GLW2110 : The Hincaster Pump And Other Stories

Saturday 6th March 2021

I've done it again.  Went out without my camera, thinking that this wouldn't be a GLW.  Nor did I expect I would want to take any any more photos for the latest BB challenge.  I think I need a change of strategy.  ither a phone with a much better camera or alternatively keep my spare camera in the car so I always have one available.

Anyway, this wouldn't have been a GLW if Levens Hall gardens had been open.  But they weren't. As a result we decided to walk up the ancient Icehouse Wood lane to Mabbin Hall.  We would then head across fields on a route that we have never previously taken in order to pick up the track down to Hincaster.  It was there that the camera was first needed and stories seemed to be hiding.

We found a seat with the words "Pump Lane Hincaster" marked on the backrest.  Directly in front of it were the remains of the old village pump.  There must be stories to be told about this.

The track ends messily.  There is a lot of litter and several abandoned cars alongside a run-down house. This must have a more modern story.

Once past this mess, we emerged onto Harry Brow .  Who was Harry?  Is there a story there also?  Things now improved radically.  The large, mounted stone ball in the middle of the small triangular green is interesting.   Geograph calls it a stone seat topped off with a lump of granite, thought to be a glacial erratic originating from near Shap.  There must be a story there as well.

Close by is a Victorian Postbox.  Ready there to accept the posting of stories?

A cottage door carried a meaningful motto.

We debated whether to return to Levens by Hincaster Hall or to carry on to Levens Park.  We chose the latter.

After looking at the recently restored canal tunnel mouth we walked the canal bed (dried out of course) towards the park.  Last time I was there (BB1930), it was like fairy-story land with lots of dolls and gnomes and the like.  This time we saw but a few.  Where did they go?  Did they meet an evil fate?  The story should be told.

We returned to Levens Hall via the Park and its impressive avenue of trees.  They are very old, many of them greatly gnarled and some almost totally disintegrated with new trees growing through their entrails. What would they tell is if we could only hear them?

One of the few benefits of Lockdown is that it has caused us to explore paths that we have discovered in what we thought was familiar territory though many still retain their secrets.  Here endeth today's story.

Don, Saturday 6th March 2021

Map:

4.0 miles  369 feet