HAREHAUGH HILL FORT Traditional Cache
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A short climb up from the road to wonderful panoramas over Coquetdale. In late summer the surrounding hills are purple with heather for miles around - a wonderful sight to behold.
This Iron Age hill fort has multiple ramparts on its western side, thought to have been constructed to impress bands of raiders. Hill forts were made up of large groups of houses, clustered together for protection on the top of hills.
Excavations in August 2005 revealed that a ridge to the west of the hillfort, the site of a mound of stones and earth about 30m long to be the remains of a Neolithic long cairn. The most important find of the excavation was a layer of peat identified beneath the stone cist in the centre of the monument. Initial processing of peat found at the site has indicated that it is full of preserved plant remains and from this it will be possible to work out exactly what the local environment was like when the cairn was constructed. No material like this in direct association with a monument of this age has been found in Northumberland before, making it the oldest monument in Upper Coquetdale!
On a Lighter Note:
The defences at Harehaugh survived the Roman invasion and 2,000 years of wear and tear, but now the site is resembling a Swiss cheese after a rabbit colony made its home in the loosely-packed earth. The ‘bunnies’ are undermining the foundations of the fort which has stood unscathed since Roman times. The alarm was first raised in the mid-1990s and a control programme started - attempts have been made to remove the rabbits using ferrets, but without success – so watch where you are putting your feet when seeking the cache!
The cache is not hidden in a rabbit hole!!!
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE FROM THE SMILEYS
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Va n fznyy pyvss snpr orybj gjb ybar gerrf pbirerq jvgu n fgbar.
Treasures
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