Gopsall Temple Geocache

Quite often whilst out Geocaching we are taken to a real gem of a place that we (and most other people) didn’t know existed. Whether it is a circular walk in the countryside or to a place of special interest, Geocaching has given us the opportunity to visit some very special places, brought to us by the owners of the caches. We were out and about geocaching back in June when I spotted a cache located in small woodland located between Twycross and Congerstone in Leicestershire. I quickly read some of the previous logs and it quickly came apparent that this was going to be one of the special places.

Geocaching at Gopsall Temple

We parked the car nearby and had a short walk across fields to the woodland which was beautiful. The Rhododendrons were in flower and the whole woodland had a beautiful untouched feel about it. Not surprising really because it was off the beaten track and people would need to make that little bit of extra effort to visit it.

Gopsall Temple Woodland

We continued our walk towards GZ and as we approached I couldn’t believe what I saw. Bearing in mind this place was not sign posted and not really marked on the map. Gopsall Temple is a Grade II listed building and it is said that George Frederick Handel closeted himself within the temple for 3 weeks during August/September 1741 to write his masterpiece “The Messiah”.

Gopsall Temple

Gopsall Temple is a place of historical importance, set within a beautiful woodland and a place that we probably would not have visited if it wasn’t for Geocaching.

Mick

Public right of way?

It amazes me sometimes whilst we are going on our Geocaching walks as to how often the footpaths are often blocked by the actions of farmers. The majority are fine, and it is the minority but it does sometimes make experiencing the delights of the countryside very difficult. Other examples of not just blocking the public right of way, but making things difficult include planting crops over the footpath, increasing the height of stiles and even blocking or preventing dogs from passing through stiles.

We were recently Geocaching around the village of Twycross (which is famous for its zoo) in Warwickshire when we came across this:

Geocaching around Twycross - Electric fence blocking the path

It is a little difficult to tell from the photo but the footpath had an electric fence passing across it. There was no way of walking to the other side of the field (as indicated by the waymarker). We had to either straddle over the electric fence (ouch) or crawl under it (which we did).

The other side of the field we were presented with a locked gate. A sign on the other side of the road points towards the gate indicating a public footpath, so we knew it was the correct way through. But has it been maintained as a public right of way. NO! We had to climb over the gate to get to the other side!

Geocaching around Twycross - Locked gate preventing footpath access

This Geocaching hobby certainly gives us a workout! As well as the miles of walking, there is the climbing, straddling, ducking and sometimes diving (especially when the bovine residents are approaching at speed)!

Mick

Caches that look like cars, trucks and other vehicles

We found a lovely cache that I wanted to share whilst doing the Ratby Burroughs series of caches back in June of this year. The Ratby Burroughs round follows a figure of eight walk starting and finishing in the village of Ratby in Leicestershire.

Geocaching around Ratby Burroughs

We had a lovely day walking this route and plenty of interesting caches were available. I love it when cache owners put some thought into their cache containers rather than the usual pre-bought containers. This one in particular was a lovely example of a cache that had been made to look like a truck.

Geocaching - truck cache

It was actually a toy truck that had the cache container strapped to the back portion. The cache was also located in its own parking lot (a hole under a tree) and I found it quite amusing when I saw it.

Mick

Geocaching around the Austrey amble

I have fallen so behind with my Geocaching diary this summer so this is the start of a catch up of all the trips we have made. This one goes back to early June when we were looking forward to a full days Geocaching around the Austrey amble. The Austrey amble starts at the village of Austrey in Warwickshire and takes a circular route through the countryside passing through the village of Newton Regis. The whole route is intersected by the M42 motorway which made what could have been a wonderful walk into something not so pleasant.

Austrey amble

I didn’t really take any photos of the area during the walk and there was a good reason for that; I didn’t find it very nice! The M42 motorway was quite dominant for much of the walk, there was even a cache placed on top of a motorway bridge which I felt was quite disturbing! Having said that, With 34 Geocaches to pick up along the way, there was bound to be some unusual cache containers to find so that is the only things I took photos of...

This cache container was disguised as a plastic penguin; this was quite amusing when we eventually spotted it peeking out from beneath the bushes.

Penguin geocache container

This skull cache container was equally as amusing but not quite so cute, but still a very inventive and unusual container.

Skull geocache container

By coincidence I was only looking at this pinecone cache container online the evening before the walk. I think they are quite popular but it is the first one of its kind that we have found so far.

Pinecone geocache container

Apologies again for not having any pictures of the area itself but I will leave that to your imagination. I also need to add that quite a few of the footpaths around the Austrey amble were not very well maintained. Many of the footpaths didn’t even have way markers, were overgrown and made the amble into more of slog!

Mick

Geocaching marathon – Bruntingthorpe parish ramble

Ok, the weekend didn’t start too brilliantly. On the Saturday we decided to do a series of caches around Broughton Astley. We entered the second field and were immediately charged by a group of Cows; hearts pounding we managed to cross the field and shut the gate behind us just in time. There was a 10ft gap followed by another gate which led into another cow field; these cows also came running over to us and we were now hemmed in by two groups of cows who were not moving. We had to climb over several sets of barbed wire fences (over which I managed to rip my trousers between the legs) and bypassed the fields. This has now given us a serious phobia for certain types of cows and we now plan our routes a little more carefully!

