Little Quest - South Yorkshire

A map in case you are lost?

 Sunday 8th August 2010

Thats right folks...we were about to attempt 2 little quest caches in one day. Team Shiltonpig had arrived in South Yorkshire...the 2nd of the Yorkshire little quests.....and our 14th in total so far...still another 34 to go. Well South Yorkshire is known for a few things...Meadowhall...Steel and that famous 1997 film The Full Monty. But you have no need to fear Mr Shiltonpig will not be pulling his pants down on this blog anytime soon. So where would you place the little quest cache in this county? The answer of course if Doncasters Premier beauty

Team Shiltonpigs house?

 spot. Now you might be forgiven for thinking "does Doncaster have a beauty spot?". But you would be wrong....because nestled near the M18 you will find Cusworth Hall and Park. And what a lovely place it is. We are glad that someone has placed a stateley home near the little quest. For more information on this place click on the now legendary linky poos. The hall itself is now just a museum and also houses a rather fine cafe. The cafe sells rather good cakes....it seemed rude not to try them out! We would like to point out that traffic wardens patrol this area so don't skimp on the amount you put into the car park fees otherwise you might have a nasty

why is everything always on a hill?

surprise for you when you get back. The house is on a hill and you need to walk to the bottom of it and then turn right and start walking through the fields. We were fortunate that the fields are a glorious colour at the moment as the barley?wheat? (or any number of crops) are being harvested and leaving opportunities for some great photos. (See photo 4). The cache was quickly found and we moved back to have a walk around the two nearby ponds and immaculately trimmed gardens. The ponds are crammed full of fish...I was surprised to see how many there were and Josh loved it. After all he loves fish, and in particular whales. He only has to see a

Fields of barley...

 pool of water to shout shouting "whale". It seems rude to correct him, so Josh will grown up thinking that perch fishes are actually whales. Mrs Shiltonpig would like the whole world to know that it was her and not the thicky thicky Mr Shiltonpig that correctly guessed the species of fish in the pond. Mr Shiltonpig would like Mrs Shiltonpig to know that "he aint boverd". For those purists amongst you all it should be pointed out that you can also see Doncaster from this place...but it will be quickly forgotten (team Shiltonpig would like to apologise to the residents of Doncaster if any offence was caused by the last few comments). Our travels so

Wave at Josh!

far have now taken us 959 miles, which if travelled from where we live would take us to near Salzburg in Austria. Just grateful that they haven't invented a little quest for Europe yet....just imagine how many miles you would have to do to get that bonus cache. This cache has a very sedate and graceful feel about it....Josh was a welcome addition to this area. Josh would like to point out that the play area is not very good for toddlers his age.

Doncasters premier beauty spot

Little Quest - Durham

Look how peaceful the river is

 Sunday 8th August 2010

Barnard Castle? ever heard of it? well to be honest we hadn't really heard too much about it. County Durham is not a county that we know too much about....having said that it does have the fantastic High Force as part of it. High Force linky poo County Durham takes its name from its famous city further north. But team Shiltonpig roll into town to find the little quest. This cache is a tell tale story to all would be cachers. We parked the car which said the cache was just a mere 0.24 miles away...

Mr Shiltonpigs trousers had shrunk in the wash

 we started following the compass and we got to a point where it said it was 230 feet away. We suddenly realised it was on the other side of the river...at first glance you would think we would be disappointed. But the only way to cross from where we could see was a quaint little bridge. Mid way on the bridge we took the first of he photos on this post. What a great site it actually turned out to be....even though we ended up walking far longer than we had intended. If you would like to know more about Barnard Castle then I suggest that you read this link here. 

Josh throwing stones again

I would think that team Shiltonpig picked the right time of day to come here, about 9am on a Sunday morning. The town hadn't woken up from the night before....nobody about and it was peaceful. The cache itself provides the best view of the ruined castle in the whole town. Not that too many people would know that judging by the fact the footpath to the cache is hardly used. This rates very highly in our little quest journey so far and rates very highly as a cache in its own rights. Josh loved this place as well, partly due to the fact there was water about. What is it about kids that as soon as they see water they want to jump right into it. (I would like to whole heartedly apologise for the poor formatting in this post...I wish Google would get it sorted)

The plants in the nearby field were huge and something out of the land of the lost...some might say that team Shiltonpig would fit into the land of the lost as well...and thats just our family that would say that!!! We have added another 45 miles to our grand journey so far which means that 874 miles have passed since we 1st set out in March to attempt our first Little Quest cache...and what a journey it has turned out to be. We are glad that one of the Little Quests have put a castle into the view...after all England is world famous for its castles!!

