Round Britain Rally, second trip with eleven landmarks

This is the second video in the series where I take part in the 2023 Round Britain Rally. This time I’m in the northern part of the midlands and north Wales.
The landmarks I collect this time are:
LM33 Nottinghamshire
LM38 Staffordshire
LM13 Derbyshire
LM35 Shropshire
LM80 Powys 3
LM74 Gwynedd
LM70 Anglesey
LM69 Aberconwy and Colwyn
LM73 Denbigh
LM82 Wrexham
LM06 Cheshire

If you would like to see the Pathe Newsreel of the Leek and Manifold railway, click this link:

If you’d like more information about the Round Britain Rally, click this link:
http://www.roundbritainrally.co.uk/

welcome back this is the second in a series of videos of me as I travel round Britain collecting round Britain rally landmarks in the first video I managed three landmarks this time I have 11 I will confess that I didn’t end up with all the footage I wanted so some of the riding shots I use to voice over might not be going exactly to The Landmark some of the video may have ended prematurely as the batteries ran out but hopefully I’ll manage to keep you entertained as you come along for the ride hope you enjoy the videos so here we are at the first Landmark this is uh Kirby in Ashfield in naam Shire and we we have a sculpture celebrating the opening of the new station in 1996 it consists of three wheels from a 08 shunting locomotive uh which is the salt that would have operated in the Kirby Summit Rail Yards until the 1960s not very much more else to say about this we’ll go on further see you at the next [Music] one we’re now on our way to weton Mill which is situated in the manifold Valley there seems to be little detail on the mill was a corn Mill it start started by William Cavendish who was the second son of Bess of Hardwick he lived from 1552 until 1626 and the mill was abandoned in 1857 it’s now used as a t- room and as National Trust holiday Cottages one interesting thing is the swaine tunnel which you pass through if if you’re approaching from hum end this is a remnant of the Narrow Gauge leak and manifold light Railway that operated from 1904 until 1934 there’s a lovely path news reil from 1930 of the Railway I’ll put a link in the [Music] [Applause] [Music] description [Music] so here we are arriving in the car park at wet and Mill as you can see it’s uh quite a popular little place considering how well tucked away it is and it’s also a very beautiful little place the river weton was flowing quite strongly and uh interestingly the river weton will quite often disappear and reappear at a boiling hole further down due to the porous nature of the rock but there we go Wet N maill done onward next St darbishire [Music] [Applause] [Music] we’re on our way to bretby darbishire this is one of those occasions where the batteries ran out before we got there but I thought you’d like to see some of the variety of roads I found myself on during the rally literally everything from motorways to Goat tracks with grass growing down the middle indeed there have been times when the roads have been unsurfaced and that can get scary on a big bike bretby is on the border of darbishire in Staffordshire east of Burton Upon Trent in the the 2011 census the population was counted as 893 should just note in the piece I do to camera that’s coming up soon I say that Village pumps were often became War memorials whilst this is true a better phrase would have been that they were often [Music] [Applause] repurposed so here we are in bretby and we’re taking a look at the Village pump and shelter which is that one there these were uh were quite common um before Main’s water supply was uh or ubiquitous and would be often at the center of villages where people go to uh get their water for everything they needed washing cooking cleaning and uh quite often they were turned into war memorials when they were no longer fulfilled fill their purpose as places to gather water so there we go this is Brett be and [Music] darer here we have another landmark without any footage of me getting there on the bike so you have a little bit of generic footage whilst you listen to what I’ve got to say here the aqueduct uh which is in at longdon on turn was re-engineered by Thomas Telford after the original one which was engineered by William CLA was Swept Away in floods it was built in 1796 to carry the shury canal across the river turn it opened a month after the homes Aqueduct on the Derby Canal which was the first cast iron Canal Aqueduct measures 186 ft or 50 7 m it’s 9 ft or 2.7 M wide 3 ft or. 91 M deep and the supports are divided into four spans of 47′ 8 in or 14.531 turn and this is um what’s known in the round Britain rally as a short walk basically what we want to photograph is over on the other side of this field which is that Aqueduct over there which given that it’s a GoPro you may not be able to see terribly well so we make our way across the field take a picture with the uh the landmark and then we go back we take take a picture of the bike with something uh something with a name on which is uh all takes a little bit of time but it also makes uh make for a little bit more interest not not least of which gets me off the bike and gets me some exercise so uh excuse me whilst I puff and Pat the way across to the uh to the uh Aqueduct be back with you in a second little Viaduct fascinating old [Applause] structure and fourway on that side well that’s it All That Remains now is for me to take my photograph and we’ll be away so uh next stop I think will be welshpool see you there [Music] welcome to another section without any uh any video of me arriving to make up for it the generic video is actually of me leaving this Landmark so the next Landmark is the lift bridge on the Montgomery Canal near welshpool little bit of history about the canal this canal was actually a little different in purpose from most canals it wasn’t actually designed to earn money of itself but it was as um as this was an agricultural area it was primarily used to transport lime to improve the land of the upper seven Valley investors would benefit from improved agricultural yields and as many of the investors were farmers they would make money that way the Montgomery Canal was completed in 1821 and officially abandoned in 1944 restoration has been taking place since since 1987 it joins the Fang gothan Canal at at Frankton Junction and it originally went to Newton it also connected to the elmir canal it’s not quite clear from what I can find online whether the section that uh I’m photographing is actually in use or not but it certainly looks very lovely last stop of the rbr for today which is the canal outside uh welshpool unfortunately it’s uh still fairly noisy still fairly Breezy but hopefully get the idea it’s really quite a nice place for those who not familiar with them these little lift bridges are designed so that you can pull them up and let a canal boat through not sure how uh how