Lower Longbeak Barrow – 29.3.2004
There is a free car park right next to the barrow at Lower Longbeak, just north of Widemouth Bay. From this car park take the path out towards the headland and after 40m you will skirt the edge of this barrow. There is not much to see but it is clearly a small barrow, with a hollowed top, covered in gorse.
Hendraburnick Quoit – 2.4.2004
Wow, this is enormous! What a site this would have been before its collapse.
This is easily found in a field south of the road that connects the A39 near the Tich Barrow to Tintagel (signposted ‘Tintagel’ from the A39). I would say that the true grid ref is closer to SX132882.
It’s actually in the field directly opposite the driveway to Treslay Farm (and there is space to park in this area just off the road), although this field seems to sometimes be temporarily separated, and has two entrances. The Quoit is just inside the field at the crest of the rising land.
I didn’t actually check whose land it was on so just had a quite mooch [see note from Bugsy – Ed]. There was no livestock in the field (one gate was even open).
Access: Easy access. The quoit is visible from the road, through a kissing-gate and stands only a few yards into a small grassy field. There are a couple of parking spaces by the quoit next to a grassy ‘island’ at the road junction between Crow’s Nest, Tremar and Derite. It is signposted, but we found that the signs seemed to disappear at Crow’s Nest (the direction we arrived from) and had to use the map.
Saturday 6 March 2004
Wonderful. I visited once about 8 years ago and had great memories of the place. It was just as I remembered.
On our journey to Land’s End, I made this visit to Trethevy mandatory. As Jane had been lusting after it for years – ever since she got the Mod Ant book – I got no argument!
Looming, incongruous, spectacular. I know I’m not alone in thinking this is THE ‘must-see’ dolmen.
We chilled for 30-40 mins and at uncanny speed, Jane produced the painting (she calls em ‘sketches’) that appears elsewhere on this page.
Access: See the Hurlers. The path leads directly north and is incredibly easy to follow because you can see the Cheesewring all the way. It undulates over reasonably even moorland for about half a mile’s easy going until you reach the foot of the hill with the Cheesewring outcrops on top. It then gets steep and considerably harder going as you negotiate craggy exposed rock and boulders.
Saturday 6 March 2004
This is such a great place! I have to confess that on my first visit to the Hurlers I hadn’t bothered to walk up here. The views and feeling of wildness and freedom are everything you could expect.
It was cold, but bearable as it wasn’t particularly windy. So Jane painted while I poked about amongst the outcrops and investigated the north side of the hill.
On the way back for another look (successful this time) for Rillaton Barrow we spotted Daniel Gumb’s House low on the hillside at the side of the quarry, just below the most teetering and prominent outcrop nearest the Hurlers. I’d forgotten about it on the way up, but for some reason had thought it was on the other side of the hill anyway....
Access: See the Hurlers. About a quarter of a mile from the Hurlers on a fairly good path leading to the Cheesewring. About halfway to the Cheesewring is an almost non-existent path to the right (east), which takes you to the barrow. It is a distinct cratered mound, a little to the SE of the highest point on this part of the moor. Probably just as easy to find by heading NNE straight across the moor from the Hurlers.
Saturday 6 March 2004
Can’t add much to previous posts, other than to support the view that for ‘bump’ fans (I’m one) it’s well worth a visit.
Battered and pretty wild, the barrow bears many scars from treasure-hunters over the years. The exposed stones of the spot where the famous cup and other artefacts were found are surprisingly diminutive and not visible from ‘ground level’. We thought we’d got the wrong place on the way from the Hurlers to the Cheesewring, but luckily we had another look on the way back and realised our mistake. I’d have been really disappointed to miss it. Good view of the Hurlers from the top of the barrow too.
Access: See the Hurlers.
Saturday 6 March 2004
By the track SW of the Hurlers lie the Pipers, a pair of appreciable standing stones, clearly part of the same complex. Just as Craig Weatherhill says there is doubt of their antiquity, Aubrey Burl seems to accept it. Guess you pays yer money and takes yer choice. Worth a look anyway.
