Bill's Walks

Round the East Durham Reserves

Filed under: Other

Distance: 12 miles

Start: Shadforth Village Green, DH6 1LJ (GR NZ 345410)

Click to view start position on Google Maps

The original reason for this walk was to make people aware of an attractive and relatively small area where there is a wealth of special plant life as well as an abundant number and variety of birds. When this is added to the industrial heritage of the area there is always plenty to observe and enjoy here. This area also illustrates the excellent work carried out by Durham County Council and other bodies in clearing up the quite recent eyesores of past mining and quarrying activities and then at the same time creating some of the nature reserves that are visited or passed on this walk.

When l first mentioned to several people that l had been walking footpaths around Cassop, Kelloe and Shadforth, few of them knew where I meant and in some ways this is understandable as this area a few years ago was the scene of much desolation and had no main roads go through it. There are superb views to be enjoyed here of Durham Cathedral and later in the walk distant views of the Cleveland Hills and the Pennines.

The locals themselves have been very involved in the changes hereabouts and this is evident in Shadforth where we start the walk. Some time ago Durham County Council produced an excellent booklet entitled “Of Wooded Vales and Limestone Hills” which gives detailed descriptions of what to see in the area and parts of this walk involves routes given in this booklet. The special emphasis in this area is the magnesium limestone grasslands which are very rare internationally and are home to a very specific and rare collection of plants. A special book “Magical Meadows and the Durham Magnesium Limestone” has also been produced by Durham County Council to highlight this area which is a “jewel in the crown” of the regions diversity. Indeed of the 307 hectares of Magnesium Grassland some 279 hectares are protected as SSSI’s.

Shadforth , where the walk starts, is an old village appearing in the Boldon Book of 1183 the name deriving from shallow ford. It is a green village with a long village green similar to Tudhoe, Staindrop etc and has an active Local History Group. Among their achievements has been the restoration of the village green and the erection of Interpretation Boards. We start by heading due west out of the village ignoring the other bridleway which goes south for a short disatnce and will be reached later in the walk. Our path leads to the site of Shadforth Mill although we leave it before reaching the site near Shadforth Beck. Note the work that has been done by the village creating a small reserve that has transformed a marshy area and created two ponds. The boardwalks here are very useful and here we take the one on the left which follows a hedge round to the left before heading south.

You soon join the bridleway (which you ignored earlier in the village) where you turn left back towards Shadforth and after about 30 metres take the footpath on the right which heads south uphill to Running Waters quarry which is now worked out. Ahead is an awkward concrete stile, a shade to the left, which is crossed and then follow the field slightly south east to the farm of Cassop Smithy. Take great care crossing the busy and fast moving A181 here to take the minor road to Old Cassop. This hamlet also goes back to the 11th Century and the aforementioned Boldon Book produced by Bishop de Pudsey who was the Bishop of Durham at the time. This is a Conservation village and the old cart building on your right has been sensitively restored.

Continue through the village climbing slowly up after the road turns south. After half a mile on the descent take the first footpath on the left which leads to Cassop Vale Nature Reserve. This is a good footpath and you have a wood on your left slightly up the hill. This area was the site of Cassop Vale Colliery which was sunk in 1840 and closed in 1868. In winter this is a good area for fieldfare and redwings feeding on hawthorn berries but thrushes are now rarely seen here. Continuing along the footpath you come to Cassop Bogs which is a SSSI. The pond, which was formed by mining subsidence, can contain several common species of duck such as mallard, teal, coot, waterhen and little grebe but I have yet to see a water rail which can appear here. This was balanced by seeing a goshawk here some years ago. Cassop Colliery was situated here and operated from 1836 to 1878.

For those in need of sustenace the village of Cassop (formerly New Cassop) has a shop and a pub (which serves good cask ale) and the village is visible just ahead up the concrete road. If you go to the village you can go west along the road to a footpath which goes to Beacon Hill and Crowtrees. However it is better to go sharp right westwards before you start the ascent to the village and take the footpath through Big Wood which is part of the Nature Reserve and is Ancient Woodland. i.e. it has been in existence prior to 1600. In Quarrington Hill is Littlewood, also a Nature Reserve opposite Cassop School which has won awards for its environmental credentials. Big Wood is best in springtime with a good display of bluebells.

A short climb brings you to the road near to the Heather Lad pub. This pub is quite nostalgic for me as in the late 1950s my cycling club (The Newcastle and Gateshead Clarion) used the nearby Quarrington Hill for their hill climbing competition. The pub has never changed in my lifetime staying in the same family but for how long it can survive in the current climate is debateable.

Walking towards Quarrington Hill you pass St Paul’s Churchyard which is managed for wildlife as over 70 species of native wildflowers and grasses grow among the graves and this illustrates what this area would have looked like before the onset of modern farming practices. St Paul’s Church was built in 1868, when the local population was much higher due to all the coal mines, and was then demolished in 1993 due to subsidence, and indeed the churchyard itself has recently also been closed due to the subsidence.