functioning the canals are at the moment around here but uh that’s it and it allows access for the farmer and his Fields right I’m going to get myself off now cuz next stop is do GTH which is about 45 mil away and uh I’ll uh I’ll put a battery in the camera take some video see if we can get some nice shots as we ride into the sunset see you soon [Music] [Applause] [Music] if you want to be keeping track of time we’ve hopped forward 2 days and I still didn’t get any footage of arriving in crith at the next Landmark as there isn’t much more to say than the piece to camera I’ll let you get straight to [Music] that [Music] [Applause] well welcome back so you now find me in North Wales in crith and uh crith as you know has a castle that’s it up there and there’s the bike and what we’re here for today is this little thing this is a tiller as you can see plaque was erected to commemorate the tragedy that occurred in September 1951 when four boys in their teacher lost their lives in the sea of crith four other boys were rescued by local boatsmen if you look at it today you wouldn’t believe there was any possibility of anything adverse happening absolutely gorgeous and that is one of the excellent things that you get from doing the r Britain rally you get to see all these wonderful places [Music] [Applause] I’m beginning to sound like a broken record haven’t got any video of me riding to this Landmark either we’re now on the aisle of Angley heading to amloc Lighthouse the lighthouse that you see now is the fourth on this site it dates from 1853 although the harbor doesn’t look like it now it was once a busy with ships taking copper ore and other ores away in 1889 the lighthouse was damaged when a storm tide broke barriers at the harbor mouth the surging seawater dragged a schooner out of the harbor and dashed it against the lighthouse where the ship shattered just goes to show you shouldn’t met with Mother [Music] Nature well I hope you can hear me public it’s uh very Breezy out here uh but we’ve now moved on to Holy Island to uml which I hope I’m pronouncing correctly and uh the rbr point is that and that is a lighthouse um not to particularly much in use now because as you can see the Harbor’s not what it once was um but it’s quite a splendid place and uh and look itself is uh quite spectacular I will try and put a little bit more detail into this when I actually make the film rather than standing [Music] here as a new day Dawns we are on our way to another round Britain Rally Point this one is the remains of the hner lead mine there’s been small scale mining in Wales since the pre-roman Iron Age when the Romans arrived in ad 78 the amount of copper gold and Lead mined increased dramatically mining at any site would continue until it was no longer profitable then the site would be abandoned this particular site hner other is the remains of a major 19th century lead processing Mill in the 1860s a Waterwheel driven crushing floor was was erected this was superseded by a stone-built gravity fed Mill in tears on the hillside and this was upgraded in 1893 to 94 and again in 1907 and operated until 1915 what’s unique about this site in Northwest Wales is this this site combined mechanical physical and chemical processes with a tuer furnace smelter hard to believe looking around that all that went on in such a lovely lush green [Music] area [Music] now they now do so now we’ve moved into uh mid Wales well no North Wales we’re just outside snow down here we’ve come to the Hafner lead nine lead mining was a popular thing in uh in this area although it was never terribly profitable apparently so but you do get a rather special [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] area well welcome back this rbr point I really did rubbish we’re on our way to miden to the mining Memorial and um the GoPro battery ran out before I got there so you haven’t got any video video of me arriving and the sound was absolutely awful because uh the road was so busy and the wind was so loud that you can barely hear me so I’m going to do this as a voice over and all I really have to tell you is the miden mining Memorial was dedicated to the mining communities of North Wales as I said before when we were at the half Lead Mine there’s a long history of lead mining in North Wales this particular Memorial was created and erected in 2006 by the miden residence Action Group other than that not very much to say on to the next [Music] one so off to the pen R engine house again with no video of riding to this one a bit of information this dates from 1794 and was built by John Wilkinson to house a beam engine the beam engine was to pump water from an adjacent Coal Mine It is believed that this is the earliest surviving colar engine houseing Wales welcome back so now we’re at the pen Rous Engine House which is that there which is a rather lovely thing I’ll just have a minute to wander up and have a look unfortunately my lucky gr out with the weather because it’s just started to drip but I was going to say you can tell it’s getting towards Summer cuz the rain is getting warmer it’s actually not that warm today so what can we tell you about this place built towards by the end of the 18th century by an iron maker John Wilkinson to pump water from an adjacent coal mine well there you go and uh it’s obviously seeing better days it’s rather hard to work out exactly which which bit did what on this I’m guessing there would have been a beam projecting out somewhere but maybe not who knows but there we are pen Engine [Music] House [Music] my confusion here is largely because the property was converted into a three-story Cottage uh before being abandoned and a lot of the outbuildings were domestic and not part of the original [Music] structure [Music] as the weather turns seriously wet after the pen R stop there’s no video of the next bit we’re off to chesher to the barnston memorial I’ll tell you a bit about it after the uh bit to camera and I went on my my way way home excuse the slightly shunky audio and the uh the crash hat but uh the weather’s turned adverse but what we’ve come to see is that big sticky up thing that’s the BR I’ll do a bit more research and find out what it’s what it’s all about and uh you’ll get a voice over later but for now it’s horrible here and I’m going home see you [Music] later the memorial commemorates a local military officer major Roger Branston who died on the 23rd of December 1857 he died from wound sustained at the siege of Ln now the parishioners raised the money for the memorial and it was designed by Edward a heer I’m off home now and you if you believe that this video was shot on this on the same day that I was riding home you are sadly mistaken I’ll see you in the next one bye for now oh and by the way it would be ever so good if you would like subscribe hit the notification bell all those good things it makes YouTube ever so happy and me too bye for now [Music] oh