A little bit of a scramble.
Avro Lancaster NF963 at Ellingstring
(Distance covered =
0.3 mile/Ascent =+19m)
and
HP Halifax
JB926 at Slipstone Crags.
(Distance covered =
1.34 mile/Ascent =+107m)
My grandson Theo along with his dad had already visited a couple of crashsites with me and had thoroughly enjoyed what to him was a bit of an adventure. He's only 5 and hasn't yet got much of a range but as he was keen to go on another adventure I had a bit search around for some more shorter wreckhunting walks that might be suitable for him.
I found 4 crashsites down in north yorkshire that were pretty close to roads so we set off down there on a nice sunny weekend in may of 2023. The tactics for this day were going to be the same as my trip to the peak district in June of 2021, where I had a list of 7 crashsites to visit. My plan back then was to go to the first one on the list and then keep moving on to the next one until daylight or my energy ran out. On this day we had a list of 4.
Amanda the Panda parked up above the Village
of Ellingstring.
The first crashsite on the list for this day was an Avro Lancaster that came to grief less than half a mile from the nearest road. This meant it was well within Theo's range but it would also mean there was most probably very little wreckage left thanks to easy access to clear the site at the time and easy access for 'Magpies' in the interim years.
Theo and his Dad off up the track to search for remains of
NF963.
As it was so near to a road and as there was a marker stone in situ it didn't take very long to reach and to find this one, but unfortunately my prediction that there would be very little wreckage left was correct, in fact there was no sign of any wreckage.
Above and next two photos:-Marker stone and plaque on the edge of a crater on the moor.
Back at the car with plenty of time and energy to move on to the second crashsite on the days itinerary.
An old milk churn at the edge of the field.
The second walk of the day was not to far a drive down the road; I had predicted that parking was going to be an issue here but luckily there was just enough space to squeeze the little Panda onto the grass verge at the location where the path we needed to follow met the road. Although not as roomy as my Shitroen C4 Grand Picasso, the Panda was proving much more suitable for visiting crashsites where narrow roads and limited parking might to be encountered. Not to mention it uses less diesel as well and is much more fun to drive on narrow windey roads.
Amanda
the Panda parked up at the start of walk two.
This one, although a mile longer than walk one was still a relatively short walk but that didn't stop the little fella from having a bit of a whinge on the way up that it was too far; until that is, he got his eye on some people doing a bit of bouldering on the crags in the distance which gave him some incentive to push on as he had decided he wanted to have a go at that.
Above and next two photos:-Making our way up to Slipstone Crags.
above and below:-Approaching the crags.
Negotiating some quite deep heather below Slipstone Crags.
I thought this crashsite was going to be quite hard to find as on approaching the area we encountered a covering of quite deep heather. There was a lot of paths that had been created presumably by people making there way between the large boulders that littered the area and luckily one of these path passed right by the crashsite of the Halifax, which consisted of a small pile of wreckage which had been collected together and a couple of bare patches of earth containing smaller pieces.
Most of what remained of Halifax JB926 had been collected together in this little pile.
Above and next 3 photos:- Having a scramble around on Slipstone Crags.
After spending quite a while exploring the crags and doing a bit of boulder climbing we decided to leave visiting crashsite number 3 and 4 on our days itinerary until another occasion as time was getting on and as it had been a scorching hot day we were thoughtful of how much trouble we would be in if we let the little man get sunburnt.
above and next 3 photos:-View of Slipstone Crags and the area where JB926 crashed.
Above and next 6 photos:- Making our way back down to car after a very enjoyable but warm stroll around Slipstone Crags.
