Baldwin

Around Carraghan in the mist

Monday 18th November 2013

We met at St Luke’s church, on the ridge between the east and west Baldwin valleys.  It is a fairly long drive from our glen – up the Mountain Road, along the Brandywell Road and then down the steep hill, past Injebreck House and the dam, and finally up the hill to the church.  There was dense hill fog or low cloud on the Mountain Road near Snaefell but it lifted slightly before we reached the Brandywell junction although the cloud cover still looked almost low enough to reach up and touch.

We decided to reverse the direction in which Trevor had planned to walk so that we wouldn’t have to climb the hill to the church at the end of the hike.  So we started off down the hill towards the dam – retracing the route which we had driven along earlier.  There was a brief patch of sunlight on the lower slopes of Colden.

During the drive down I had noticed that there was a lot of water running down the overflow ramp from the dam.  This wasn’t surprising because we had heavy rain overnight.  I took a quick detour to photograph the River Glass below the dam, flowing under the old stone bridge we had just crossed.

The next quick detour was up some steps to the top of the dam wall.  It was a peaceful scene with just a solitary fisherman on the bank near the yachts – and a single cormorant swimming in the distance.

Further along the road there was a lovely view across the northern part of the dam towards Carraghan.

And a little further on there was a gap in the wall leading to the remains of an old track down towards the dam.  Another short burst of sunlight illuminated the scene.

The next stop was at a pretty little waterfall near the road.  We have stopped off here in the past on hot summer days to let the dogs paddle and cool off in the water.

We continued up the road past Injebreck House and then turned up an old track.  It isn’t a public right or way and it may not be strictly legal to walk up this route any more.  It is included in an old book “Manx Hill Walks” – with the note “This track is a private way, which the landowner kindly permits walkers to use on an occasional basis.”   There may well have been a change of landowner since the book was written but we hoped for the best and headed up the track.

We usually associate mushrooms and toadstools with wooded areas but we walked past numerous patches of fungi on the hillside – probably varieties of waxcap as they are found mainly in grassland and upland pastures.  These were the most spectacular.  The little round caps were bright red as they emerged through the grass and then became paler as they opened up and matured.

Looking back at the view down to the dam in the valley under increasingly ominous clouds.

I was puzzled by the track that we were following.  It seemed to be too wide to be an old packhorse route or a conventional old farm track and care had been taken to construct stone drains under the surface in a few places.  The private gardens of Injebreck House used to be one of the numerous pleasure gardens which opened during the late nineteenth century for the entertainment of Victorian tourists.  We discussed the possibility that our track might have been the original road from the Brandywell Road down into the West Baldwin Valley. The present road (which may have replaced it) turns down near Brandywell Cottage on the other side of Injebreck Hill. 

I left the road to take a photo of the remains of a wall over a drain, built into a small ravine, to take water under the road.  We were approaching the edge of the hill fog/low cloud and were quite close to the Brandywell Road.

The photography came to a standstill for a while as we walked up the Brandywell Road in the patchy fog.  Every now and then there would be a brief patch of distant views to the north but they only lasted for seconds.  I managed to capture a hazy image of Sulby Dam before it disappeared again in the mist.

We passed a signpost indicating a greenway road but decided that it probably wasn’t the correct route because there was no Millennium Way sign.  Then we walked on and on and on along the Brandywell Road.  It was hard to get our bearings in the patchy fog and I was getting anxious, thinking that we had missed the turning and might arrive at the junction with the Mountain Road any minute.  But Trevor was confident about the route and he was right.  We turned right when we finally reached the Millennium Way marker and after a while we reached another sign post.  It marked the junction of the Millennium Way and the greenway road which we had passed earlier.  We could have cut the corner by walking along the greenway road but it had a stony surface and it was probably more comfortable walking along the tarred road.

The surface of the track now became uncomfortably rocky – but at least it was downhill all the way back to St Luke’s.  Carraghan was looming above us on the right but there was no sign of  the alleged “presiding genius” of the mountain,  the legendary little red-cloaked Ben Veg Carraghan wandering the hills with her goose.

Once we were below the clouds we could see down into the green East Baldwin valley on the left.

The track deteriorated further down the hill . . . into a mess of mud, deep ruts, stones and running water.  But had improved again by the time Tim took this photo.

We stopped to take photos at Keeill Abban, the site of an early Tynwald (parliament meeting). 

There was an excursion to this site by 45 members of the Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society on July 24^th 1900.  The members discussed the actual site of the Tynwald as it was alleged by Mr Kelly that the Ordnance Survey Map had marked it in the wrong place.  He said that the real site was well known to all the local inhabitants because the Parish Club used to march around it once a year although this custom had since been abandoned.  It was suggested that the Tynwald was held “on a natural eminence in a commanding situation” which had unfortunately been quarried in order to build St Luke’s Church.  The Society also noted that “It had been a wish of the late Deemster Gill that a stone should be set up to mark the site of this interesting national monument, and, at the meeting held later on, it was resolved that this Society should use its best efforts to have this carried out.”

This is what the site looks like now.

Attached to a large stone set into the ring of stones, which marks the site, is a metal plaque with the inscription

Site of Tynwald

Holden at Killabane

1428.

The plaque must have been erected following “the best efforts” of the IoMNH&AS after their excursion – probably early in the twentieth century and I imagine the stone circle was constructed at the same time.  I hope they built it in the right place.

St Luke’s church is just one field further down the Millennium Way.  It is the last of a series of churches said to be built on the site of an ancient keeill.  Rather confusingly that keeill has the same name as the Tynwald site – Keeill Abban. 

We took some photos of the church from the field just below the stone circle.

The Bishop at the time must have been quite crafty because the building was divided into two sections with a moveable dividing door.  The west wing (on the right in this photo) was a school room and only the eastern chancel end was consecrated.  This meant that most of the costs of building the church could be met from funds allocated for school building.

When we returned to the cars I was puzzled by this sign on the gate into the churchyard.  Someone had painted “Luke’s Gate” on the other gate below the churchyard, which seemed logical given the name of the church – but who is Robbie?

We were lucky with the weather.  The rain, which had been threatening all morning, didn't start until we were  in the cars ready to drive home.

PS  When we returned home I was greeted by our last geriatric dog, Danny  . . . demanding his daily walk!  He didn’t consider the fact that I had been walking all morning (or the fact that it had started raining) was an adequate excuse for postponing or cancelling his walk.  So I had to change into dry boots and go straight out again.