Rufford & Mere Sands Nature Reserve
Our 4.7369 miles (7.6233 km) route today, has been saved and is available at...
We started from the car park, in Meadow Lane, next to Rufford Station.
As you can see from the map, we headed back towards the canal and joined the towpath, heading South towards Lock Number 7.
Large Fungi, growing on grass cuttings were spotted very soon after joining the towpath...
...and then, on the opposite bank of the canal, what appeared to be a jackdaw on a goose's back...
It turned out to be a goose with a damaged wing!
After the lock, just before the swing-bridge, two swans came to see if we had brought any food...
They were very quiet...
...and came very close to us...
...sadly we hadn't brought any food for them.
Poor planning.
We were impressed with the new path, just after Brick Kiln Lane, along the edge of the stream...
...it made it possible to look around far more than we were able to in the past.
Lots of sightings of black birds, a thrush and robins...
Eventually we reached Mere Sands Nature Reserve and, as predicted by the weather forecast, the sun came out.
Entering, the Nature Reserve...
...we walked clockwise around the edge, until we reached the exit, near Woodlands Animal Sanctuary.
We saw a lot of birds, including...
- Ducks,
- Robins,
- Blackbirds,
- Gold Finch,
- Great Tits,
- Blue Tits,
- Tree Creepers,
- Moorhens and
- Coots,
We also saw two large Grey Squirrels as well as a large carved, wooden one...
There are some leaves hanging on but most have carpeted the woodland floor...
We crossed a number of bridges on our walk, including one next to a small, man-made waterfall...
The reflections of autumnal trees and blue sky, in the meres, was very pretty; I took a couple of pictures from one of the bird-hides...
There were quite a few waterfowl on the meres but the geese, in the main, could be heard on the fields around and about...
Bracket Fungus on Silver Birch was also spotted...
On leaving the Reserve we walked past fields of leeks...
...and other crops.
There were lots of options for walks as well, with footpaths heading off in various directions...
Eventually we looped back to the canal, crossing Town Meadow Swing-bridge to head back towards the car...
As planned we called into Fettler's Wharf for lunch; the, what was a Coffee Shop, was now Tastebuds Cafe...
...which provided us with a very nice lunch.
"Another enjoyable Sunday Meander on a cold but sunny day! Well worth following our steps, if you can!"
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