Success in Chasing the Black Powder

 Hullo... we are on a bit of an adventure! Last blog post... we discovered a king tide which prevented us from going along the shore but... we are going up and over! But came across this sign... 

Luckily, from last time... I know that there is only a big pile of dirt and rocks up there... someone wanted to build a house and dumped all this stuff there... and cut down a bunch of trees on the slope and... we think it's tied up in the courts. Because this would not be a great location for a house with all the slope issues...

Let's just poke our noses up a bit?? Any house being built? Nope... just a pile of dirt!

Seeeee!!! And over by that white house is the old road down the embankment... let's go!

This is a much more civilized work-around than splashing through freezing king tides...

There's the ferry again...

Oh... and we found another invasive plant there... the tree on the left...

That is English ivy... The tree behind Sandy's head is...

Something else... beary sprawly... we think it's Irish ivy... which begs the question... why is Ireland not overrun with this stuff too??

And here we are... wow... that tide is really high!

But we want to go just over there... where that big jut-out is...

We can do it!

And we made it! See the old foundations here??

And this big wall?

And more foundations here...

And some old pilings still here...

There used to be a dock and pier here with a little steep railway that ran up the embankment. The nitro-glycerine was shipped in through here, and then wagons took it to the black powder works further inland. One day... despite all the straw in the bed of the wagon, and super springy springs... the wagon exploded. They didn't find anything of the driver or horse... 

There sure is a lot of cool history around here... And we know LF's working on his archaeological degree sooooo we thought he'd like to check this out!

The wall extends for quite a ways and rumour has it that there is an old bunker in there for storing nitro. Back in the 60s teens would explore this area but... all of that was sealed off.

Now we just have to scamper back this way...

And we made it... although Sandy did slip and get a bit dirty!

We have one more stop to make... because we are walking back through the subdivision...

Hah!!! The Tardis!!! 

Pretty cool, eh??

It's one of the coolest Little Library boxes we've ever seen...

We tried sitting in it for a bit but... we didn't time-travel anywhere... Darn. This must not be the "real" Dr. Who tardis....

Still, beary cool!

Chasing the Black Powder Works

Hullo! Today we are going on a bit of a hike and hoping to get to the old black powder docks! I was sure that I had blogged about this place before but... apparently not!! Oooohhhh... wait... it was an IG Story!!!

We are going down a ravine with a creek in it... heading for the shore. Here you can see an old dam, possibly used for power generation back in the day?

You see, there was a lot of coal mining in the area back in the early 1900s and the miners needed dynamite... and it was expensive to ship out from England... so they set up a dynamite (black powder) plant in the area...

This looks like an old foundation... maybe for the water flow or a generating station?

There are a LOT of stairs going down this ravine. Luckily, they have rubber strips for folks with paws!

There are beary pretty waterfalls in here during the winter...

Pretty, yes?

One thing we are noticing in this ravine is a LOT of English ivy...

There are houses on either side of the ravine edges and obviously, the ivy has escaped the gardens. But it is beary invasive in our climate... what we want to know is... why is England not over-run with English Ivy???

Oh, we are almost down to the water!

Oh... wow... normally there's a bit of a beach here but... hmmm... is it a king tide???

Let's just check the tide app... Hmmm... yep... couldn't be much worse!

We found a spot where we could get down to the water...

Oh wo, usually there is a big sand/gravel bar over there!

We want to go the other way along the shore and there is a bit of a trail here... let's go!

Oh look... one photo with three invasive species in it!!

English ivy...

Daphne laureola aka Spurge-laurel (beary bad). It too used to be popular as an ornamental garden plant... those are never good. It's sap is toxic and poisonous!

And then Himalyan blackberry... so yummy but sooooo invasive!

Right... let's keep going...

No... wait... see... English ivy climbing the trees... eventually it will kill the tree... again, why is England not completely tree-less???

Ah-hah!! We have a spot to reach the water!

And a great view of one of the ferries! This one has been in repairs for one of its drive shafts since... July?? It was supposed to be done in October but there were problems and... it's still sitting there with no timeline of when it will be sailing again.

And we want to go... thattaway.... hmmm... somebody is either going to get a soaker or... we are going to have to find a detour...

But there is no detour along the shore... not with all those blackberries and steep slopes!

Are we stymied? No we are not! We are adventurers!! We shall prevail!

You see... there's a trail that goes up to the top of the slope (ugh... up)... and then there should be the old road that goes down further along the shore... where we want to go...

Let's go!! It's a bit slippery and muddy in spots and... we did encounter this sign...

"Private Property - No Trespassing"... right... is that going to stop us???

 TO BE CONTINUED