Concrete is Fun and Interesting... Honest!

I had a run of three consecutive pillars from S1530 through S1532, which I could turn into a run of six if I bagged the next two, as I also had S1535.  Additionally, S1534 Cold Ashby was of historical interest, being the very first pillar to be used by the Ordnance Survey in their retriangulation of Great Britain, way back in the 1930s.  Northamptonshire was a little further out from my home base than most of my previous trips, but there were some suitably fast roads to take me there, and I figured Cold Ashby was doable if I made it the top end of a loop.  I studied the map.  Yeah, I can do this… I nearly did myself some serious damage en route.  S6740 Nippets was a hedge-dweller beside a cornfield.  There was an easily accessed track on the other side of the hedge, which I would probably be able to photograph the pillar from, but the logs noted that the flush bracket faced into the field, so I deemed that side to be preferable.  Unfortunately, access ...

I was struck by the exceptional beauty of this little patch of England, and with a number of potential bags still out there, I set my sights on returning to the South Downs the following fortnight to hoover up some more.  The region did not disappoint.  S1814 Coneyhurst Hill had been given a fresh coat of white paint to distinguish it from the pillar-shaped National Trust donation box that shared its hilltop location.  Another one with a fabulous view, too.  S1813 Froggetts Farm was playing host to a herd of deer, who were grazing in the field containing the trig, but who quickly bolted as soon as I hopped the stile into it.  S6411 Flexham Park was the subject of a YouTube video mere days after my visit, describing it as a lost trig.  It’s not so much lost as very well obscured from view, being in a dense coppiced wood with no paths or clearings.  Another one for which GPS is generally recommended, but for which the advice “keep going up” is all I need...

Lesson Seven:   There’s little point being a trigpointer if you don’t have a head for heights.   I had admired S2533 Cley Hill from afar, passing it some distance away when my wife and I paid a visit to Longleat Safari Park a couple of years earlier.  It looked like it would offer a particularly fabulous view, and the revelation that it had a trig pillar on top of it was about as surprising as Christmas landing on December 25 th .  I planned a roadtrip that led directly to it (the smaller the car park, the earlier in the morning you want to get there), and then mapped out a rambling journey back home that took in ten more pillars.  May 31 st  was a beautiful morning, bright and clear.  Arriving in a half-empty car park, I proceeded to follow the footpath to the hill and then up the side.  It was very steep – moreso than anything I’d previously encountered.  And I… well, let’s just say I would make a very poor mountaineer, and I’ve no plans to...

After another three months of plague-enforced house arrest, I actually found myself getting quite comfortable inside my own four walls, and a little unwilling to emerge.  If the trigpointing bug wasn’t so strong, I might have stayed shut in for a lot longer.  This silly little pastime is actually quite addictive, though, so on Easter Sunday, I eased myself slowly into the outside world once more.  Wanting to thank the Easter Bunny for the very generous quantity of egg-shaped chocolate with which I had been gifted (I am also addicted to confectionary – to an extent which is quite frightening), I headed out to possibly the UK’s most famous rabbit warren and enjoyed a stunning springtime view from S1680 Watership Down.  The sun was out; the uphill walk was fairly moderate; the field carrying the trig was devoid of crops; and I was actually surprised to see a small procession of walkers queuing up to hop the fence and beat a clear and well-trodden path to the pillar – ev...