Freoaghane

Over Sartfell and around Freoaghane

Monday,  9 July 2012

 

We started from the side of the Brandywell Road near the gate by the Sartfell Plantation and climbed up the very wet slope on the south side of Sartfell.  When we reached the top, we caught our first sight of the north west coast of the Island bathed in watery sunshine.  We were distracted from admiring the view by a skylark which put on an impressive aerial display of high level flying and singing far above our heads.

 

The view from the top.

The next part of the route was down the steep slope into the dip between Sartfell and Freoaghane - the top of Glion Kiark (Glen of the Moorhen - or Glen of the Grouse).  Half way down we got a good view of Kirk Michael - framed in the V between the two hills - showing that it could shine by the sea almost as well as Ramsey.

We were heading for this old sheep pen and dip near the top of Glion Kiark where we could join up with the rough path around the west side of Freoaghane.

From the sheep pen we continued downhill until we caught sight of a remote ruin across Glion Kiark on the lower slopes of Sartfell.  I haven't been there but Trevor and Dorothy went there once to take photographs. 

 

 According to this Government site:  http://www.gov.im/lib/docs/mnh/education/TRB/Mining/teachersresourcebkpt3quarrying.pdf    'A range of ruined buildings on the lower slopes of Sartfell at Kirk Michael once comprised living quarters stabling together with a smithy and pay office A belfry at the end of one of the buildings for the bell which was rung at the beginning and ending of shifts still remains The usual powder house stood some distance away The slate trials here had been abandoned before 1874 when the following account of the workings appeared in Shaw's Guide "The high mountain on the right is Sartjell deeply indented in whose bosom are several quarries which were vigorously opened by a spirited Belfast company of capitalists in search of slate and very many thousands of pounds were recklessly spent in openings into the mountain and in the erection of a spacious pile of buildings no longer needed for the purpose for which they were erected Across an intervening stream is the neighbouring mountain of Slieau ne Fraughane where the like kind of expensive operations were for many years carried on with English capital but all to no profitable purpose and both undertakings have been hopelessly abandoned."'

 

I found some more information on a geocaching site   http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=bec0a4a9-9925-44be-85d0-cdfa193dc7ad  They describe the remains of the buildings as ". . .  one of the most inaccessible old ruins on the Isle of Man – the site of old slate quarry workings at the foot of Sartfell in Glion Kiark (“Glen of the Grouse”). This quarry originally employed about twenty quarrymen, many of whom were Welsh, who came over to the Island following the closures of quarries in their homeland. It closed in about 1874 due to the poor quality of the slate and the buildings subsequently fell into disrepair.

 

The ruins are those of the blacksmiths shop, stables, a pay office and accommodation for the men. Though the roof and the upper floors are long since disappeared (the materials removed for re-use elsewhere), the walls and even the fireplaces and chimneys still stand today. The belfry at the end of building deceptively gives it the appearance of an old church. In fact, the bell which it once housed was used to signal the beginning and ending of the mens’ work shifts, which ran day and night.

Sudden collapses at such quarries were commonplace, and the quarry at Glion Kiark was no exception. Local folklore tells how one night the quarry manager found that that there had been a landslide in the quarry and he feared all the men were buried. He hurried back to Barregarrow for help, only to find the men there safe and well. They told him that on this particular night, they had gone to the quarry to begin work and heard a child crying out on the hillside above them. Regarding this as an ill omen, they returned home. Possibly they had heard the sound of the rock movement before the collapse.
A little further up the glen, you can also still find the ruins of the old explosive magazine (N54° 15.579’ W004° 34.059’).
Stout hiking boots are strongly recommended."

Old Slate Quarry Buildings.

On the lower slopes of Freoaghane there were a couple of streams to negotiate.  Tim took this photo of me and Danny looking for an easy way to cross one stream.  I managed to get across with dry boots but Danny misjudged the crossing, stepped into a deep pool, and got rather wet.

A little further on the path completely disappeared between dense patches of gorse and tall rushes growing in the damp ground at the bottom of the old sod field wall.  They used to be called "Manx hedges".  We got through by walking along the steeply sloping side of the "hedge".  I rather hoped that I might get an action photo of one of the hikers tumbling down the bank but they negotiated it like true mountain goats.

