This walk starts from the village of Dunsop bridge where you can park
your car next to the 100000th BT payphone that was opened by Sir
Ranulph Fiennes himself.. The plan was to try and find the Whitendale
and Brennand hanging stones which are supposed to be the centre of the
British Isle, The route leaves the village and follows the small brook
upstream and onto the moors.
The
weather was quite cold but the sky was blue enough and you very quickly
leave civilisation behind as you follow the water board service road.
The hills round here are mostly boggy peat and are the sponge that feeds the surrounding reservoirs.
The views up here in the forest of Bowland are like no other you are likely to see and the area seems to be seldom visited.
I had a map and ignoring the no dogs signs I quickly came across an obvious pointer to my destination.
The
weather turned typically misty and following a bearing became tricky as
the ground underfoot throws you first one way and then the other..I
also had to negotiate big peaty scars where the streams had eroded away
the topsoil..These detours can wreck your intended path so try and keep
an eye on some thing in the distance so you can regain your bearing.
Out
of the mist appeared some stones which fitted the bill I was looking
for so I had a butty and admired the mist for a while..Whether these are
the Brennand or Whitendale stones I know not.
From
here I decided to make for the trig point on Whins Brow,its about two
miles I guess but the walking is bloody hard work.You have to cross
small valleys with steep sides where you have to grab lungs full of air
and the surrounding heather to drag yourself up,
The
ground is real hard work and when I saw a fence heading the right way I
made a bee line for it and used it as a handrail all the way to the
top.
On
the way up I saw a farmer bouncing and rocking his way across the moor
on his quad bike, it looked very uncomfortable indeed. By the time I
reached the trig point I was huffing and puffing like a good un'
The
tarn is Brennand tarn where I found a geocache and sat and admired the
views into the empty distance..I once read that the Queen comes up here
shooting and as she owns most of the land she can do as she pleases I
guess..
From here I grabbed another handrail fence and stumbled slipped and slithered my way back to Dunsop bridge for a brew.
