Burial mounds and ancient tracks in Dorset

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We're walking along an ancient track towards the summit of what many local people consider the highest hill in Dorset.
Pilsdon Pen.

But in recent years, this flat-topped landmark has been usurped by its tree-clad neighbour, Lewesdon Hill. Ordnance Survey insists Pilsdon is 909ft, some six inches shorter than Lewesdon (below).
 
Despite the evidence to the contrary, people who have lived here all their lives will tell you Pilsdon is the taller of the two. The Cow to Lewesdon's Calf, as sailors used to call them.

Whatever the truth, in the grand scheme of things, neither is very tall.

But the two ancient hillforts stand like sentinels over the Marshwood Vale.

From this side of Pilsdon, we look out across to Somerset.
 
 
On a clear day, we can see Glastonbury Tor and the Mendips.

There are Bronze Age burial mounds at Pilsdon Pen. And on the trackway on its north west flank, something much more recent.
That's about it.

Love Maddie x

Comments

  1. Irish Eyes2 June 2015 at 13:15

    I have puffed and panted my way up through the burial mounds, hillforts and memorial tablets with you; owing to the bad weather the arthritis is playing up so I wasn't quite quick enough to stand beside you and share the view. I have also been for a stroll past the safely grazing sheep and a little further back. I have thoroughly enjoyed every step of my journey. You paint such a wonderful word picture of all you see around you. I love it, you take us with you.

    I can indeed see an escapee to the country going absolutely wild about that lovely house; my fear would be that they might try to "make it more contemporary"; a current trend that I abhor. An elderly architect friend of my Mother once told me "play to the strength of the building. Art Deco to Art Deco, Tudor to Tudor and don't stick a box full of glass onto something that has withstood wind, rain and storm for a couple of hundred years". Wise words. I'll, as Arnie says, be back. X

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. maddie2 June 2015 at 13:59

      Lovely to have you back here, Irish Eyes. That house from my last post is indeed lovely, if a little dilapidated. But it all adds to the richness of the place and everything around me. Glad to have you on the journey and, no, you didn't slow me down. X

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