WARNING - many of the logs are wet so please carry a few spares, one or two are missing. I'm afraid I'm now too old and past it to get round the full series so can only perform minor maintenance a few at a time - and as I no longer drive I ned a friend as well! The Ferndean Way runs from Colne to Wycoller alongside Colne Water and this series of 36 caches over about 9 miles replaces and expands my old caches along this route. I have started the series here as it is a large, free, car park which I have never known to be full. PLEASE NOTE the closing times (8-5 winter, 8-7 summer) as you don’t want to be locked in – you can park on the road outside if you think this is a possibility.
There is a smaller car park – which may be full, especially at the weekend, at the bottom, main, entrance to the Park at Cotton Tree on the Trawden Road near the last cache. BB8 8DE for Sat Navs. This too is free and is permanently open. It is also a better location if you feel you may have to split the series over 2 days. I have put the information on how this can be best done on FW18 (GC5Q863).
You will need a pencil for the micro caches and possibly tweezers too. The moderate and large caches have pencils but are all double boxed to try to keep the logs dry so in reality every cache is a micro obviously taking longer to extract and sign – please keep to one line, and feel free to use any abbreviations you like and just sign in once for a group. Quite a few of the caches are next to dry stone walls but NONE ARE IN THEM. There are also several very boggy stretches. The riverside path (The Ferndean Way) really needs no directions but the return leg to it is more tricky – particularly note the instructions for the next leg on FW18 and FW29 as the route following these caches is not straightforward. It would be handy to have OL21 South Pennines. Also if there’s nothing special to say about a cache feel free to just put TFTC when logging.
You may feel it advisable to take this cache to your car to do the deed so that fellow car park users don’t wonder what you’re up to in the unlikely spot where the cache is located. The Ferndean Way is possibly the most used path in Pendle so watch out for muggles galore.
To get to the next cache either go through the wood at the east end of the car park (slightly shorter and delightful but frequently boggy) or drop down into the park.