By the side of Melbourne Pool, just downstream from Staunton Harold Reservoir, is an area of woodland on the Melbourne Hall estate called Intake Woods. Have popped through these woods occasionally and been intrigued by this low tunnel that takes overflow from the pool in times of high water...
The bars never looked like shifting, however, but idle curiousity led me to look into where the outfall might be. It turned out to be in an unexpected place, and a night visit had to be arranged. Cue a stoopy, painful, extremely entertaining mooch for nearly two hours ...
The outfall. About four feet high. It only got bigger than this once. Still, at least it was consistent. In we go ...
Looking back out past the sandstone blocks; it's brick all the way down after this part. And lots of it! And lots of spiders too...
As the crow flies, between the outfall and the shaft (the one place you can stand up, more about that later) it's about 150 metres on the surface, but the tunnel bends several times and it's muddy going. Took about 45 minutes to do these bits, maybe I'm just old...
Finally reached the only place to stand, a shaft about three metres deep that is directly beneath the stile into the woods on the surface. As above...
...so below...
Sticks dropped down the gap between the flagstones.
After this point you're under the woods, as the increasing amount of tree roots coming in constantly reminds you!
Having been underground over an hour now, and doing more hands and knees crawling than I like outside of a lead mine, I called it a day at this point.
How far had I gone? God knows. From end to end on the surface it's around a kilometre, but I clearly wasn't at the end; at the same time, it's certainly not a straight line! Rumour has it that at one point there is a junction, and a branch tunnel goes under the pool and towards one of the town's older streets. Don't know if it exists, but it certainly could, and someone more flexible and less knackered than me can go look for it. I still had to get out of the bugger...
Anyway, thanks for looking!
The bars never looked like shifting, however, but idle curiousity led me to look into where the outfall might be. It turned out to be in an unexpected place, and a night visit had to be arranged. Cue a stoopy, painful, extremely entertaining mooch for nearly two hours ...
The outfall. About four feet high. It only got bigger than this once. Still, at least it was consistent. In we go ...
Looking back out past the sandstone blocks; it's brick all the way down after this part. And lots of it! And lots of spiders too...
As the crow flies, between the outfall and the shaft (the one place you can stand up, more about that later) it's about 150 metres on the surface, but the tunnel bends several times and it's muddy going. Took about 45 minutes to do these bits, maybe I'm just old...
Finally reached the only place to stand, a shaft about three metres deep that is directly beneath the stile into the woods on the surface. As above...
...so below...
Sticks dropped down the gap between the flagstones.
After this point you're under the woods, as the increasing amount of tree roots coming in constantly reminds you!
Having been underground over an hour now, and doing more hands and knees crawling than I like outside of a lead mine, I called it a day at this point.
How far had I gone? God knows. From end to end on the surface it's around a kilometre, but I clearly wasn't at the end; at the same time, it's certainly not a straight line! Rumour has it that at one point there is a junction, and a branch tunnel goes under the pool and towards one of the town's older streets. Don't know if it exists, but it certainly could, and someone more flexible and less knackered than me can go look for it. I still had to get out of the bugger...
Anyway, thanks for looking!