On the wasy back to the car it is also worth pointing out that Josh went on some swings and slides...his current favourite pastime at the moment....well that and pooing!

Look at the legs on that!

Josh looking at the croak croaks

Little Quest - North Yorkshire

Greasy Joes Cafe

 Saturday August 7th 2010

So it is probably time for Mr Shiltonpig to have a bit of a rant....so team Shiltonpig roll into North Yorkshire...the first of the 4 yorkshire little quests to get. In our humble opinon North Yorkshire may be known for many things....the moors, Whitby perhaps? but come on lets face it everyone knows it for Heartbeat. The TV show that is stuck in the 1960s. So let me get this straight...Heartbeat started in 1992 with Nick Berry? Do you remember him? so that means that 18 years has passed in the town of Aidensfield (which is actually Pickering), so even

Have you seen Heather? We can't find her?

if the programme had started in 1960, it should now be 1978...but somehow it is still the 1960s???Perhaps this is some strange time wormhole, where people have to relive and relive events??? Anyway I suppose that I should get to the story of the cache....so we pulled up at the car park, and to our great surprise there was a greasy spoon van/cafe parked there. It was a welcome sight...especially as we ordered the last 2 bacon baps...most annoying for the person behind us in the queue....(but why would a greasy spoon cafe run out of bacon...but that question will have to be left unanswered, like all

Josh and his new found friend

big questions in the universe). It had started to rain, and lets face it this summer, that is hardly big news. But the shower stopped after we had the roll in our bellies. The possibility of rain gave Josh the cahnce to explore something new....the umbrella, lets face it he is going to get plenty of chances to become acquaninted with them over the next few years. But in the meantime he dragged a brolly that was bigger than him all the way to the cache. This meant that a very easy 0.22 mile walk suddenly became a long hike, as every 2 minutes we had to stop and wait for Josh to keep up with us. In the end the very

Still can't find Heather?

impatient Mr Shiltonpig just carried him on his shoulders. The moorland was absolutely beautiful and you could see the coast so easily including several large ships on the sea. Always a plus in our humble opinion. When we found the cache which was very easy, adn looked inside there was a log book but no co-ordinates. Aaargh! On closer inspection it appears that another cacher had replaced the logbook....we took a photo of us and the cache to prove we had been there. At the time of writing you will be relieved to know that we were emailed the co-ordinates!!

Josh prepares to attack

So another little quest and another thumbs up from team Shiltonpig. It has a very barren feel to it this cache...and sums up what most people think of, when they think of North Yorkshire...this now means on our little quest trek around England we have so far travelled 829 miles. Wow thats a very long way do you not think?

Police would like to speak to these 2 suspicious people

Little Quest - Northumberland

Barrasford Park

 Thursday August 5th 2010

Wow...2 Little Quests in the same day...we were on a roll so we were! After completing the more urban little quest in Tyne and Wear later that morning we travelled 30 odd miles to the north west and found ourselves in Northumberland. This now means we have travelled 748 miles in order to get just 11 little quest caches so far....plus to be honest there is heated debate in the team Shiltonpig household as to which little quests are the best ones. We actually are that sad that we rank in a league table. At the end after we have completed all 48 of them we

Remote Northumberland

 will share that with you....anyway onto Northumberland. Mr Shiltonpig has a confession to make after many many years of his favourite county being Devon (partly due to those amazing tors in Dartmoor, cream teas and happy childhood memories) it has now been knocked off the top by this amazing county Northumberland. It has pretty much everything you could possibly want....if you could buy shares in a county...I would own them all...if I was on commission I would clearly be earning loads. It has it all amazing beaches, history coming out of its ears (does a county have ears????) and finally moorland and lots of Hadrians

2 suspicious characters...

