Sunday 29th September 2013-09-30
We don’t usually walk on a Sunday but Trevor and Dorothy are in Ireland for two weeks so we could just pick any day that suited us – and Sunday had the best weather forecast. Strong winds were predicted but at least it promised to be dry with sunny spells. The strong winds are expected to last at least until Thursday so there was no point in waiting for calmer weather.
We started from the parking area at Tholt-y-Will and walked down the road towards Sulby. The gate by the footbridge over the river near the Craft Centre was taped shut and there was a notice saying that Tholt-y-Will Glen was closed due to fallen trees. The notice looked as though it had been up since the blizzard in March. Trevor and Dorothy mentioned last week that most of Glen Helen is closed too – so our choice of “autumn leaves” walks is going to be limited this year. I expect it will be a long time before the glens are cleared because government cuts have had an impact on the manpower available to deal with the problem.
As we walked down the road, Tim stopped to take a photo of the Irish cottages – now one house and called Irish Cottage.
This is the photo that he took on Sunday . . .
. . . and this is how the scene appeared in an old postcard. According to George E. Quayle “ . . . between the road and the river we come to two little cottages known as The Irishmen’s Cottages. Irishmen probably lived and worked here when the stone walls were being built at the time of the Enclosure of the Common Lands.” I tried to get a shot from the place where the old photo was taken but the house was completely obscured by trees.
When we reached Killabrega Cottage we discovered that a new fence had been erected and we were no longer able to turn off up the zig-zag path on the southern side of the cottage. We walked past the cottage and noticed a new gate on the far side of the little garden on the north side of the cottage. The gate led to the hillside beyond and the grass looked as though people had walked across it from the road to the gate. So we walked through the garden. The zig zag path dates back to the 1930’s when the last resident of Killabrega Farm moved down to the cottage in the glen. He walked up this path every day to feed his hens up at the old farm. The next photo was taken from the path and shows the back of the cottage. You may just be able to make out the gate on the left of a small tree but it is almost completely hidden by the bracken which was about head high. I tried to take a photo of Tim who was walking ahead of me up the track but only the top of his cap was visible.
A little further on I caught up with Tim because he had stopped to look at this hairy caterpillar on the path. I have often seen them out at the Ayres but never before on a bracken covered hillside. I think it is a fox moth caterpillar.
Eventually we battled through to the stile at the top of the zig-zag path and I balanced rather precariously on the stile and took this photo down into the glen . . .
. . . and this photo across the little stream to the lower slopes of Mount Karrin and a rather good stone wall which may have been built by the Irishmen. The leaves on the bracken are starting to change from green to gold in a rather patchy way.
There was another large patch of bracken to wade through before we reached the sloping grassy fields below the farm.
It was still uphill all the way but not nearly as steep as the beginning of the climb from the road. We soon caught sight of the tops of the trees near the farm buildings. Before all the conifer plantations were planted after the second World War, there were very few trees on the upland farms apart from those growing along streams and a few around the farm buildings. So a group of trees is usually evidence of previous habitation.
We spent some time examining the farm buildings but I will describe them in the following post and will continue with the walk.
We decided to walk back along the Druidale Road so we crossed the fields behind the farm, and Tim took this photo of the farm with Mount Karrin in the background.
The wind was strong and gusty. I was interested in these clumps of small rushes growing amongst the heather. They appeared to be green at the base and a sort of coppery bronze above. They shimmered as they waved about, almost flattened at times by the stronger gusts of wind.
The wind was unpleasantly strong on the road, once we passed the shelter of the trees, so we turned down into the plantation and followed the track to Sherragh Vane, another old farmhouse, that is best known for being described in T.E. Brown’s poem “Kitty of the Sherragh Vane”. By the path, near the gate into the plantation we saw a speckled wood butterfly. There are only a few butterflies flying in the garden now but the speckled woods seem to be staying around longer than most.
Little remains of Sherragh Vane which is now surrounded by a conifer plantation but we stopped to take a few photos.
And then we headed downhill, following the path that leads back to the Old Chapel near the parking area. On the way we passed this block of quartz. It is one of these rocks which gave the name to Sherragh Vane, which means “white foal” in Manx. It is easy to mistake these large pieces of quartz for a white animal if you see them in the distance.
The steep path passed many fallen trees.
And just before we reached the car I saw this rather handsome toadstool at the side of the path.
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