Secluded Pond
We saw a new fence with gates and life rings appear alongside the approach road to Salisbury. A new nature reserve? RAMSAR site and SSSI status? Probably no chance of placing a cache then, but worth investigating!. Could this be a Secret Location reserved for Geocaching Elite - The Charter Members? The answer is far more prosaic, it might look like a nature reserve, but is a Retention Pond used to collect the run-off from the A36, preventing all the heavy metals, phosphates and other nasties from poluting our watercourses. It had been hiding in the undergrowth anonomously getting on with the job of keeping our environment clean for some years. However, think of the delight the area could present to children. Ponds full of poisonous gunk with black slime - irresistable! So the nice kind Health and Safety People have drawn attention to this magnet by putting up warning signs and helpfully providing gates and steps that lead to the stygian pools of delight.
Geocachers are just like children; inquisitive, only with a higher level of awareness - sometimes! Perhaps you will be intrigued to learn what happens to all that water that drains off the highway?. I expect, like me, you just thought that it got mixed up with everything else in the drains and ended up either at a water treatment plant, along with our household sewage, or in the ditch/river. To find out more, Click here.
The cache is just inside the site, so no need to splosh about in the gunge. Please don't park on the A36, or in the entrance way opposite the cache. Parking is safe at the suggested location in a cul-de-sac off Clarendon Road (signposted Alderbury - when they put the sign back up!). Take care crossing the road, or walk down to the new Pelican crossing specially installed for geocachers visiting this site. Just to keep you safe, H&S have now fitted padlocks to the gates. However, the cache is just outside, and there is no need to climb over the fence or the gate. Please take care though to shut the cache box securely and hide it where found before you leave.