wall. The Little Quest cache was located in Barrasford Park, which was very very quiet and a rather unusual as its seems nobody has walked down this footpath for ages...and perhaps the only ones that do are the people who come for this Little Quest. Its hard to describe it...but here you go, a quarry is in the distant, there is moorland all around and there is a small woodland around. The cache is down a very grassy path...and Josh enjoyed running through the long grass. To be honest this cache was nice and easy to find...and that is a welcome feeling. There is nothing worse than travelling a long long way to find those all

Need to move the camera nearer I think

 important co-ordinates inside the cache only to find that you can't find them. Not sure that this represents the best that Northumberland can offer...try the Bamburgh 360 cache further north which is truly amazing. This cache however is nowhere near the worse of the little quests and Mr Shiltonpig loved the remote feeling of the cache that some of the others haven't done so far...and so a thumbs up from this small band of travellers...so if you find yourself up here, you could do worse than to come here!

The self timer button strikes again...

Little Quest - Tyne and Wear

Not at actual location

 Thursday August 5th 2010

"Why aye man"....Ant and Dec...Geordieland....Cheryl Cole....yes thats right folks team Shiltonpig have entered the world of Tyne and Wear. Having visited this part of the world many times, we were intrigued as to where the Little Quest cache would be placed. After all when you think of Newcastle upon Tyne you tend to think of a sprawling city (albeit a very nice one). We were stopping in Gateshead and you will not be shocked to find out that it was in a travelodge.

Lets go fly a kite

 The cache took us to an area that in a large way reminded us of home...the National Forest. Reason being was this is reclaimed land, and you can tell if you know where to look. But the good news is that as you walk around, you can hardly think that you are anywhere near Newcastle. For more information on this park, I suggest you click on this link. A short walk to the cache site, then had a small delay as we bumped into one of the many muggles in the area, a dog walker. This created 2 problems, firstly the fact that Josh absolutely loves dogs at the moment and secondly the woman then decided to talk to us for ages. Which to be honest yet again

Is this really Tyne and Wear?

shows why we think Northerners are more friendly...anyway after that lady disappear. We started looking for the cache...Josh was playing up so Mr Shiltonpig had to look alone. Problem was that the co-ordinates kept bouncing and bouncing around. The clue was a little vague and for the life of me I could not find a stone. Then all of a sudden Mrs Shiltonpig shouts up...Mr Shiltonpig rushes towards her expecting to find the cache. Instead they are looking at across the river. And there for the first time ever team Shiltonpig see a Kingfisher in the UK (we once saw some Amazon Kingfishers but thats a long story and we would hate to

Mrs Shiltonpig dragging Josh as usual

 detract from this particular one). It was so bright, thats what was so surprising...sadly we didnt get a photo and sadly it didnt say around for too long. Having said that we will always remember this cache as the Kingfisher cache. Anyway shortly after the Kingfisher Mr Shiltonpig was getting very stressed about finding this cache...and then under a stone he found it! Yay...we made a note of the co-oridnates and made our way back to the car. Mr Shiltonpig has had his camera for 5 years and while there are now phones with higher megapixel capabilities he refuses to upgrade....but he discovered a new feature....the self timing button.

No Kingfishers in site boo hoo

Could have done with this for years....and so from now on hopefully you will get to see more photos of the 3 of us! Perhaps thats not a good thing for you dear readers....but tough...you are going to have to swallow your pride and look at a few more photos of us. So another little quest down and we add a further 112 miles to the journey so far...current total 718 miles...wow that is a long way!  Thanks for reading...

Happy family photo

Little Quest - Cumbria

Look at the water in that...

