Four Stones Hill Standing Stones View all content for Four Stones Hill

All previous posts have no positive words on getting there, so I put it off for years and went elsewhere, until today, its the spring equinox today, and after a successful sunrise at Elvaplain stone circle I felt today was the day to go. I did what the previous posts seemed to suggest and approached from Drybarrows farm. I couldn't park near the farm because of all the signs written forbidding me from doing so, so I had to squeeze the car in on the little east to west road north of Winder hill. It was precariously parked, but with what looks like a long walk (just over a mile)to the stones I wanted to get as close as I could. Walking through the farm was the worst bit, trying to get by without bumping into angry farmer (they're all angry, they may not always show it, but they're all angry on the inside) all those negative signs on the road made me feel unwanted. But got through the farm I did, and out onto the open moor. There are lots of paths going this way and that, trying to stay on the one that would take me to the stones proved impossible. It wasn't long before I was well off the right path and climbing Little Birkhouse hill, the view over Haweswater was pretty good, and I was sure I hadn't passed the stones yet so I carried on, up Great Birkhouse hill, from there I skirted round the south side of Fourstones hill, and there they were, to me they were in profile and looked like one stone, so I still wasn't convinced I was there until I was right upon them. Standing at the stone pair the view is joyous, on the nice scale it stands somewhere between very nice and I need to sit down. The reservoir is an imposition on the landscape, there would have been a river down there in the past, it's just a lot bigger now. The way the sunlight speeds across the countryside, lighting up the distant hill sides, I sat down. So what happened to the other two stones? Was this a four poster? or a four stone row? Or were the four stones the remains of a bigger circle? Answers on a postcard to....... The stones are quite different, the smaller one sits in it's eternal pool and is kind of triangular and leans towards it's partner, the taller one is a long robust pillar. From the stones about 100 meters north east is the cairn, the two are not intervisible. I get back up and start circling the stones, after many many photos, I go for a little walk about, get some height and perspective change. I drop back down right onto the cairn, it's quite a good one, large and stony and with a shallow scooped interior. Its time to go, with my car parked where it is I've spent too long here. On the way back I follow the footpath more correctly and miss the farm out altogether passing by to its south and east by several hundred meters, I wish I'd gone this way first. If you intend to see all of the lake districts ancient remains (A list) the two stones at Fourstones hill are a definite must see, the view will astound and the stones will confound. But getting there is still a pain in the......

Posted by postman 22nd March 2022ce

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