Site Visit and Conservation at Brown's Folly Nature Reserve
with the Avon Wildlife Trust
This is our annual clear-up of the geological sites on this SSSI Reserve. Come along with gardening tools or just take the opportunity to visit the sites and talk about the geology. Variable levels of activity depending on what you decide to do!
Meet at 11.00 a.m. Brown's Folly Car Park (ST 798694). There are some steep slopes; strong shoes and hard hats are essential.
We shall have a morning walk east of Camerton and then a drive to lunch at Combe Hay, where there is a pub with excellent food. In the afternoon we shall walk around the canal at Combe Hay. There are a reasonable number of exposures spanning Mercia Mudstone to Inferior Oolite, plenty of canal features, coal mine remains and links with William Smith. Copies of relevant archive maps and documents will be provided.
Meet at 10.30 a.m on the road beside Camerton Old Mine, grid ref. ST 681 579. Take the A367 from Bath towards Radstock and turn right on the B3115. At Meadgate, turn left towards Camerton. Parking in spaces along local roads. Lunch at the pub in Combe Hay. Walking boots or strong shoes essential because of muddy paths.
leader: Isobel Geddes, author of 'Hidden Depths', the Geology of Wiltshire
Chisbury Hill-fort: view of the wooded hills east of Savernake Forest, on the edge of the London Basin, where the Chalk is capped by a thin layer of Tertiary sands and clays.
Stype Wood: the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary is marked by solution hollows where streams running down over clayey Tertiary beds on the hill-top disappear when they get down to the porous/permeable Chalk below.
Littlecote quarry: a solution pipe in the top of the Chalk can be seen to be filled with Clay-with-Fints.
Kennet & Avon canal: the canal will we followed from Great Bedwyn westwards, passing the Crofton Beam Engine -built to pump water into the canal at its highest point. Nearby, to the west, the canal goes through the brick-lined Savernake tunnel as it enters the Vale of Pewsey.
Vale of Pewsey: we will look at the structure of the vale and how it affects the bounding Chalk escarpments, with a stop at a pit in the Melbourn Rock at the base of the Middle Chalk.
Meet at 11.00 a.m. Manor Farm Stud, Chisbury - SU 280 660. We have permission to park in the farmyard: turn right after going into the farm entrance and go round into yard area to park (south-east side of the house). Walk to the redundant church behind the buildings.
As this is some 35 miles from Bath, those who want to share cars to reduce the size of the convoy to the next 5 localities as well as save on petrol, could meet at 10.15 and park on Spa Road, Melksham (by the 3 big spa lodging houses) where we met up for the field trip 2 years ago, GR ST 914 628, (behind the roundabout on the A365 southeast of Melksham on the road to Devizes - take road towards town centre/hospital at that roundabout, then turn sharp right almost immediately).
A member of the Bath G.S. committee will wait there until 10.15 a.m.
There will be a lunch stop in Great Bedwyn where there are two pubs. Hard hats and strong shoes will be required
We shall take a short walk along the prom to consider sea defences and beach restoration and there will be a brief review of what is below the Bristol Channel. We shall also walk through the woods to Greenaleigh to examine head deposits, the arcuate shingle ridge, Variscan/Tertiary tectonics and Devonian sediments.
Meet at 10.30a.m. Harbour Car Park, Minehead by the Lifeboat Station.
leader:Dr. Eric Robinson, University College, University of London
2004 saw Sherborne in the public gaze, thanks to the television programme "Restoration", which figured the elegant Sherborne House as badly in need of care and attention. The cause was the saving of inside wall paintings, but the stone exterior alone is a lesson in what-not-to-do in the case of heritage buildings. The streets of Sherborne are testimony to the excellent local Middle Jurassic limestone as a building stone - to compare with Bath Stone. We shall start at Sherborne Abbey and will follow a trail which picks up buildings and pavings that will interest.
Meet at 10.30 a.m. at the West Door of Sherborne Abbey. Bring a packed lunch or buy lunch in Sherborne.
The most convenient accommodation would be near Yaverland (east of island, north of Sandown).
On Sunday, Atherfield is en route to the Yarmouth/Lymington ferry.
Joint event with Bristol Naturalists' Society and the West of England Geological Association
This is an exciting annual event to promote our local rocks and fossils to the public. If you have any spare rock, mineral and fossil specimens that can be given out to children, please contact us.
The event is held from 10.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m. at the Information Board site just beneath the bridge on the Bristol and Bath Railway Path near Saltford. There will be a range of activities going on throughout the day.
Meet at 10.30am at Hartham Quarry. £5 per person for the Bath Stone Quarry Museum Trust.
Hard hat, high visibility vest, stout footwear and a strong torch essential. (Bath GS can provide hat and vest). The tour will end at about 12 noon.
Ample. Three large car parks. one at side of Heritage Centre and one just back up the approach road. Both £2 all day. One in front of Heritage Centre £3 all day. All pay & display
Programme:
Morning : Charmouth Beach (Black Ven] and Heritage Centre
(There will be a Fossil Roadshow at the Heritage Centre on this day)
12.20
Leave beach to walk into Charmouth (600m) for the 12.38 bus to Lyme Regis (10 mins £1.30)
12.45-2.00
In Lyme Regis. Visit Lyme Regis Museum (well worth it) Look at (long-awaited) seafront and slope stabilization works in progress along the Promenade.
Lunch
On Monmouth beach just west of The Cobb.
2.00-3.15
Walk west along the beach (mostly shingle and rock) to the 'Ammonite Graveyard' (1000m), and return.
3.15
Walk from Lyme Regis to Charmouth along the foreshore, past Church Cliffs and the famous landslips ('the largest coastal mudslide complex in Europe'). (3000m, arr 4.30).
NB This is only possible 1.5hrs either side of low tide (which is at 4.04 on this day).
General:
The Beach Cafe at Charmouth opens at 10.00am.
The Fossil Roadshow will open at 10.30
Convening at 11.00 is for the short walk west along the beach to look at the Black Ven cliffs, and return.
Participants are welcome to join and leave the trip at any point.
Anyone wishing to join at Lyme Regis should note that parking in the centre of the town is limited and expensive. There is a Park & Ride out on the Sidmouth Road and they say the P&R bus down to the town will be operating on this day.
Possibly useful bus times:
Lyme - Charmouth 3.35 if you want to skip the return walk.
Charmouth - Lyme 4.38 if your car is at Lyme.