Sunday 25th July 2010

It is so unfair....some counties just have it all. For example Cumbria....its the type of county that if you were to fly a plane over it, and drop a cache from the plane, when you were to discover where it landed it would still be an amazing place. The Lake District as Cumbria is more famously known is a place where you can still go and find wilderness in the good old U.K. Team Shiltonpig rolled into town...it was soon clear that this cache required some necessity to go uphill. Probably the highest

Mount Everest

cache so far on the little quest trail. It was soon apparent that Josh and Mrs Shiltonpig might find this one a little hard and so it was left to poor old Mr Shiltonpig to climb what seemed like Mount Everest by the time he got to the top. But I am getting ahead of myself....the cache itself lies on the outskirts of Coniston, near a mountain called the "Old Man of Coniston"...not sure why its called an old man but I can guarantee you that Mr Shiltonpig aged several years walking to the top. It had started so easily and with no Josh on his shoulders, he was walking faster uphill than he had done all year. The path was easy

Some counties have all the luck...

and the gradiant of the hill was just the right incline. But for some reason when the gps showed there was 0.34 miles to go, things became a lot harder....Mr Shiltonpig just couldn't see a clear path to the top and so decided to cross the river....that was easier said than done, while it was not deep, it was deep enough so that you didn't want to get wet in it. After doing several triple somersaults across and doing a rather neat run, skip and a jump, Mr Shiltonpig found himself on the right side of the river....but more perils awaited. Next up he still couldn't find any path of any description and he

Coniston water in the distance

soon found himself wading through ferns up to his waist. This is much harder than it sounds and energy levels soon dipped, and with no other team member to keep him going he was soon in low morale. But he kept going through wet grass, leech infested ferns and dangerous rocks that said "I want to break your ankle" as you walked past. Somehow each 0.01 of a mile seemed to last like a whole mile itself. But finally the gps read 314 feet and the cache was in sight...however it soon become apparent that he was going to have to climb over the top of a cliff to get it....energy levels were now seriously low and he was regretting not having that extra slice of bacon for breakfast. It was a death defying act of selflessness that made Mr Shiltonpig decide to keep going and look for that quest. Josh and Mrs Shiltonpig would never had been able to forgive him for not getting the little quest co-ordinates. So step by step and stone by stone Mr Shiltonpig climbed up what seemed like every mountain put together and finally reached the summit. Once the cache was found, he sat on the rock edge and admired the cache and the views...he pulled out his can of pepsi max and felt like the advert says "live life to the max". He reflected on how beautiful Cumbria really is and then reminded himself that every county has its weak points....for Cumbria its Barrow on Furness....and so another 78 miles are added onto the overall total which means team Shiltonpig have travelled 606 miles to get just 9 Little Quests already!

Sorry there is no photo of Mr Shiltonpig

Little Quest - Lancashire

Road of Death

 Saturday 24th July 2010

So the holiday began in true form with a whistle stop tour to the county of Lancashire....now I think its fair to say that this particular county is known for a fait few things....hot pots...flat caps and of course Coronation Street. We were disappointed that we didn't see any of these things....Vera Duckworth didn't appear to welcome us to the cache...just what is wrong with geocaching these days when a celebrity isn't there to meet and greet you? tut tut tut. Anyway what did greet us was one of the worst roads in the whole of England, I kid you not that

Mrs Shiltonpig and Josh and a cache

 if you were to see this particular road you would have though an earthquake would have hit it. Never the less team Shiltonpig with Mr Shiltonpigs expert driving soon encountered and succeeded in parking like no one has ever before. It may be worth pointing out that this was a private road and we were not supposed to park on it...but seeing as Mr Shiltonpig can't read or write then we ignored it. The cache itself was at the top of a hill...surprise surprise.....having said that it was about 3/4s of the way up on what was an amazingly hot sunny day. The path is clouded by trees and then all of a sudden the trees open up and you can see the most

If you look closely you can see a field

 amazing view. In fact it was so amazing that even though we were very near the town of Skelmersdale (said in a very very scouse accent) we could see the Blackpool tower over 20-25 miles away. This was a very welcome surprise and for once Mr Shiltonpig without any sarcasm will admit that for 24 hours this went to the top of his favourite Little Quest caches...and certainly a contender for the years top 10. Team Shiltonpig like a little quest cache that tries to either find a really beautiful spot in the county or tries to reflect an entire county in one spot. This one succeeds in both in our humble shiltonpig opinion!

Have you seen this photo already?

 There was no one about and even Josh joined in the start to the holiday by not (yes I repeat not) doing a poo while we went for the cache. We admired the view and sadly did not have a picnic to eat (though it was about 9.15am) so could not take in the views any longer. A quick walk down the hill saw us complete another nearby cache which had nothing whatsoever to do with green crayons....Josh saw one of his favourite things at the moment...a digger and was trying his best to do a "terrible two" moment and try and get his poor parents to give in and let him have a go. We opted on the side of caution this time but who knows you may yet see

What county are we in again?

Josh driving down the road on one of those things yet! A great cache to start the journey off and even though no one was waiting for us at the bottom to reward us with a hot pot of stew we will forgive them that. So it just leaves us to say that so far on our little quest journies we have travelled a whopping 528 miles so far which is from Derbyshire to Frankfurt one way....which is where our travel bug is at the moment. Anyway thats all for now, granted not the best bit in our blog but hopefully you feel value for money (i.e. that we are not currently charging you to read this...)

Little Quest: Derbyshire

Josh braves the giant doc leaves

17th July 2010

So Little Quest number 7 (Is there really still 40 Little Quests to go?) took us to Joshs county...Derbyshire. So what do you think of when you think of Derbyshire? More than likely the Peak District...and perhaps if you are old enough you may remember a programme called Peak Practice. But hopefully you won't hold that against the people of this fine county. Sadly Josh is too young to realise what a beautiful county he was born into, but he will in time we are sure. Though hopefully he won't end up supporting any of those dodgy teams in the area!

A "Wow" moment

The little quest in Derbyshire took team Shiltonpig up a very very steep hill, you know the kind I am on about...the ones that make Mount Everest look small...and the kind that somehow you still see cyclists riding up them to try and prove "they still have it." In our humble opinion it is fair to say they don't...its madness!...its madness in a car and our 1905 1st edition Ford car nearly didn't make it to the top. At one point we made Josh get out and push, but he kept wanting a rest so he gave up. Kids today just are not made of sterner stuff....in Victorian times kids were mining coal....but our 2 year old son can't even push a car up a hill!! Tut tut!

Mother and Son sharing a moment

When we had made it safely to the top, there was a slight walk to the top of the hill. You can see Riber Castle...apparently a few years ago it used to be some kind of zoo and those nice people calling themselves animal rights movement let out some Lynx into the area, we didn't see any sadly but dark gruseome tales still exist of flesh eating cats devouring the local population. We did see a Josh however who devours food quicker than any Lynx could. When we arrived at the top of the hill, it was one of those "WOW" moments. You know the ones I mean, when you can't help but go "WOW" at what

Knocking on a Watchtowers door

you see. The whole of Matlock and the surrounding area could be seen, as well as the cliff face and Derbyshire dales. It was absolutely breathtaking, and was also pleasant in the fact that normally to see such a sight you have to walk miles uphill, but we cheated and drove. The photo above doesn't even begin to do this justice....and very very worthy of representing Derbyshire. Though to be fair Derbyshire is blessed with plenty of great places...probably to make up for the fact that some people locally calls everyone "duck or duckie". Josh took it upon himself to examine every rock and stick. This Little Quest cache has caused much debate in team Shiltonpigs household, as one half feel this is the best Little Quest cache so far and another one is still saying that Lincolnshire has the best. What is in agreement however that we have been treated to a fantastic cache and one that all should visit when in this neck of the woods. So far we have travelled 434 miles on our Little Quest journey...and we are enjoying every minute of it....we hope you are too. If not please send your complaints to the Derbyshire Tourist Board and start your petition now to get this blog offline.

Mr Shiltonpig posing with his beautiful son

Little Quest - Lincolnshire

Josh points to the ducks

 Sunday May 16th 2010

So team Shiltonpig rolled into Lincolnshire county on their 6th leg of a 48 leg little quest. Lincolnshire was not ready for us...well Josh anyway. So what do you think of when you think of Lincolnshire....for me I think of lots of flat land...and lincolnshire sausages....shudders at the remembrance of an undercooked sausage yesterday morning. (Were just glad that Lincolnshire keeps their sausages to themselves). Well this cache adventure took us to a village called Fiskerton. Fiskerton is unusual in the fact that it has a river and 2 canals running alongside

Josh points to the sheep

 it, making it for an rather unusual place. Apparently there are lots of kingfishers here....we only saw the fisher variety...you know the ones, lonely creatures that sit in green macks whatever the weather in the hope they will catch a fish. We arrived at ridiculous o'clock in the morning...yes thats right having a Josh is fatal to your sleeping habits. We were fortunate that we could drive close to the cache, any closer and we would have been in the river! Now the cache takes you to a green and white bridge. This bridge is just a normal run of the mill bridge, albeit it with a lot more green paint on it than others.

