Goostrey Village Circular

Saturday 4 June 2016 4.25 miles
Carol, Donna, Tracey + Jane

The day started warm and cloudy, a really comfortable temperature, t-shirt weather.

We parked at the Red Lion in Goostrey.

The walk through the bongs was lovely, it is always great to walk through woodland, the wild garlic flowers were dying off so there wasn't a smell.

There was a single cow on the same side of the wire fence as us. It looked a bit nervous on seeing us so we walked further down the slope so we weren't too close. It relaxed and went back to eating.

We could hear water flowing strongly, but we couldn't see through the woodland. we joined the lane and crossed the bridge where there was plenty of water flowing under it. Across the field we could see that some sort of old weir structure, I presume that the water flowing over the weir was making the noise.

The converted old mill is for sale at £850,000.

There was some confusion at Swanwick Hall farm. We were looking for a path with a boardwalk, we had joined a path of gravel that had a 'Footpath' sign at the beginning so we returned to find the right path. We walked through to the farm, a girl who was working in the field told us to use the other path. So we returned and used the permissive path. This path meant that we didn't have to walk through the farmyard.

The farm was growing potatoes and the was a field of very small Christmas trees. The farm drive was quite long, they planted baskets attached to the fence. They looked attractive but it would be quite a job to keep them hydrated especially in this warm weather.

As we came to the road we noticed a finger post opposite so we followed the lane, as we came to the road an old man started talking to us. He was quite sad, he said he had been caring for the last 15 years and was now by himself, so he was looking to do something with other people. He asked if we were part of a U3A group. We suggested that he should go to the library to find out about what was going on locally as he didn't have access to a computer.

We had passed a new build on the lane, I had noticed the front door was open, someone was working on the property. As we returned down the lane as we had gone the wrong way, I noticed a for sale sign that said there were two new builds. One had been built near the lane and the other had been built in the back garden of the bungalow. We returned to Booth Bed Lane and walked passed the store.

At the cross roads we went across Main Road into Hermitage Lane, there are plenty of nice houses set back from the road.

On leaving the lane we followed a tree lined path, to the right hand side we could hear loud bird noises, there were a number of large sheds. we wondered if they were chickens laying eggs, but it is actually a turkey farm.

We walked across open fields with short mowed grass, it made the field look very flat.

We didn't see any Holstein Friesian cattle, the next fields were empty of animals at this farm, the grass had been left to grow in the field we crossed, a machine was going up and down the field spraying something on the grass. 

We joined a lane where there was a little traffic, we had to be careful when going around the corners, we crossed the road to make ourselves more visible to drivers.

Jodrell bank radio telescope was visible as we walked across the next field. Always a spectacular sight.

We still needed to have our lunch. We sat on the edge of a field planted with corn and had our lunch. The corn was only about  15- 20 cms tall, it is hard to believe that in a few months the crop will be above our heads.

We went through the churchyard, looking at the gravestone. We passed one gravestone which did not look very old, but it showed that both Miriam and Ellen had died in 1899, Ellen being only four.

We had a wander about Goostrey Home and Leisure.Then we went to the Tea Room for our afternoon tea and cake.