Access: Pretty easy. By road, head for the small village of Minions off the B3254 near Liskeard. The Hurlers and the Pipers are on the NW side of the road at the SW end of the village. There is a car park that might get quite busy peak season (with attached barely recognisable cairn).
The stones are about 200 yards (tops) across relatively flat grassy moor and are not at all overgrown. May be boggy in wet weather.
There is also a roughish track that runs just to the SE of the circles, but this is probably no better for access to the circles. It does lead straight to the Pipers though. (And on towards the Craddock Moor circle etc).
Saturday 6 March 2004
What a place to start off my first Cornwall trip in around 8 years! My memories of the place turned out to be really hazy – I didn’t remember it being so impressive!
It came up as a candidate for somewhere to stop on the way to the Land’s End peninsula, simply because I really wanted Jane to see Trethevy Quoit. As the Hurlers are so close, it seemed like a viable ‘addition’, though I wasn’t that enthusiastic.
In fact, I was more interested in the neighbouring Rillaton Barrow, just because I hadn’t seen it before!
Of course I’ve read a fair amount about the Hurlers since that first visit and seen the pics on here, so I should’ve known to expect more. After all, it’s not everywhere that you get to see 3 stone circles in a row with a couple of nice ‘probable’ outliers (see the Pipers and a prominent ‘proto-temple’!!!
Actually seeing the Hurlers again though, I saw that my memory it as ‘scrappy’ and ‘wrecked’ was far fom the truth. OK, the south circle is largely gone but its presence is clear. And the other 2 are a bit ‘knocked-about’, but far more complete than I expected. Along with the setting, this all makes for a pretty damn spectacular ‘monument’!
With the weather changing constantly as the dark but broken clouds scudded across the sun, the ‘atmosphere’ of the site seemed to change from moment to moment. Picturesque and welcoming, to bleak and unfriendly in seconds. Considering the proximity of the village, it’s amazing how remote the site can feel after a short time there.
It is impossible to overlook the presence of the Cheesewring, though it’s far enough away that it doesn’t dominate the site, and isn’t exactly an integral part of it in the way of say, the Cnoc an Tursa at Callanish, or the Gorsedd at Bryn Celli Ddu. Its significance is surely indisputable, however, and seems clearly to have been part of the overall ‘vision’ of the place.
If you visit, do make sure you walk up to the Cheesewring and Rillaton Barrow if you can!
We didn’t make it to Craddock Moor stone circle and other sites on the moor, as we still had quite a distance to go before journey’s end (and Trethevy Quoit was calling). We did stop briefly at the Long Tom christianised menhir though, as we were passing.
3 April 2004:Every stone has been defaced with Jackson Pollock-type splatters of primrose yellow gloss paint, applied with a small 1” house painters brush, I would guess, as the splatters are small and streaky. A larger brush would carry far more paint. Every stone, large and small has been attacked both front and back. The grass is splattered, the earth is splattered and I feel personally violated by this mindless vandalism.
I wept with horror at the stupidity of it: the maliciousness defacing of this most beautiful of ancient places, which also happens to be at the geographical The Epicentre of My World. Someone, somewhere, probably a local, deliberately planned it, deliberately set out to strike at every stone from every angle.
An important site in that it is a Neolithic Clyde chambered cairn with a cup and ring mark.
The only other such finds (as far as I know) are at Cairnholy – one on a cup and ring marked stele which was found in a chamber in Cairnholy 1 and assumed to be secondary and another on a chamber stone also at Cairnholy 1 which could have been exposed and thus decorated at any later date.
There is, of course, no telling when the cup and ring was added at Ardmarnock but its position in the centre of the septal stone in the chamber might suggest that it was part of the original structure. There is also a cup mark on the other side of the septal stone.
