Darcy Lever Gravel Pits

24th July

Journey Length 5.0ml

Click here for route

An extremely hot evening determined our expedition for tonight, after cycling home from work I contacted Graham and we agreed due to the extreme weather we would limit our ride, so I decided that we could explore the gravel pits around Darcy Lever.
We met up on Hall lane where the canal used to cross over the viaduct, from here we back tracked slightly and followed the paths around the rear of Little Lever school and behind Bowness Road and followed the path and down the very steep hill to Blackshaw Brook and across the little bridge, here we were unsure which way to turn and typically we chose the wrong direction and had to do a u-turn and head along a path towards Radcliffe Road but the path bent to the left and back towards Darcy Lever , it was a very narrow path and not suited to cycling but we were not going to turn back and battled on through chest height foliage.Soon we came out onto Croftside and turned left down the lane which led us to Old Hall Farm and a dead end, so once again we made a u-turn, being explorers this often happens. We had noticed a opening back along the lane and when we got there it was one of the entrances to the gravel pits, now I knew where I was so off down the paths we went, myself leading the way.
Leading Graham around this area I took him on a little tour.

Firstly we went past the back of the farm and down to one of the ponds where you can see dragonflies and there is a wooded sculpture of a dragon fly. From here we circled around back to the tow path and back into the gravel pits further along to explore more of the ponds and to see the wildlife, but unfortunately for us the ponds we very low due to the recent hot weather so there was nothing really to see.
Earlier I had told Graham that there are Roe deer in this area and has he had never seen them and I had previously seen them in this area he asked me to show him. We set off down from the canal to the path that runs along side with the river, part way down the path there was a small wooden bench, here we turned left up a very narrow path up the hill to the open land above the cutting, this is where previously I had seen Roe deer on numerous occasions, but this was not to be one of those occasions.
We returned to the tow path of the canal and crossed the now filled in canal up the hill to another small area of the gravel pits, passing through this area we came out into a field, as cross this along a path that was parallel to the canal which brought us out onto Radcliffe Road.

Now with the heat and exercise we felt in need of some refreshment , and so there was no choice but to call in the Farmers Arms (which just happens to be my local) to partake in a refreshing Fosters. After being thoroughly refreshed we went our separate ways home until next time.