Frodsham Frolics Saturday 9th Sept 2017

The first trail of the season

The Prez wasn’t quite firing on all four so I volunteered, along with Intercontinental Wells, to litter around 8 miles of Cheshire countryside.

At 10.30am on the dot we left Forest Hills, armed with bags of sawdust and strips of paper….at 10.50am.

Joe’s route took us left out of Forest Hills and down hill to pick up the path that we followed south, skirting the eastern side of Beacon Hill. The sun shone and the birdies sang….but the clouds looked ominously April-like.

Sure enough, some very heavy rain-showers were encountered – but we weren’t downhearted much at all. Well not very much.

Note to self: Bring (old) weatherproof camera in future.

A sharp turn to the east took us by Crow Mere and then downhill to the B5152 close to Newton Hall. By this stage of the game both Intercontinental Wells and I though we had a pretty good idea where the Hon Prez was going to take us. We were almost right.

Then we got wet. Very wet actually. The rain shower, albeit only lasting a few minutes, was very heavy.

There followed a couple of miles of wet and nominally downhill ziggery & zaggery, some of which coincided with the North Cheshire Way.

At the Weaver Navigation we trotted in a sort of NNW direction, scattering a mixture of sawdust and the smallest of strips of paper for the runners to follow. We followed the muddy path alongside the Weaver Navigation and the Frodsham Cut as far as Frodsham Lock where we turned west for about 546 yards 500 metres.

Apples (windfalls) and blackberries were collected around here. They made a very fine apple & blackberry crumble* the next day.

Turning south and gently uphill along a section of Eddisbury Way we littered our way through Bradley, and then on the North Cheshire Way, back to cross the B5152, approximately 546 yards NW of where we crossed it earlier. Blue sky had appeared and it was quite warm.

This area must be well populated with giant moles. Or mayber badgers.

More uphill followed, this time back to Beacon Hill. A short section of the return route coincided with the outward section – we had to be careful not to confuse the runners (some are easily confused) so trail had to be littered carefully. I think we succeeded.

A final bit of an uphill tug on tarmac took us back to Forest Hills where coffee and butties were enjoyed (well I enjoyed mine).

Runners arrived back in dribs and drabs – I think there may have been a couple of packs out:

Early Taylor

Ding Dong, smiling. Always smiling

Goulder cruising in, well ahead of the main pack

Nobody complained, not even about the nettles, so I reckon Joe did a good job with his route.

A good meal was enjoyed by all, shame about the beer but there you go.

Where we went, anti-clockwise:

7.6 miles with around 820ft of ascent. And descent. It was decent.

Thanks to Joe for dreaming up the route, and to Joe and Intercontinental Wells for their excellent company on the trail-laying expedition.

* The Apple & Blackberry crumble….well the remnants of it: