As part of our ongoing efforts to keep the Wem Walks clear, today’s task was Soulton Wood – Part of Wem Walk 6.
It was necessary to clear the paths en-route to Soulton Wood, then the access bridge before attacking the mass of brambles and nettles completely blocking the path.
That done we exited the wood – and our hearts sank. The two onward fields haven’t been cultivated this year and are over three feet high in grass, weeds, nettles and brambles – passable and no, we didn’t try to clear the path. Fortunately we were able to find and clear around the various marker posts so that walkers, just as they think they’ve gone wrong, can find the route.
We arrived at the finger post for the path leading down to the wooden river bridge – it pointed into a shoulder high mass of weeds and nettles! By now the batteries on our strimmers were getting low so we only cleared a rough path down to the bridge. Peter actually managed to navigate to the bridge on the first try.
We had just enough power to clear the bridge and the exit before retracing our steps, through the wood that thankfully we’d just cleared, back to civilisation.
Wem Walk 6 isn’t completely cleared yet and if today was a sample of the vegetation on other walks we’ve got our work cut out!
Have a look at how we got on.
It’s a really great walk and well worth the effort; we hope that today was the worst of the clearing.