Before we reached the next glen, Glion Maarlys (the Glen of the theft), the northernmost fork of Glion Kiark, we saw a female hen harrier circling overhead.  It was too high to get a good photo and kept circling higher and higher until it was just a speck in the sky.  Then we turned up into Glion  Maarlys.  Upstream from the old dam, there are the remains of a mine - the Kirk Michael Lead Mine.  According to Stan Basnett this ". . . recalls another attempt to find the same productive vein of galena which yielded rich supplies of lead at Laxey, on the opposite coast.  Like so many of these small trials, it was unproductive and soon abandoned."  Old buildings and spoil heaps remain by the stream but we didn't have enough time to discover an entrance to any of the shafts. 

We stopped for a tea break before tackling the steep climb up to Carn Vael and I found some little patches of wild thyme growing near the stream.

 The next part of the walk was the most tiring - a steep climb. uphill all the way in warm sunshine.  We were hot and exhausted by the time we reached Carn Vael, near the junction of the Baltic Road and the Slieau Curn Greenway Road, and were quite happy to see some dark clouds gathering - but they didn't bring a cooling shower. 

 

There are varying opinions about the origin of the cairn.  According to J.J. Kneen (Place names of the Isle of Man 1925) "Tradition says that people from Baldwin (Kirk Braddan) when going to Sacrament would each take a stone and drop it on this cairn. Probably the Sacrament would be administered by the Bishop himself at Bishop's Court" (near Kirk Michael).  Another source (Terry Marsh - The Isle of Man A Walker's Guide 2004) says that the cairn is "largely the product of passing miners in years gone by, who would add another rock every time they walked by as a kind of talisman." 

 

But my preferred and totally fanciful explanation is that it marks the grave of a giant - called Michael.  The story is told in A Manx Scrapbook by J.J. Gill in 1929.  He wrote "Carn Vael, " Michael's Cairn," at the head of Glion ny Maarlys, should perhaps have had the place of honour in this short list (List of Place-names and Place-lore of the Parish of Michael), if - as might be argued from the legend - Michael was the first Captain of the Parish and gave it his name, for the person buried under the cairn is said to have been a giant called Michael. His tomb was not unworthy of him, for when seen by the Ordnance Surveyor it was twelve feet high and thirty-five in diameter. The well near it is Saint Michael's Well, so it is clear there has been some juggling with the archangelic cognomen, and it may be imagined to have taken the following course. After the giant's actual name was forgotten the saint's was conferred upon the cairn and well (which suggests that pagan reverence was paid to them); the giant then retaliated by taking the name of the saint, so that now the saint controls the well under his own name and the giant continues in possession of the cairn under the saint's name ; and honour is satisfied." 

 

I wasted a lot of time searching on maps for Chibbyr Vael (Michael's Well) and the neighbouring Keeill Vael (Michael's Chapel) without any success - until I finally discovered that they were in the Druidale valley and now lie beneath the waters of Sulby Dam.  So it looks as though the giant got the best of the bargain.  His cairn remains, although it is definitely not twelve feet high, but the saint's chapel and well have disappeared from view.

 

Carn Vael with Kirk Michael in the background.

There were more clouds to the east hovering around the Sulby Dam, Snaefell and North Barrule.  Scattered showers had been predicted but they all missed us and we had a completely dry walk.

The most interesting part of the walk was over and we had a long trudge back to the cars along a stony road but there were a few flowers to break the tedium.  I haven't seen any flowers on the dominant heather, the paler purple, Calluna vulgaris, yet this summer.  Its common names are Ling or Scotch heather - or Freoegh mooar in Manx.

 

The bell heather (Erica cinerea) is starting to flower though, and there are always a few little yellow tormentil flowers (Potentilla erecta) amongst the heather and grasses up on the moors.  The bell heather flowers are a similar shape to the cross leaved heath which we saw last week, but are a darker colour, and the leaves are different.

 I have given up trying to get a good close-up shot of the tiny white flowers of the heath bedstraw (Galium erectum) but rather liked this patch growing on a sheltered bank between the track and the plantation.