The site was cleared of its impenetrable rhododendrons a few years ago but they are begining to grow back in. They make it difficult to see the extent of the surviving cairn but the well preserved chamber arrangements are still visible.
What we probably have here is a single compartment chamber fronted by two large portal stones and a slipped capstone. It faces NE.
A 1970s description treats the portal stones as two side stones of another compartment. Their shape does not support this interpretation but it would allow the other visible stone to be treated as a capstone to this second compartment.
More detail with the photo captions.
The site is well worth a visit. It is in the grounds of Ardmarnock House and is signposted from the south drive of the house. It is a good site to take a bike to. The approach to Ardmarnock House is down a private well surfaced road 2 miles long. Non-bikers (like me) can park at the entrance to the Melldalloch holiday cottages off the B8000 and walk.
To break the monotony of the walk, there is along the way a hill fort (also signposted but not visited) and a good cup and ring marked stone at NR92107401. I tried to find the latter but tree-felling operations made it impossible to get close.
Visited 31 March 2004
A ruined but pleasant chamber is all that remains of this Clyde cairn. It sits on a mound facing NE overlooking the Holy Loch.
Details with the photo captions.
Chambered cairns are probably the burial places of the group which farmed locally and a Neolithic domestic settlement has been found 1 km to the S.
Parking is available at the nearby Heritage Trail.
Visited 31 March 2004
Two standing stones in a beautiful location at the head of Loch Scriven.
2.4m and 1.6m high.
Visited 31 March 2004
My family and I visited this site in the summer of 2002ce. The path up from the main Ballymoney-Cushendall road is very steep, with a sharp right angled turn on a very narrow unpaved ascent bounded by hedges and fences, too destructive of the environment to negotiate by car. I’d recommend walking up after parking in front of the house directly off the road. It’s easy to miss the sign coming out of Cushendall, so drive slowly the mile or so up into the hills from the village.
I’ve cannot confirm whether the Ulster poet John Hewitt is in fact buried beneath the commemorative cairn at his beloved vista. There was no “official” information posted at the site when we visited. Harbison (p. 40) calls the “grave” a “neolithic court-tomb with a forecourt of low stones facing south-eastwards and giving access to a two-chambered gallery placed in an ill-defined oval mound.”
However, the views are magnificent, the (ca. 2000bce--Donnelly; 3000bce--Harbison) horned cairn handsome in its simple setting, and the quest rewarding, even if Ossian’s legend occurred long after the site’s actual establishment. The townland, Lubitavish, “loop of pleasure” nestles in Glenaan, one of Antrim’s nine glens, on the Dall river.
South of this, Lurigethan, (Lurigeadan=Luragh Eadan, “brow of the long ridge,“) the fabled site of giants, continues associations; Ossian’s father, Finn MacCool, lived among the other Fianna in its cave, Lig-na-Fenia.
Sources:
Maureen Donnelly. The Nine Glens. rev. ed. Coleraine & Ballycastle: Impact Printing, 2000.
Peter Harbison. Guide to National and Historic Monuments of Ireland. Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 1992.
Robert Sharpe & Charles McAlister. A Glimpse of Glenariffe. Glenariffe, Co Antrim: McAlister & Sharpe, 1997.
The story behind the photo.....
It is early October 1990. I have driven all the way from Cornwall to Fife in a 1000cc Suzuki 4x4 with a dodgy radiator. After a few days in the Kingdom to recuperate and take on liquid (me, not the car) me and Brian head north to bag a hill or two.
We reach a pub in the middle of nowhere as the “sun” sets over the hills. Here we eat before carrying on up the road to the foot of Ben Hope. It is dark by the time we reach the broch....and it is also blowing a gale. The car has only got a canvas top but with the spirit of adventure flowing through our veins we settle down for the night.
Settling down means several spliffs, a packet of chocolate hob-nobs and John Peel on the radio. My lasting memory of that night is the cold, the rain and a Vietnamese version of “A hard rains gonna fall”.