At the start of the houses take the footpath on your right next to the Interpretation Board. The footpath on the left comes down here from Beacon Hill next to the houses. Beacon Hill is so named as there was a beacon here ready to be lit should an invasion occur during the Napoleonic Wars. You have now entered a reclamation area planted with trees which is part of Crowtrees Nature Reserve managed by Durham County Council. The old quarry face to the north next to the graveyard is interesting and again this is a good area for birds with several finch species seen here regularly. Not a bad area for owls either with little owl and tawny owls about as well as birds of prey including buzzard. The Interpretation Board at the entrance highlights the mining history as there were two mines in this vicinity. Heugh Hall Colliery near to Old Quarrington opened in 1840 and closed in 1897 and was once owned by William Hedley of Puffing Billy fame while Crowtrees Colliery down in the valley was sunk in 1820 and also closed in the 1890s. Part of the shaft supports are all that is left of this mine.

The track reaches the road at the west end of Quarrington Hill and the path directly across the road is taken again through an area of newly planted trees. Follow the footpath, which goes round the back of the houses, and after about 400 yards take any of the paths on the right through the trees and keep south to get to Kelloe, where you emerge onto a housing estate. These houses are designed on a crescent which is followed to the right down to the main road. This is crossed and a footpath through a new iron gate is followed downhill to a footbridge over Kelloe Beck. Here is the trackbed of the old Clarence Railway which transported coal from the area to Port Clarence on the Tees. It is now a good path which is followed east crossing a road and then coming out at an open cemetery site with sculptured artwork relating to the coal mine of East Hetton Colliery. Nearby is a plaque commemorating ten men killed in an inundation of water at the pit. East Hetton was operated from 1837 right up to 1983 and at its peak employed 1100 men and boys. Some of the pits were interconnected and indeed some survivors of the Trimdon Grange Explosion escaped from Trimdon Grange via East Hetton. The sculpture shows a simulated entrance to a mine and the columns are decorated with the miners tokens which were used to know who was in the mine at any particular time. East Hetton operated at a depth of 900 feet. Alan Price of The Animals fame made a popular record of a song written by Tommy Armstrong of Tanfield near Beamish (The Pitman Poet)called “The Trimdon Grange Explosion”. Armstrong’s grave at Tanfield is visited on one of the walks starting at Beamish and versions of this song by both Alan Armstrong and Louis Killen can be found on YouTube. Well worth a listen!

Next and immediately over the road is St Helen’s Church which is a beauty in a lovely setting. It is Norman in origin as can be noted by its heavily buttressed west tower and the Norman doorways on the south and to the north side of the nave. There is also a famous cross in this church dedicated to Saint Helena. Proceeding east along he road we come to the site of the East Hetton Slurry lagoons ahead. All is nature now with smooth newts colonised in the pond but formerly this site was covered with deep slurry which covered everything except the tallest trees. Take the footpath to the north of the beck, as the other on the south can be wet after wet weather, and next to a newly created pond the main path heads uphill to the north. Follow this for a short distance to where it turns right and here continue straight up following the water channel through the young trees. This was the site of a massive pit heap which was one of the tallest in Co Durham. It was reclaimed in the 1990s and planted with thousands of trees.

At the top within sight of Cassop you come to a t-junction of tracks. If you turn left here you arrive at Littlewood Local Nature Reserve (LNR) designated in 2001 which supports 13 nationally rare plants and 84 rare invertebrates and is opposite Cassop School. On this site can be found the Dark Red Helleborine flower and the Northern Brown Argus Butterfly. In 2013 the four fields at the top and on the right on the way up from the lagoons have been planted with 60,000 trees (mainly oak) on 350 acres of fields. This work has been carried out by the Woodland Trust in collaboration with Durham County Council as part of the Woodland Trusts Diamond Jubilee Woods Project. What a sight to see in fifty years hence and another great effort by the Trust to enhance our county along with Burnhall, Dipton ,Elemore and many others!

Pass through these new woods on the lane to Cassop village next to the t-junction and at the entrance to the village take the old railway track, initially along the back of the houses, heading east. It is worth the extra few minutes to leave this track for a while after about 500 yards to go through to the main road and see the mural on the side of “The Pub & Kitchen” pub. After about a mile on the railway track you come out on the A181 which is crossed and the track picked up again. The board on the roadside gives the story of how the village of Thornley started the Durham Miners Gala.

Leave the track to the left heading north (where there is a junction to a plant equipment yard) to the right and and go north to the main street which is crossed to pick up a footpath which leads to Ox Close Farm. The first half mile of this footpath is appalling with dog crap every two yards and it would be impossible to allow a child to walk along here. This is in spite of a disposal bin and relevant notices. Some of the residents of the village should be ashamed of their total disregard of others and do themselves, the village or indeed to the County of Durham no credit at all. (Update: On a recent walk up this footpath I was glad to see a significant improvement to the dog problem, long may it continue!). Over a long period this is possibly the worst place for rubbish that we pass through anywhere in the county. The path improves after climbing up a little before dropping down to Ox Close where you turn left on to the road via the house entrance. Head north on the road until opposite Paradise Farm where you cross the stile on your left to follow the waymarked route back to Shadforth noting the ruins of Low Croft Farm shortly after leaving the road at Paradise. Shadforth Dene which is up to the left as you descend to the village is a pleasant place with a footpath through it leading to the road which can be followed back to Ox Close to make a short circular walk from Shadforth.