My excavation in Wigginton has revealed a 10m deep cap of clay on top of the chalk - we are nearly 200m above sea level. Yet Ivinghoe Beacon (which is about the same height) has virtually no clay cap. I’m not sure why this is? It’s very ‘grounding’ to think about what’s beneath our feet and how we are connected to the wider landscape.
One of the very first English countryside places I took Timothy, early in the first spring after we married at a Christmas-bedecked Westminster Registry Office, was the Long Man of Wilmington, graven into the chalk of the South Downs Way. We then took The Street, smallest of roads we'd yet been on, down to West Dean, East Dean and then up onto Beachy Head. Chalk right down from sky to sea... Thanks for bringing that memory to my forebrain.
Wow, this is fascinating!
My excavation in Wigginton has revealed a 10m deep cap of clay on top of the chalk - we are nearly 200m above sea level. Yet Ivinghoe Beacon (which is about the same height) has virtually no clay cap. I’m not sure why this is? It’s very ‘grounding’ to think about what’s beneath our feet and how we are connected to the wider landscape.
One of the very first English countryside places I took Timothy, early in the first spring after we married at a Christmas-bedecked Westminster Registry Office, was the Long Man of Wilmington, graven into the chalk of the South Downs Way. We then took The Street, smallest of roads we'd yet been on, down to West Dean, East Dean and then up onto Beachy Head. Chalk right down from sky to sea... Thanks for bringing that memory to my forebrain.