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I had planned to do a bit of free-climbing today but the thought of the 5/5 tree climbs in the predicted high winds put me off. So I reverted to one of my many lists. I have 99 of them listed on Geocaching.com so there was plenty to choose from. My back-up list for the day would be “North Colchester.” However I had written up my original order of play in my notebook so I needed a new one.
For some time, I’d seen adverts for D’s Diner just off the A12 in Hatfield Peverel. So this seemed like a good place to stop off on the way to plan the day. The coffee and bacon sandwich were spot on and sorted out my chosen path for the day and had written it up.
The first stop was a garden centre car park in Turkey Cock Lane, Stanway for a short series of trads and a multi, hopefully. It was bloody cold when I started the walk, with a biting wind so I was glad of the layers of clothing that I’d invested in for the day. I got started at Root and branch reform and quickly found another five trads up to Footpath Marker. I then walked down to the start of the Willows Wander multi.
I had a stroke of luck here. I stepped onto an inspection chamber which gave way and my right leg plunged down into the chamber. I was lucky not to have broken my leg! However the leg was trapped and I had to ease it out. Checking that there was no serious damage, I got on with the task of gathering the answers. Having worked out the coords, I had a bracing walk towards the woods at GZ for a very quick find of a loosely hidden cache.
After warming up with a coffee at the garden centre cafe, I set the google maps to Nayland. I’d been here before and found the CM but I could see on the app that I hadn’t! I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t logged it but would I have to sort it out when I got home.🔸
Once I’d parked the car near the bridge, I walked along the river for a quick find of Nayland & Wissington Trail #7 - The Weir. Retracing my steps back along the river, I had a look at Trip, Trap, Trapping. The cache was under the bridge according to the hint but I had no luck. I looked at previous logs to find that there had been a number of recent DNFs and that a ladder that was needed. I checked the attributes and there were none. I wasn’t going to post a DNF but did post a note stating that if there was a need for tools, there should be attributes. 😡
I carried on into Suffolk picking up seven of the SEBC series via Stoke by Nayland and Polstead. I’ve been working my way through this series for months as I’ve woven my way along the Suffolk and Essex border. I also found two of the AAD‘s Tree Trail mini series including a 2/1.5 tree climb complete with the tree climbing attribute.😀 🤔 I wasn’t going to complain as I needed this for a challenge cache that I’m working towards. I could qualify for Blockbuster-Stylee Bingo Challenge many times over but you have to register before you can start working on it. I’ve posted that I’m in.
I finished off the day with a circular walk of trads around Polstead taking in The Witches Tree, a spectacular lightning struck tree shown in the photo, and The One Ring. Now this one wasn’t for the squeamish. I found the hand but not the ring!
I finished the day on a low! I walked a good half mile down from The Witches Tree to the Homey Bridge trad. I could see the hint item easy enough but no cache. I checked the log to find a sad litany of failure over the past year or so. There hasn’t been a log to sign for a long time and some people have been logging a find of the top! This had to change so I put an Archive request on it.🤔
🔸 I had found the Nayland CM previously but it had been archived and resurrected so I’ll have another go next week.
1 Multi, 21 Traditional
#6409