Tuesday’s Ten – The Redlake Tramway

By: Blonde One

For this week’s Tuesday’s Ten I would like to share some of the amazing and interesting things that you will find if you take a walk along the old Redlake Tramway track which snakes north west from Shipley Bridge towards Redlake tip and lake. It’s a slow climb of about 200 meters along a nicely accessible track.

Here’s just some of the things that we found along the way:

1. Every now and then there are boundary stones to the side of the track. These would be reassuring if it was a bit misty.

2. Amazing views; especially as you get towards the top of the track.

3. Remnants of industrialisation. We found slabs of granite with little stumps of metal embedded and also granite with nice neat holes.

4. We found a very pleasing looking bog. Although we were definitely not tempted to jump in!

5. As we approached Redlake we found the cairn at Western White Barrow (or Western Whittaburrow).

6. The summit of the cairn revealed the remains of a building. Investigation upon our return revealed that it was a shelter for the peat cutters that used to work there.

7. The remains of Petre’s Cross can be found just to the side of the cairn although it looks more like a boundary stone than a cross.

8. We eventually crossed the path of the Two Moor’s Way, near to the top of the track. This is an equally interesting section of moorland and has much to recommend it.