Secrets And By-Ways

Comments on my last post suggested that Hertfordshire looked like the Mid-West of the USA, or maybe parts of Australia. I can see what you mean; at this time of year with crops ripening or harvested there is a similarity - in the shots I've shown you so far at least. So for all of you and especially for Dimple, who liked the old road through the trees, here's another selection of pictures from my walk.

My last post lamented that Hertfordshire had neither mountains, moorlands or coast for the walker to traverse. It does have one little secret though.

This wonder is scattered in discrete fragments over the whole county. There are no visitor centres, guidebooks or TV series singing its praises. You'll have to spend hours gazing at detailed maps to find just traces of it. Even then you might be wrong. But out on foot, every so often, you'll encounter little bits of magic that will raise the spirits and send the imagination cartwheeling. Every so often you'll find roads and tracks, long-forgotten and neglected, that sing of both history and mystery.

To tell the truth they probably cause the local authorities all kinds of headaches for many of them are designated as roads. But you'll see from the photos that they're not suitable for modern traffic! For years they lay unused and unconsidered. The problems started when off-road driving became a possibility. Legally you could take your four-wheel drive vehicle down these tracks, in the process causing untold damage. Expensive changes had to be made to their legal status so that, like the one above, they became "Public restricted by-ways, unsuitable for vehicles".

The great age of these tracks, some are Roman and some may be even older, can be seen by the way that they have become worn deep into the landscape by centuries of travel.

Nowadays they are used by horse-riders, walkers and the occasional cyclist. Also in a few cases agricultural vehicles will use them to access the fields. In places they run alongside fields elsewhere they travel through a green tunnel.

Oak boughs tangle overhead and spread cool shade over the path...

Sometimes the reason for the old road can still be clearly seen; an old quarry perhaps where stone for building was sourced. Or else an ancient wood where the trees have been coppiced; that is cut off close to the ground so that a crop of straight poles is obtained.

A patch of nettles might indicate a former habitation. For some reason nettles like to grow around houses and a bit of poking about sometimes reveals an old post-hole or hearth.

Even nettles can be both interesting and beautiful to some folks!

And here's a Comma butterfly sunning itself. What an exotic shape they are when you take the time to look!

For some people faeries and hobgoblins abound in places like this! I know full well that it's just rabbits and sometimes badgers that make the holes in the earthen banks but that doesn't mean that I don't find magic in these old ways, shady and silent, that run through our land.

Take care.