Don’t misunderstand me; I like civilisation, I really do. I like that my grand-daughter Micaela can walk down the street without needing to actively fear every man that walks past, or worry about being pounced on by a sabre-toothed tiger, or a cave-lion. There are just so many benefits, like amoeba-free water plumbed direct into the home, lots of shops with shelves full of food good to eat, and maps of the area freely available. It’s all excellent stuff, even if it’s just the Matrix.

So why do I miss wild woods? With wolves, and deer running free? Possibly it is the Austrian blood from my mother calling to me, or perhaps because I have finally reached the edge of Nottingham’s suburban housing (Spring Lane), but at my last mapping session I was able to stand within Gedling Country Park and gaze from the high sierra south across a vista of naturally-seeded trees (please forgive my whimsy) and gain a hint of what the long-gone Sherwood Forest might have looked like:–

However, make the most of it, for the Gedling Access Road (GAR) is coming (GAR Diary), and many of those trees are lambs awaiting the slaughter so that tomorrow’s civilisation can embed itself yet more firmly into today. That brown scar beyond the trees in the photograph below is land being made ready for the Arnold Lane interchange with the GAR:–

The developers have agreed 2 years to complete the GAR, starting spring 2017. Apart from a couple of decades of development blight, nothing has been seen until this work on the interchange.

I reached this part of Nottingham in my mapping schedule two weeks ago & realised that the whole area was due for dramatic change very soon. There were a couple of things that I wanted to photograph before they were gone, and gave myself yesterday (Sunday 28 May) to do it.

1. Chase Farm + Cottage

Chase Farm is possibly named for being built within Thorneywood Chase (originally owned by the King & stocked with red & fallow deer, and thus the area had a history of hunts, horses & dogs + poachers such as Robin Hood). It is one of the two farms that has been blighted by the GAR (Glebe Farm is the other). Unlike Glebe Farm, which still has horses in the eastern fields & an energetic lady that visits them, Chase Farm has been entirely deserted, as has all the fields that it once farmed. The access track for the farm ran from Mapperley Plains; the council has had to block that track due to fly-tipping at the farm. Both farm & cottage are now sad sights:–

2. Mapperley Tunnel

The Pepperpots’ tunnel approach lay deep within a gorge of trees, with the former track-bed up to 20 feet (7m) below the top of the cutting. If you decide to explore it yourself then be warned that, once off the official tracks, there are zero fences to prevent a precipitous fall to the floor. Also, do not be a fool like myself & wear light-coloured trousers & street-shoes; Clarks are comfortable shoes & remind me fondly of Street in Somerset, but are mostly useless for exploring muddy forests (if it has been raining recently then probably best not to bother, as the access is down steeply-pitched slopes; you may get down but not back up).

Until I surveyed it I did not realise that there are two cuttings that run parallel to each other. The first I followed is to the north & seems to lead to a blank, dead-end. The second cutting to the south leads to the tunnel entrance, and most dark & spooky it was. There is already an exploration into the tunnel available on the internet (and Wikipedia), but I only went 10 foot inside at the most!

Update 2 July 2022

Mapillary has changed it’s download URLs & therefore all links within my diaries that use photos stored in Mapillary are broken. I’m slowly going through to update them. The new URLs are terrifyingly long, but show OK on my screen (and I hope also on yours).