Daylight arrives at last and the full glory of Sutherland is upon us. It is a land of rock and water and very little else. The broch stands proud beside us, the only thing that could have withstood last nights storm. If I remember rightly it has inner walls and a passage way all the way round inside. We breakfast within its shell before setting out up Ben Hope.
That’s another story...what a beast of a mountain. It was so cold we got to the top and turned right round and came straight back down.
As for Sutherland, it is a wonderful wild place. I am not sure how many TMA sites there are to visit but the landscape is just stunning. Sandwood Bay at the far North West tip is possibly one of the finest beaches in the UK.
One day I might get back there.
Broch found today. Only meant to go to Gaitnip, then noted down the other Five Hillocks for an upclose sometime, finally thought what the heck and went for Holm. This tine the broch mound stuck out like a sore thumb to me – last time I started round the loch from further end and that is where I went wrong I feel. At the bottom of the hill before you finally enter St. Mary’s (from the ‘Kirwall end’) it straddles the space between the road junction and the Electricity thingy. Big but insignificant looking and covered by grassy tussocks. Closing in I was disappointed to see spaces several metres across where mucho excavation had taken place, looking as if the place had been quartered. Straight lines, curvy lines, and a ruddy great hole over in the centre. Looks very deceiving. Coming in my foot rocked on a hidden slab. Turned out most of the floor and walls are fairly intact beneath a grassy and/or mossy covering. Sitting on an outer wall I could see large exposed stones either side of what appeared to be an entrance A reasonable number of stones could be seen on the inner wall of the centre. Came back from there and was astounded I could follow the outer section of the inner wall still standing to a reasonable height all the way around. In some places sections of wall were exposed for several metres several courses high. Well worth a look for the sure-footed.
On second visit ascertained all entrances original, dtected more walls.
I’ve been meaning to visit this site for some time and, now that I’ve done so, would fully recommend it. It’s on the road to Kilmartin so anyone visiting there might want to call in. There’s a lot to see though so you’d need to allocate two hours at least if you want to cover all of it.
It is now part of the Brainport Bay Heritage Trail (includes wildlife, geology, etc) with parking, leaflets, waymarking and information boards.
Like any archaeoastronomy site, there are problems but what is interesting about this site is that the main features are difficult to explain in any context other than for solar viewing.
For a full description of the site and some of its problems, see the Clive Ruggles book mentioned in Miscellaneous. Only brief details are given here along with the photo captions. I’ve also posted photos of the information boards but they skip over some of the issues.
For parking, you have a number of options depending on how far you want to walk and how you feel about taking your car along forest tracks.
Easiest but with most walking is to park at the start of the Trail in Minard (by the shore just before the traffic lights if going south).
Alternatively drive south and turn left at the sign for Minard Castle B&B. There is a large parking area first on the left next to the forest track.
If you want to take your car into the forest (I did!), you can get near to the Solar Platform site by turning right after a while and going down the narrow winding track. There is room to park and turn ONE car here. You will be next to the standing stone and to get to the platform head E along the path (do not follow the waymarkers).
The Oak Bank stone sites can be reached by going along the forest track and not turning right. Parking and turning for ONE car at the end.
Visited 24 March 2004
This is a good example of a Clyde chambered cairn.
It is situated in the National Trust for Scotland’s Crarae Gardens which has its good and bad points. On the positive side, it is well cared for even if it is a little over-manicured for my tastes. On the negative side, if you arrive between 10 and 5 from April to October, you may be asked to pay the £5 entrance fee. Outside these times there is an honesty box and the gardens are open dawn to dusk all year round.
Interesting features at this cairn are: the flat facade; the size of the orthostats on the facade; the dry stone walling (reconstructed). More details with the photo captions.
This is a site which many will pass on the road to Kilmartin and it’s well worth stopping to have a look at if your schedule permits.
The gardens are well signposted off the A83, north of Minard.
