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Drake Stone

Natural Rock Feature

Folklore

A tiny addition about the adjacent lough's traditions.
...a footpath leads up past the Drake Stone to Harbottle Lough, a lonely eerie tarn in the hollow of the hills - a stretch of long heather and sphagnum marks an old extension of the lake. The west end of the lough is packed with a dense growth of buckbean, horsetail, and rushes. The water is always pure and very cold - so cold that it was said to be certain death to attempt to swim across. We, however, know of several who have performed the feat and are still alive to tell the tale. A number of large round blocks of sandstone is to be seen lying about on the top of the hill; these are rejected mill-stones, which puzzle strangers very much as to their origin.
From 'Upper Coquetdale, Northumberland: its history, traditions, folk-lore and scenery' by D D Dixon (1903).
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
3rd June 2010ce
Edited 3rd June 2010ce

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