Expedition 194 - 21st June 2008
The Silver Walk

Our first visit to the Silver Walk since its recent reconstruction, and what a beautiful job they have made of it. I recommend everyone to use it while the weather is good, but you have to be fairly nimble - if you can jump you'll be OK.

We had quite a good day for the expedition but only three explorers, Fern, Robbie L., and Rowan; there were quite a few adults, though: Howard, Pamela, Philippa, Richard and Sharon, plus two dogs, Ellie and Polly. Polly seemed to be pretty old and started the expedition with some apprehension, but she was leading the way before long.

We had a look at the site of the old Dorlin House, by the car park and then walked along the shore past the big Corsican pines to the corner, where everyone had a look at the bed of sea sandwort, which has increased tremendously over the past few years. When we reached the start of the Silver Walk, the young explorers became very excited and it was a job keeping them from running too far in front. I warned them not to waste energy and there was a time later on when they needed it.

The path winds on and on and up and down, with lots of steps and corners and it seemed to take ages before we got to the end of the Briag path and started up through the valley to Port a'Bhata. We stopped at the little wood at the foot of the glen where Fergie's dad used to collect elm twigs and we had a look for the elm tree, with debatable results.

The next part of the expedition became harder and harder for the smaller members of the party since we got into well-grown bracken and they had to stay fairly close to avoid getting lost. We took a difficult route through the village and stopped for our break by a wall next to the shore. I went off to see the biggest of the old houses but there was no way we could get small people through the bracken so we set off through the village from house to house. Judging from the drawings, this was the most exciting part and we all explored several houses before making an arduous climb through the bracken back to the Silver Walk.

On the way back the pace was noticeably slower and we saw a few interesting insects, including a fine beetle on the path, which certainly isn't in my beetle book. At first I thought I only had a picture of the beetle, but later I found a picture of the expedition by the shore.

John Dye