A WALK IN THE WOODS OR WAS IT FORRES?

Alliteration alert!

For February's foray, Forres fitted the bill.

Some of our number had enjoyed less than perfect health in January, so we had chosen a more gentle walk than normal around the outskirts of Forres.

We also thought that attendance was likely to have been a bit light, but as it happens, everybody turned up except Dave and Sandra who are in Finnish Lapland cross country skiing, which sounds more like torture to me than a holiday. Not only did everyone turn up, but Agnes came along again and brought Richie with her. He is our first Dinosaur virgin for a considerable period of time.

Agnes being involved, meant that she and Richie were the last to arrive, albeit only a few minutes late. Here are the rest of us hanging around the car park and paying no attention to the sign which asked that the gate please be kept clear.

Soon we were all ready and off we set up the hill through some nice Beech woodland.

This all looks very nice and natural, but Beech is not, in fact, native to Scotland. All the Beech here have been planted or have self seeded from planted specimens. Indeed, some environmental zealots would remove Beech from so called natural woodlands in Scotland.

There were lots of initials carved in the trunks of these Beech trees, which is very common. This is because Beech have comparatively thin bark and once the star crossed lovers have inflicted their surgery on the tree, it cannot heal itself and recover, ensuring that DC's dalliance with TM will remain until the tree falls down, which for Beech, could be centuries.

It was fun scuffing our feet through the leaves like children, though.

Not much grows under a dense Beech canopy and, further on where the canopy has thinned and there are more conifers, you find another exotic species. No, not Sharon and Sue, but the Rhododendron, which would be much more at home in the Himalayas. 

 Meanwhile, the Forres forest gods watched on in bemusement as we walked past. Perhaps the god was looking over Helge's Hole, which lay beside the path. This is also known as Hell's Hole. A skeleton was discovered here when the site was excavated to form a cricket or sports ground! This was said to be the remains of a suicide. It may have got the name from old shinty games played near here with the aim of getting the ball to the hole. The successful team said they had got the ball to Hale's Hole - the goal of success. The losing team said they hadn't got the ball anywhere near Hell's Hole.

Nobody really knows.

We were soon, literally, out of the woods, but we could still see the trees.

You could also see the catkins. 

These are Hazel catkins - a sure sign that Spring is on the way. They will shed pollen to the wind when March comes.

The walk then took us down to the Burn of Mosset, which was quite pretty to look at, but in the past the burn has flooded Forres on numerous occasions.

The ducks seem oblivious to the approach of the resident crocodile.

The burn opens out into Sanquhar Loch. The loch is actually a man-made pond and it sat in front of Sanquhar House, which at one time was owned by the man who established Dallas Dhu distillery, which is reasonably close by. It actually includes a fish ladder at the west end of the loch, so I guess salmon used the stream, which is a tributary of the Findhorn, for spawning. It was created in 1900 to provide cooling water for Benromach distillery, another enterprise of Mr Edwards who owned Sanquhar House. The House is now demolished and replaced with a street of bungalows!

 There must be some fish still there, although this Heron seems a mite laid back in trying to catch them.

 We didn't have to try too hard to get one of Maureen's sweeties, though.

Shortly after the sweetie stop, we got to an open field, known locally as the Coffin Field. The old Sanquhar Estate office was near the trees, but I can find no reason why the field was so called. There are remains of an old church a bit to the east, so perhaps coffins were rested here before going on to the church.

Sharon explains to the assembled masses that she has no idea why it is called the coffin field.

Heading down to the edge of the woods, Hugh spotted this squirrel, just to show that he does pay attention on the walks.

Out of the trees we could see the sky again and it had become what is called a 'mackerel sky'. Mackerel skies are formed from cirrocumulus or altocumulus clouds and are a reliable sign of an impending change in the weather. They form ahead of an approaching warm front and pressure falls, leading to rain some hours after their appearance. Sure enough, it poured with rain on Sunday evening.

Our next stop was supposed to have been at a bird hide overlooking wetlands. However, some Yoofs had burnt it down, so we took a group photo with the ruin in the foreground!

 The wetlands were very still and the reflections of reeds in the water looked like some kind of modern art installation. 

 Next stop lunch, which we had on top of a dam designed as part of the Forres flood prevention works. But this was no ordinary dam. Oh no!

It is a baffled crump weir flow control structure. Not only that, it is the first of it's kind in the UK!

I could go on and bore you with a description of a baffled crump weir flow control dam, but I can't understand it, so if you want further information try the proceedings of the 13th British Dams Society Biennial Conference of 2004!

This is us sitting on our baffled crumps after lunch.You can tell how excited we are. 

There was more excitement to come in the shape of the galleried barn at Chapelton Farm. There have been buildings here since the 16th Century, but I can't find any direct references to the barn itself. Presumably the gallery was used for storage purposes, perhaps for feed for the animals that occupied the barn.

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The next building was Leanchoil Hospital. This was built in 1892 with funds donated by Lord Strathcona. He was born in Forres and went on to become hugely successful  and wealthy in Canada. He was governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, co-founder of the Canadian Pacific railway, and chair of Burmah Oil among other things. The hospital was named after the farm where his mother had grown up.

Of greater historical significance was the fact that Pam had her tonsils removed there when she was 5, not long after it opened.

Not long after the hospital, we entered the woods again and skirted round the golf course.

There were golfers around, but I doubt they were having such a good time as us.

There was a sign near the golf course which might have been referring to my wayward tee shots which often spray in all directions. I never carry firearms on the course, though.

Back round to the woods on Cluny Hill, where the natives seemed distinctly unfriendly.

The paths took us up to the Nelson Tower, one of only 4 in the country built to celebrate Lord Nelson. The foundations were laid in 1806 using funds raised by public subscription. It was not completed and opened to the public until Trafalgar Day, October 21st 1812. Clearly the good people of Forres were not overly enamoured of Lord Nelson as they had to call for more funds twice following the initial subscriptions.

There are fine views from the site of the tower, especially now that someone has seen fit to butcher the surrounding trees.

An oil rig being towed out to the North Sea.

 Finally, here we are at the bottom of the tower, because it is only open in the summer, so we could not get to the top.

 It was a fine walk and it was really good to have such a big turnout and special mention to Richie and Agnes for joining us. Hopefully they have not been put off and will come along again. It is always nice to have some new blood, no matter how old it might be.

From the car park it was off to Brodie to search for a parking space before we got to have some tea and some very nice scones.