This is a lovely area to explore with its network of paths through woodlands and open fields. The village of Essendon also has a lovely church and a playground (located down the footpath adjacent to the school), some weekends you might even get to watch a bit of cricket at the big playing field. From Essendon you can walk to Little Berkhamsted across the golf course and this cache is part of the series that I am placing along this route which will eventually form a loop back to Essendon. In Little Berkhamsted you will find a few ammenities and a play park as well as a lovely church which is now the subject of a new church micro cache after the previous was archived in 2011.
You do not need to cross any fences to find this cache. Parking in Essendon in School Lane or by the church is pretty easy and serves as a good base for the rest of the caches as well as the two by "geocacheUK" in the local "Backhouse Woods". There is parking in Little Berkhamsted of course if you wish to approach from that direction. Beware the path alongside the chalkpit after Ashfield Farm and toward the golf course gets very muddy in winter so wellies probably needed. There is also a ford with a little bridge which can get hard to cross after very heavy rain (N 51° 45.766 W 000° 08.566) an alternative could be along the roadway to Kennel Hall farm and then across the golf course at that point.
You are going to need tweezers for this mag-nano cache which is within a few feet of the rickety old stile.
About the cache's name sake....
Garden Spiders (Araneus diadematus) are found throughout the UK from June to October. Females are larger up to 13mm, males up to 8mm. These spiders, often found in hedgerows, woodlands and gardens eat mostly flying insects which are caught in their orb webs. Garden spiders are sometimes called Cross spiders on account of the white '+' cross-shaped mark on the abdomen. They're most frequently seen in September and October, when they reach adult size. The spiderlings are yellow in colour with little black markings and are often seen in a group on a web, all scattering away from each other when disturbed. The females are frequently found upside-down in the centre of their circular webs, which they construct about a metre off the ground, in trees and hedges. The colouration of the abdomen is very variable. It can be anything from dark chocolate brown, through bright orange, to yellow. Usually at least five of the dots making up the cross marking are visible to some extent, so it is the cross to look out for on these common spiders.
