PLEASE DO NOT CLIMB THE FENCE, THERE IS AN ENTRANCE! This geocache is hidden at Burrs County Park just a short walk from the car park.
Burrs is one of Bury's earliest industrial sites notable for its use of water and its association with the Peel Family. Although many of the buildings which once made up the two mill communities at Burrs and Higher Woodhill have now gone, enough remains to give an interesting insight into manufacturing technology and life in the early nineteenth century
You are looking at the remains of Higher Woodhill Mill, originally a cotton mill but which turned to paper making after the cotton famine of the 1860s. The remains include the waterwheel pit, which dates from around 1850 and held one of the last and largest wheels to be built in north west England.
The stone blocks between the wheel pit and the river are the base for the mill's steam engine. The circular pit near the railway bridge is the base of the mill gasometer. The cache is now hidden within the remains of the mill chimney. This was originally constructed of brick and stood approximately 45 meter high. It collapsed around 1908 and was replaced with a chimney consisting of a brick and concrete base with a steel stack.
The small reservoirs are what remains of a much larger reservoir which stored wate for turned the wheel