A short one!
Fairy Battle L4997 on Lamb Hill
(Distance covered =
2.2 mile/Ascent =+101 m)
According to the HGRW grid reference this site was immediately adjacent to a road. I searched quite a large area either side of the road on a previous visit but bracken and forestry debris meant that even if the grid ref I had at the time was correct (which it wasn't),I was on a hiding to nothing.
After receiving the correct grid reference I decided to nip back to have another look on the way back from visiting another crashsite on nearby Queensberry Hill. I had failed to find anything at that crashsite and I wasn't too confident of finding anything at this one either as I knew that Dumfries and Galloway Museum had been asked by the landowners to clear all the surface wreckage.
Blueberry Esmerelda Muffin II parked beside the start of what I hoped was the correct forest track.
Even if there was nothing left to see I could at least get a photograph of where the Battle crashed and it was only a very short walk anyways, so nowhere near as bad as walking 10 mile to find nothing, a bit like what had just happened on Queensberry Hill!
Above and below:-As well as being a short walk it was also a pleasant walk, at least the section through the woods was anyway.
It wasn't so pleasant through this felled section.
The person who gave me the correct grid ref also told me there was reported to be pieces of the Battle on the other side of a nearby wall as well. Once I arrived in the area of the crash it was immediatley obvious I was going to find nothing as it was in a felled area of trees. My hopes were raised on several occasion when I spotted something that looked like aircraft alloy only to find after battling through the forestry debris to get closer that it was a bleached bit of timber.
The area where the Battle crashed. On this photo the terrain doesn't look anywhere near as bad as it actually was, with deep drainage ditches, mounds of rotten timber, tree stumps and sharp jagged twigs and branches
plus the nettles!.
Another one for my failures list, but I did find something of interest as I left. Everyone has heard of the town in the UK with the longest name, in case you havn't it's 'llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch', but how many people know which place has the shortest name? well I drove through it on my way back to Dumfries!
Click this link for more information about the crash
Lamb Hill Battle