West Stour "The Ship" Stour Valley Way No.5
The parking for this cache is in "The Ship Inn & Hotel" car
park at West Stour on the A30. Once there you can either go over
the stile in the corner of the car park, or through the farm gate
which is much more obvious. They both take you into the same field
within yards of each other.
The Stour Valley Way footpath follows the line of the fence down
to the river. The fence is along both sides of what the fishermen
call the "double ditch". This is a very wide ditch which is about
double the depth of a normal one. In the summer months there's not
much water flowing through, but in the winter it's deep, especially
at the lower end where the river tends to flow back up along
it.
You need to get over this ditch and to do that you have to get over
a stile in the fence closest to you, down the steep bank, walk over
a double width railway sleeper bridge and then over the stile in
the next fence up the bank in front of you.
The co-ords for this are N 51 00.054 ... W002 18.427 MAKE
SURE YOU CROSS HERE AS IT CAN'T BE DONE SAFELY FURTHER DOWN THE
FIELD.
Once up in the field on the other side, you have to walk down
the hill towards the river. Fairly quickly you will be able to see
a wooden bridge down the hill a short distance ahead of you which
spans the river.
The co-ords for the bridge are ... N50 59.955 ... W002
18.303 Cross over the bridge (you have to scale un-moveable
bars each end) and then it's a straight walk to the cache. Once
over the bridge you need to be aware that there are often fishermen
and other animals (usually cattle) in this field. When the cattle
are here dogs must be kept on a lead.
Please re-hide this cache just as you found it
Do be careful crossing the road as traffic really flies along
here.