Visited 24 March 2004
This is off the A4106 road to Porthcawl just after the village of Laleston.At the second roundabout after the village take the first left exit and look for a farm lane on the left, here you can park and walk up the lane untill you see on the left a public footpath,follow this up the hill to the small wood skirt the wood on the left and you will see the barrow and the capstone.
This “four-poster” has five stones – eight if you count the low-lying ones. So you might be confused; I know I was.
Burl describes it as a four-poster with an outlier. OK, but it’s a very close outlier – an “inlier” maybe?
And the other three stones? One may be a capstone from a cist apparently. The other two don’t get a mention.
Let’s try another source to see if they can clear it up. What about the Aberdeen Council Archaeology website?
“Five stone oval circle” (good) “transitional between recumbent stone circles and four-posters” (pardon?).
Oh I give up! It’s a lovely site in a lovely setting. Let’s just take some pictures.
Easier to get to than Burl suggests. Park at the gates of Glassel House on minor road S of Milton of Campfield. Walk along forest track opposite. After about 150m, look for path to left. This leads to the circle.
Visited 28 March 2004
When you think of neolithic enclosures, you often think about hardly evident earthworks in a long cultivated field. This one, however is massive in terms of its embankments of large boulders. Most of the southern end of the birch wood is enclosed and the enclosure extends accross the next two southerly fields. In the northern of these fields, the embankments have been cleared out of the field.
Dave 26th March 2004
A small ring cairn with south east and north west entrances. The south east one aligns directly with the pass that the A619 goes through. There is a rubble embakment and shallow inner ditch. This place has a great ambience.
Dave 26th March 2004
Access my distant memory suggests it was a pleasant and fairly flat walk of no more than about a quarter to half a mile across moorland....
Having looked at the map, today, I reckon the map ref’s more like SX612730.
Sometime in 1995-6
I’d previously posted this under Merrivale because I couldn’t remember where it was but knew it was vaguely near there.
When I finally remembered to ask on the forum if anyone knew it, TMAer greywether suggested it was the Crock of Gold – I recognised the name immediately....
Now I know more (ie a little bit!) about cairns, I’d like to visit again!!
This stone stands on the B4450, halfway between Churchill and Chipping Norton, in the northern roadside hedge. Usually, it’s difficult to find, being swamped by the hedge; however, on my latest visit the hedge had recently been cut, freeing the stone from its green prison. To my dismay, the stone had been trimmed, too, with loose flakes lying on the top.
Visited this place about 6 years ago on a hitch-hiking tour of Cork and Kerry. Having been dropped off in the town of Cahersiveen during a funeral we booked into the local hostel and then walked over the bridge to the north of the town. Heading west we came across this fort, at the time I was not what you would call well up on things ancient but remember being overwhelmed by the size of the place. The walls towered above us and all seemed so clean, no greenery growing out of the gaps etc. Kathy, my partner, climbed up the inner steps to the top of the wall and then had a “moment” when she realised she had to then go down!
Looking back at the OS map I realise how much we missed in the area, must make a note to go back....with our own transport.
Nearby to the fort is a wonderful old medieval castle, half of it has fallen down giving it the look of one of those cross section drawings you see in books.
As Tiompan knows, this one is in a fairly dodgy situation. I spoke to the farmer about it, and he has agreed to ensure that no further risk will occur to the stone from its current situation.
Sorry if this sounds a bit mysterious, but the stone could be regarded as ‘portable’ and we don’t want it to disappear.
Unless, of course, the risk continues and we’re forced to take it into “protective custody”!
The site has been reported to the local museum, but nothing much seems to have been done.
Revisited today, glorious sunny afternoon, so I have deleted a lot of the old misty photos and added some which show the overall layout of the site a bit better. However, the heather’s starting to grow again so it’s disappearing fast....
George has been doing some digging : he talked to a gent from the local history group, who came across the site 4 years ago. They contacted Liz Thoms from the local museum, but as far as they know she never visited the site. As far as is known however, no local ‘built’ this and it’s looking as if it is another true rediscovery.
