In August & September PathFix volunteers have installed four new fingerposts on the Cumbria Way (CW) north of Ulverston, as part of our efforts to greatly improve the waymarking of the Cumbria Way. Many thanks to Westmorland & Furness Countryside Access Team for supplying the fingerposts.
Click photos to enlarge.
Two Fingerposts on Old Hall Road
Earlier this year we proposed and coordinated a Cumbria Way route improvement between Gill Banks and Old Hall Farm just north of Ulverston. The new route avoids a steep and eroded climb and also avoids the busy active farmyard at Old Hall Farm. To waymark the new route we have now fitted two new fingerposts.
Where Gill Banks path meets Old Hall Rd (OS Map & Grid Ref): –
This is where the new CW route gets to the end of the attractive Gill Banks track and comes onto the very minor Old Hall Rd lane.
BEFORE: The old fingerpost was starting to rot, but it also needed a new finger for the Cumbria Way.
AFTER: The new post has fingers for all 3 routes – CW south down the Gill Banks path, CW north along Old Hall Road and north-east along the footpath over Flan Hill to Town Bank Road.
Access track to Old Hall Farm fro Old Hall Rd (OS Map & Grid Ref): –
This is where the CW (when heading north) leaves leaves Old Hall Rd and goes down the farm access track and then turns right before the farmyard.
BEFORE: There should have previously been a fingerpost here, since the farm access track is a footpath leaving Old Hall Rd, but it was missing.
AFTER: New fingerpost waymarks both the public footpath and the CW route north and south.
Two fingerposts near Hollowmire Farm
Near Hollowmire Farm (heading north) the CW follows a very minor lane for 250m at Eller Riggs Brow, and new fingerposts were needed where it joined and left this lane: –
Where CW meets lane by Hollowmire Farm (OS Map & Grid Ref): –
Here the old fingerpost had lost one of its fingers and the remaining finger was hard to read. It has now been replaced with a new one that has fingers for walkers going both north and south on the Cumbria Way.
200m north of Hollowmire Farm (OS Map & Grid Ref): –
Here the CW northwards leaves the lane onto a footpath to Osmotherley Church: –
BEFORE: The old fingerpost had rotted at the bottom and collapsed into the long grass. Its top part had later been re-erected but was rather short and had lost one of its fingers.
©Photo courtesy of Cumbria Tourism.
AFTER: Renewed and now has two legible fingers, so caters for CW walkers heading south as well as north.