Bruntingthorpe Parish Ramble

We wanted a full day out Geocaching on Sunday, so after a lot of careful planning (reading previous cache logs to make sure there were no cows), we decided to do the Bruntingthorpe parish ramble. This was going to be quite a Geocaching marathon for us since it is a 7 mile circular route with 31 caches and took us about 6 hours to complete; I am very proud of my little boy who didn’t moan once while we walked it and it was quite a hot day too. The route started at a lovely village called Arnesby and passed through the equally beautiful villages of Shearsby, Bruntingthorpe and Peatling Magna.

Unusual Cache Containers

With over 30 Geocaches to find on this marathon we would inevitably find some very unusual cache containers. The first unusual container we came across was this water drain cover. This had us scratching our heads for ages and then Angela picked it up from within some long grass and there it was hidden underneath.

Water drain cover cache container

And this Geocache was hidden within a mobile phone case that was placed within a tree!

Mobile phone geocache

We had never searched for Geocaches within a churchyard before so this was another first; this cache was hidden behind a gravestone that was propped up against the church wall.

Churchyard Geocaching - Cache behind a gravestone

We finished the round trip by returning to the village of Arnesby. The village has a lovely privately owned windmill that we could see for much of the route.

Arnesby windmill

And the last cache of the day was located within an old red telephone box that had been converted into a book swap for the village.

Old red telephone box geocache

What a great day we had around Bruntingthorpe and we got back to a well earned rest.

Mick

Pixar Movie Geocaches

Whilst looking for possible Geocaching routes last weekend I noticed a new series of caches had been published around the village of Ashby Parva. There had been thirteen caches hidden in a circular route through the fields surrounding the town. The series of caches were all based upon the Pixar movies; so being a fan of their movies we thought it would be quite fun to do.

Geocaching around Ashby Parva

So we set off with our picnic packed and parked the car in the centre of Ashby Parva. A short walk through a couple of fields led us to the first of the caches then we were greeted by these beautiful animals, not sure whether they are Llamas or Alpacas, but they are so cute!

Llamas at Ashby Parva

We continued our walk and through the fields surrounding Ashby Parva and met lots and lots of sheep and new-born lambs. There were lots of ‘baa’ sounds coming from us as we marched across the fields.

Sheep at Ashby Parva

Pixar Movie Cache Containers

As mentioned before, the Geocaching route was based upon the great Pixar movies and many of the cache containers were also Pixar movie characters. So we had the Alien for Toy Story turned into a cache container:

Toy Story Alien cache container

A Mr Potato Head from Toy Story cache container:

Toy Story Mr Potato Head cache container

The character Emile from the movie Ratatouille Geocache container:

Ratatouille 'Emile' cache container

The awesome Nemo from the movie Finding Nemo cache container:

Finding Nemo cache container

...and finally a small bird house representing the movie ‘Up’ cache container:

Birdhouse cache container

We also had cache containers disguised as characters from the movie Cars and even WALL-E. We had such a great time Geocaching around Ashby Parva and it was great to be reminded of such great films. To date Pixar have produced the following films:

Toy Story
A Bug's Life
Toy Story 2
Monsters, Inc.
Finding Nemo
The Incredibles
Cars
Ratatouille
WALL-E
Up
Toy Story 3
Cars 2
Brave

It is difficult to pick a favourite but if I had to I would have to say WALL-E, who is such a loveable character, a great story and the message regarding mass consumerism and littering our planet is priceless!

What is your favourite Pixar movie?

Mick

Geocaching around Baddesley Common

Following our last visit a few weeks ago to Baddesley Ensor we decided to return last weekend and do some more Geocaching in the area. Baddesley Common is located adjacent to the village of Baddesley Ensor and for centuries was the site of a colliery and to this day there is still evidence of the mining activities around the common.

Geocaching around Baddesley Common

On arriving at the common we saw two stone benches and a bird bath, each one was beautifully carved giving evidence of the mining history for the area.

Baddesley Common stone bench

Baddesley Common still has a huge amount of evidence from its industrial past and it is a shame to see quite a lot of it being consumed by nature and neglected. This was the main entrance to the colliery, now sealed up with a concrete slab. It is such a shame that the tunnel is not maintained and maybe opened for special guided tours.

Baddesley Colliery entrance

I managed to get a photograph through the small opening within the doorway and it looks beautiful inside with the red brick archway of the tunnel. It is a shame this has to be hidden away behind a concrete slab.

Baddesley Colliery entrance tunnel

Next to the old entrance to Baddesley Colliery we found one of our first Geocaches on the common. Quite fittingly the location was marked by an old rusty Miners lamp.

Baddesley Common miners lamp

Further along we discovered this beautiful bridge that was built to pass over the Baddesley colliery railway. We stopped for quite a long time here whilst having a picnic.

Baddesley Colliery railway bridge

I spent quite some time admiring the workmanship that had gone into the brickwork of the bridge. A fantastic relic of our industrial past and it is quite sad to see it being left to ruin.

Baddesley Colliery railway bridge brickwork

We had a great day walking around Baddesley Common and look forward to returning one day. The common is only 15 minutes away from where we live and I don’t think we would have ever visited it if it wasn’t for Geocaching.

Mick