cumbria

Yum! Brands expanded its Pizza Hut operations into the UK in 1973, and the restaurant was a success between friends and family looking to dig in. A few sites were built across Cumbria, but eventually only one survived through to 2025. However, following some troubles with administration, in...

In the middle of the forest in Cumbria, we found an old American school bus, an Accrington double decker school bus, loads of vans and land rovers. Going by the tax discs these have all been here over 20 years, dead sheep in the last pic.

Some sandstone quarries and mines in Garsdale, dots on the picture below. The red dots are big enough to have some underground, the orange ones are just small open excavations (not pictured below). I haven’t found any photos or history for these, just names on maps with the quarries/mines shown...

Gisland Hall Hotel in Carlisle, Cumbria. This was possibly one of the best explores i have done to date - a huge site with hardly any vandalism at all, no smashed windows (other than to try gain access) or graffiti to my suprise and very easy access! This hotel has 74 rooms, a bar, function...

The former Wesleyan Methodist Church barrow in furness Cumbria Built and opened in 1862, it was enlarged in 1870, and closed in 1935. More recently it has been in use as a nightclub from the late 80s known as Cee Pees and then Eclipse and Scorpio and finally Skint with a couple of other very...

A roundup of the remaining pumps in Cumbria, collected over several years on the way to mills or mines. The success rate was about 40% based on old maps, but this figure is only approximate since the labelling is not reliable - in practice you have to look at everything that might be water...

More mines on the western escarpment of the North Pennines. These are two minor sites on a mineralised vein which runs through the scar above Melmerby - the red dots are levels (tunnels, adits) marked on old maps. Lead has been extracted here since at least the early 1700s although apparently...

Another old mine up a valley in the Lake District. This one is very small, last worked in the 1870s, with the output for one year (1854) recorded as 4.5 tonnes of smelted lead. I haven’t found any underground pictures but there are two short levels (red dots) with a ‘graphite trial’ (pink dot)...

A couple of old lead mines in the Grisedale Valley near Ullswater. As usual it wasn’t clear if there was much underground to explore here, so the only thing to do was to go and look. The place is easy to get to, following one of the numerous paths which lead up to Helvellyn and neighbouring...

History A bit of history taken from the RAF’s site. RAF Spadeadam's first connection with modern defence came in the late 1950s when it was chosen as the site of the test establishment for the 'Blue Streak', Britain's intended Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM). Until then, the area...

Another mine on the western escarpment of the North Pennines, the next one along from Dufton, Scoredale and Long Fell. Like others it started as a lead mine before switching to barytes when demand for this grew, eventually producing > 200,000 tonnes. Although information can be found on most of...

Located up a valley a few miles north of Scoredale, these mines are rather similar to the ones there, Report - - Scordale Lead Mines (Cumbria, 2020-2022) | Mines and Quarries. As usual there were no pictures of anything, so I got some old mine plans and went for a couple of walks to see what...

A small barytes mine on a hill just south of Scoredale in the North Pennines. I did it after looking at the lead mines in Scoredale, which in later years were also worked for barytes: https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/scordale-lead-mines-cumbria-2020-2022.132561/ History. Long Fell...

First off I know this has been covered a million time but I’ve always wanted to visit! Thankfully we picked a really clear day to go yesterday and I couldn’t be happier with how the day went. Also massive thank you to Bobdobina for the help as well! There is a direct path that takes you to the...

A wet and soggy through trip from the Brownley Hill Mine, ending up a few miles away at the Nentsbury Hag Mine - many of the workings cross over the county boundary into Northumberland. . Entrance to the Horse Level at Brownley Hill The narrow tunnel soon opens up to bigger and better things...