River Washburn

A few more images of a short section of the River Washburn.

This shows the ingress of water from ‘Redshaw Gill Beck’ into the River Washburn. Whenever I walk about the countryside I’m struck by the odd bits of wall, stone gateposts and the like which initially seem pretty random but must give a clue to the history of the place – I’m often left with a ‘what’ and ‘why’ in my mind.  The stone wall here, on the right of the Beck seems to have been carefully constructed, but I’m not sure what the purpose would have been.  Perhaps it’s a feature of some long last garden.

I was taken by this tree on the opposite side of the river.  Unfortunately, the sun was not in the best position, but it’s something to bear in mind the next time I’m there (hopefully early one morning for the best lighting.)

As we walked along the river we noticed various signs of some sort of activity, wires across the river, boulders clearly place in positions where they wouldn’t have occurred naturally – choking the river at various spots.  This pole nailed it for us – the flow of the river has been ‘adjusted’ in places to the benefit of kayakers.  Following some web-based research, I now know that the local water authority co-operate by releasing extra water from the Thruscross Reservoir to facilitate some kayaking competitions.  (Another thing to suss before I go up there next – I might be able to get some action shots!)

——–Stephen———