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This weekend, I had to collect something from Heybridge near Maldon so it made absolute sense to have a little clear up of caches around town. I needed to be at my meeting point at 0930 so started early and was at my first cache at six. Guess where this ROH cache - South Woodham to Chelmsford bus route - was? I took shelter and had a quick find.
Next up was one that had intrigued me for a while - Old Pumping Station Car - what’s that about? I parked near Woodham Walter church and followed the footpath to the woods. It turns out that there was originally a swamp here.🤔 The swamp used to be drained by the pumping station and a car had been left behind when the station closed. Luckily the ground was firm underfoot and I soon found the car and the cache. A good mechanic would get the motor going in a couple of days.🤣
I was now going to attempt the Woodham to Maldon series set by ollie_stedman, a mate of nathanjhunt. This had nine trads of varying difficulty along the banks of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation. One has been archived and I have permission to replace two that are MIA. It‘s going to be a trek this morning that I’ll probably split in half.
I started at Hoe Mill Lock with a very quick find of #1. There is another cache here named Hoe Mill Lock almost under the bridge but this was MIA. I walked down the old tow path picking up #2 and replacing the missing #3. I returned to Hoe Mill and drove down to Beeleigh Falls.
I parked up and walked a couple of miles back to #5 and replaced this one that had gone missing. #6 was going to be a problem. It’s a tree climb which may need a ladder. I had noted two young anglers camped up beneath the trees on the way through and they were still there.☹️ I looked up into the trees but couldn’t see any cache. The logs said that there were recent DNFs so I thought that I’d give it a swerve. I asked the boys how they had got their equipment down there and they’d carried it from Hoe Mill Lock. I’m not carrying a ladder three miles, matey.😬
#7, #8 and #9 were found very quickly but I had a half hearted attempt to find the multi A Beeleigh Nice Cache near the Falls. I never seem to get the coords right so never find the cache. However time was getting on so perhaps I used this as my excuse. 😀
9 Traditional
#7467