The caches contain the usual items PLUS ADDITIONAL INFORMATION so that you can find out more about the history of farming in this interesting and beautiful area.
The co-ordinates for the Dent Meander multi-cache are NOT THE ACTUAL CO-ORDINATES for the cache site, but for the car park in Dent (charge).
The co-ordinates for the actual geocache are:
N 54° A . B C D , W 002° E . F G H
Your task is to complete the co-ordinates for the geocache by taking a stroll round the lovely village of Dent. It is then only a short walk to the cache. From car park to cache is less than a mile but it can be made into a circular walk of just over 2.5 miles.
Dent is the only village in the dale because the landscape was first divided up by Viking settlers who preferred living in scattered family farms along the valley sides rather than in settlements. The dale was famous in the 18th century for its ‘terrible knitters’, who were ‘terribly’ good at knitting thick socks and caps as a way of supplementing farm incomes. Farmers today are still finding ways to diversify. If you have time visit the Dent Village Heritage Centre, run by a local farmer’s wife.
A: Make your way from the car park across the road and up the lane by the side of Dent Memorial Hall to The Green. Find the house where the famous geologist Adam Sedgwick was born and from the date stone above the door add the last three digits together to arrive at A.
B: You have another two tasks to do here.
Firstly find the year that Adam Sedgwick was born and make a note of the second digit.
Secondly count how many large trees there are on The Green.
Add the total number of the trees to the second number of the year of birth to arrive at B.
C: Continue on past the house to the street at the end and find the Reading Room next to the red telephone box. Take the last digit of the date on the building to get C.
D: Walk up the cobbled street past the Adam Sedgwick Memorial and into St Andrew’s church yard where George Hodgson, the so-called Vampire of Dent is buried. Find his flagstone near the main church door and take the third digit of the year that he died to get D.
E: At the Inn, that has something to do with England’s patron saint slaying a beast, there is a signpost. Total the mileages for Hawes and Ingleton and then subtract 4 to arrive at the figure for E.
F: Walk down the road to Hawes passing the old Bakehouse to where you will find the beginning of a footpath to High Laning, next to some railings. Find the black sheep heads, made by the local blacksmith, and see how many there are to give you F.
G: Do not turn down the footpath but carry on down the road, passing the Bridge Liability Marker (The WR stands for West Riding County Council who once upon a time had to maintain the bridge and its surface). Find the Dales Way information board where you will see two pictures of bridges over rivers. The total number of arches in these two bridges will give you G.
H: Nearby there is a metal bench that is a memorial to local man Alan Meakin who used to lead wonderful walks for the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority (memorial plaque missing at the time hiding the cache). Count the number of bars on the backrest of the bench and subtract 1 to arrive at H.
When you have found all of the above you have the co-ordinates to enter into your GPS, so now cross the road bridge and away you go for a short walk to find the cache (for peace of mind the total sum of the digits A to H is 65).
Please note - the cache is just over the top of a wall. Take care not to dislodge any stones in the wall itself.
This cache can be included with two others we have hidden in the area. If you want to bag all three of the caches the waypoint names are below.
There is an infrequent bus service to Dent from Sedbergh and Kendal. Dent railway station has regular trains but be aware it’s a good 2 miles down to the village (and back uphill on the return!).
The three caches in the area including this one are:
Dent Meander (this cache)
Clog Echoes
Gorse, Gorse, of course