I'll Phone a Friend.......

By Jeremy 'Jez' Bell

As your Rights of Way Officer, I find my duties fall into three main areas: -

Firstly, there is the paperwork side where I am receiving updates from Wiltshire, Hampshire or occasionally even Dorset County Councils about changes to rights of way such as T.R.O.’s or upgrades and sometimes there are changes to the definitive map.

Secondly, there is the communicative part where I am advising these same County Councils as to any problems we have with rights of way such as obstructions natural or man made, or heavy damage on the byways by tractors or irresponsible users. Club members on their own exploration of our Byways mostly find these.

Thirdly, there is the mobile part where I try to get out and about on the byways myself, looking at obstructions and taking photos as evidence, looking at lesser-known routes with a view to introducing them to the rest of the club. Being from Dorset, this is the area that I have investigated the most so far.

This exploring has taught me two or three lessons that, although being quite obvious, I had completely ignored. The first and most obvious is NEVER GO ALONE, then NEVER RELY ON YOUR MOBILE and also, GET OUT YOUR VEHICLE AND LOOK AROUND.

When trying an unknown or known lane, just because it is marked as a byway or was driveable last time doesn’t mean it is in regular use or even passable now. This has caught me out a couple of times recently when I was out looking at possible routes to use for a green lane trip.

The first time this happened I was trying a group of lanes I had last driven back in February, The first looked reasonably well used and although the hedges were close it was easily passable. Returning to it this May I found it totally overgrown and was surprised by the depth of the grass and by how the width of the lane had reduced. Knowing the track already gave me the confidence to push through (walking some bits first) the foliage parted easily and I got through undamaged. The rest of the lanes hadn’t changed so much and were easy to drive; this gave me the confidence to investigate another lane on the map that I hadn’t tried yet. This lane was shown on the map as leading down the side of a farm, between some fields and crossing a river at the site of a disused mill. I found the lane easily and it was easy going until I got near the river, at that point the ruts (tractor made) got deeper, my tyres only being standard Range Rover were far from ideal for deep ruts. At this point I should have turned back! I decided instead to try and straddle the ruts (turning around seemed a bit chicken). All was going well until the lane narrowed and the only way to keep going was to put one set of wheels up the bank by the hedge. I decided at this point to reverse back up the lane. As I reversed, one tyre dropped into a rut pulling me side-ways so all four tyres ended up off the ground because the axles were resting on the raised centre of the track. A thorough examination of my situation (much wheel spinning and swearing) showed me I was well and truly stuck!

Time to phone a friend with a Landy. Unfortunately no-one was able to help, Bob’s, Rich’s and Sparkey’s wagons all being off the road for fixing, also I only had minimal phone reception where I was and could only text - not very reliable!

Swallowing my pride, I walked back up to the farm I had passed earlier. Fortunately the farmer was friendly and more amused than annoyed by me asking for a tow out. Grabbing a lift on his tractor back to my Rangy, I attached my rope and he pulled me out with absolutely no effort at all.

I decided to go home after that.

First lesson; NEVER GO ALONE.

If I had had a second vehicle with me I wouldn’t have had to get that farmer to tow me out as my mate could have given me a tow plus they probably would have told me how stupid I was going that far to start with.

The next time I should have followed the NEVER GO ALONE rule was a couple of months later. It was May and I was once again out looking at lanes for this green lane trip. After forgetting my maps the previous weekend when 5 of us went out together, I thought I would check the lanes myself.

I was out Shaftsbury way anyway and after finding the first lane straight away, it was easily passable, confidence was high for the second. Pulling into the entrance of the Byway it looked well used, the reason for this turned out to be a couple of fields with horses in them a third of the way down the track

From then on, the track looked as though it hadn’t been used for a long time.

The track went down a steep hill after the horse fields with a deep wash out gully running down the left-hand side. Luckily, the track was wide enough for me to drive through while still staying out of the gully. I should have taken this as a sign of things to come but was more interested in trying a new lane.

At the bottom of the hill, the track went round to the left and there I found a drainpipe that ran under the track and had begun to wash one side of it away. After a brief struggle over this, I came upon a water-filled dip followed by a steep slope. After several attempts the combination of dip and wet clay slope still proved impossible to overcome and I eventually realised that I was going to have to reverse all the way back up the hill to the horse fields so I could turn round. I got almost to the top of the hill before all four wheels began to spin so I dropped back down the slope a little to where the grip was better, applied a little more throttle and started back up the hill again. I got a little further this time but then began to slip sideways into the gully on my left, several more attempts only ended up with me in the gully having to go back down the hill in order to get out.

Time to phone a friend again! This time I found that I had no signal at all!

Second lesson; NEVER RELY ON YOUR PHONE!

Right, this situation calls for a bit of sawing and shovelling then, I cut four or five medium size limbs off some nearby trees placing them in the gully and then dug off the leaf mulch/dirt on top of the gravel surface of the track. Time to try again with a great deal of slipping and sliding and a large dollop of luck I made it up to the top of the hill and back onto the well used part of the track. I turned my Rangy round and headed off to try and find where the Byway came out so I could see what the rest of the lane was like.

The far end of the lane looked well used so I followed it to where I found an entrance to a house. No more than twelve metres on from this gateway was the top of the slope I had been trying to climb. I realised that the house had been just off to my left the whole time I had been attempting to climb the slope. The woods were so dark that I hadn’t seen it at all!

Third lesson; GET OUT OF YOUR VEHICLE AND LOOK AROUND, walk on ahead sometimes if you’re not sure of the terrain.

Taking this as a sign that I needed my eyes/head tested, I went home.

The lessons re-learnt on these trips seem obvious but I had managed to forget them and also that, although my Rangy is an excellent 4x4, it can still get out of its depth sometimes.

I am sure there are many more rules that you have discovered and more we will pick up along the way, but at the moment these are the freshest in my mind!

So if anyone would like to come out exploring with me, or volunteer to show me the Byways of Hampshire and Wiltshire then let me know.

Keep it shiny side up!

Jez

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