roughly a 30 minute drive from where I live. The origin of its name is lost in the mists of time, but this essentially consists of a long ridge overlooking the Forest of Bowland.
It's interesting to note the difference in ground conditions between here and Anglezarke moor. A couple of inches of water seems to sit like a pool on the surface of Anglezarke moor, but for the most part the peat beneath it is quite spongey and stable. Longridge Fell is a different beast altogether, with the soaked topsoil being more of a slimy paste in between pockets of deep mud. This made my ascent up the ridge both slow and laborious.
On this walk I figured a bit more reach might be in order, so I took the Z8 + 24-70 f/2.8S and 100-400 f/4.5-5.6S, which is a bit on the heavy side, but way more manageable than my complete GFX kit while capable of covering a wider range of situations.
This was also an early afternoon walk in what began as fine weather, but deteriorated into a bit of a downpour. The Z8 + 24-70 combo did get a good showering, but seems to have survived okay and I took care to dry it thoroughly once I made it back to the car.
The Forest of Bowland*
*may not include actual forest.
Longridge fell gives an excellent view of the hills that form The Forest of Bowland. Unfortunately, at least on the route I took up from Jeffrey Hill it's a bit of a one trick pony, so once you've tired of this view there's not much else to occupy the senses before reaching the summit.
Parlick
It's only while researching the area for this post that I realised this green/beige lump is Parlick, the solitary fell I've previously climbed in the Forest of Bowland. There wasn't a lot to commend it from what I recall, but now that I'm limited to lower hills with my heart condition I may need to reassess it.
Stumped
I enjoy photographing woodland and the character and form of trees, so I was looking forward to wandering back through the woods from the top of Longridge Fell. But having left the ridge path and taken a short walk into the woods I was faced with a scene of devastation as most of the trees had been cut down. From the look of it this forest is a plantation, so I guess this is its inevitable fate, but I always find these to be quite sad places once the tree felling machines have blown through. Plantations often feel a bit grim beforehand too, like the trees know what fate ultimately awaits them. Counting the rings I think this tree was 37 when it met its grisly fate.
Uprooted
This one appears to have been ripped out of the ground as it was torn down.
Memories of Mardale
If you ever get the chance to visit the flooded village of Mardale, which occasionally resurfaces to a point where you can walk around it when the water level in the reservoir is allowed to drop sufficiently, you may find a tree stump beside the former location of the church. This stump with its exposed roots and bleached colour remind me very much of that one.
Hanging On
Having left the steep and slippery path down through the devastated woods I was now on a forestry commission road lined by pines and occasionally other trees such as this plucky marcescent fellow, still desperately clinging to its long dead leaves.
Incoming
As I left the forest the rain hit, marking the end of the exploration phase and increasing my need to get back to the car. While picking as direct a route as possible I passed this rather nice Scots Pine beside a broken dry stone wall, pictured here with the murk of the incoming storm behind it.
