This year we decided to spend the summer solstice a little more quiely than usual. So we decided to spend it at Barnscar in the middle of nowhere camped in an iron age village no tom toms, no Fire-eaters and no born again christians trying to convert us!
So we pitched our tent high upon Barnscar (hoping we wouldnt be noticed) and spent the night here it was very peaceful and not a soul for miles bliss! This place is so calming the ground is nice and spongy to sleep on and it was beautiful to watch the sun rise over the Cumbrian Mountains on Midsummers morning.
Sadly this was Midsummer and the Ferns and bracken had grown to about 4 foot high so it was hard to see most of it.I did however find some stone tools just lying on the ground and a possible forgotten stone circle with an outlier too.
Barnscar is a little hard to get to but more than worth the effort it has a real ambience to it and is just dripping in archaeology a must for all TMAer's if you get to Cumbria dont miss this one!
I'd been wanting to go to Barnscar for quite a while, apparently it was an entire city abandoned. Theres not many references to it and no photos i know of, so i set off to find it.
Its a bit of a trek to find it (to say the least!)and wasnt entirely convinced it was still there. Im so glad i was wrong wow! what a place!
Barnscar is situated on top of a small hill with two peaks on a plateau surrounded 360 degrees by much higher peaks, surreal mountains with the sea to the west an absolutely beautiful idylic location with no roads noise or buildings to disturb the serenity.
The approach to the plateau itself is a fantastic array of stone avenues follow these upto the hill and on top are just inumerable cairns buildings and roundhouses. theres more stone avenues up there too walls that seem to surround the city and on the most northerly peak of the hill there is two much larger circular structures one being roughly 20 metres in diameter the other slightly smaller. i also found a circle of 6 cairns on slightly more levelled ground. Ive no idea how far this place stretches as the shadows grew longer the light began to fade i had no more time to spend here today but i must come back here soon this place has blown me away. I left rather reluctantly feeling slightly nauseas by the hugeness of the site and the vibes here, on the way home i was greeted by 2 wild deer what a perfect day,fantastic!
Scheduled Ancient Monument SD19NW 1 according to English Heritage's Pastscape website comprises seven types of Bronze Age site , three Roman types , a mediaeval shieling and an undated coin hoard !
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