Mr Shiltonpig takes one for the team

What was strange is that you would think a bridge would not have too many places to hide a cache, but this was the hardest Little Quest so far for us. It got to the point where we thought we were not going to find it. But Mrs Shiltonpig came to the rescue and calmed down a rather stressed Mr Shiltonpig who had become like a coal miner burrowing into every little corner on the bridge. He had wished that he was the size of Josh who was the perfect height for getting into the nooks and crannies. Can someone please tell us what a cranny is please....with a cherry on????

Wave at us please....

 After the huge relief to find the cache and note down the co-ordinates...we are prepared to sell these co-ordinates for say 1 billion pounds...which at todays exchange rate is now worth 1 rupee. We then admired the view, trying capture your county in one cache is no easy task, and the cache owner bears the stress and pressure of hiding it. This cache however was worthy of a little quest in our humble opinion. You can see for miles in this flat area of the country, we have already mentioned you can see three waterworks (no we are not talking about a bladder!)

Plus it has the added benefit of having the amazing and imposing Lincoln Cathedral in the skyline that must be over 10 miles away and yet still manages to dominate the landscape. The photos may not do the place justice, but this was one of a favourite little quest caches so far and well worth a visit in its own right. If you would like to know more about Fiskerton click on my little linky poo. So far we have knocked up 384 miles on our Little Quest journeys so far. It is with a heavy heart and an empty belly that we leave Lincolnshire. We will be back.....oh yes we will be back!

Little Quest - Warwickshire

Saturday May 1st 2010

Warwickshire....what do you think when you think of this county. Posh is usually what comes to mind....Stratford upon Avon and Warwick (and in particular Warwick Castle) are some of the great tourist places in the entire county....easily reflected in the price of houses here lol In fact on any of the sign posts indicating you have reached Warwickshire it will tell you proudly that it is "Shakespeares county". Well this was our destination for our 5th leg of a 48 leg journey around England...we doubt however when you think

A plant even bigger than Josh

of Warwickshire you think of a small village called Newbold Pacey. As usual the animals were out in force to give team Shiltonpig a scare, after the attack by the 5 deer yesterday, we were still a little shaky...as 2 massive dogs came bolting down the path. Now we are more than happy for dogs to run free and enjoy themselves, but the speed and the size of these dogs was superhuman...they were like giant great Danes with fangs and vampire tendencies and wanted to suck out our blood. I exaggerate not! An interesting conversation ensueded with the nearby dog owner, and I think they understood our concerns by the end of the "chat".

Josh "Lord of the Manor (pond)"

Newbold Pacey had in 1086 (that dreaded Domesday Book appears again) had simply been Newbold and by the time the 12th century turned around, some lord of the manor type guy (Adam de Pacey) had renamed the village in their honour. Shame the ancestor wasn't called shiltonpig as Newbold Shiltonpig has a nice ring to it don't you think? Newbold is a very very small village...heck we didn't even see a pub there...I mean whats that all about?? However more intriguing is the fact that in 1185 Knights Templar were given land. Perhaps Dan Brown might visit and be the title of his new bestseller??

A glow above church?

The cache in question was at the back of a couple of fields which to be honest didn't take that long. So we decided to have a wander around the rest of the small village. Even though it was about 9.30 the village didn't seem to have woken up, not to worry though as Josh could make enough noise for the rest of them. Especially as he needed his nappy changing. The St George church was rebulit in 1881...but for the life of us we can't work out why they have put a bus stop in the middle of the graveyard, I mean its ok to have some lovely large well trimmed hedges...but a bus stop?

A Bus stop in a graveyard??

The things some churches do these days? As it was called St George we had hoped to see a Dragon, we were sadly disappointed...not even a sniff of one. Though Josh picked one up at McDonalds later in the day...does that count?? So a very short and quick Little Quest trip, our quickest Little Quest find so far. This means our journey has added us another 100 miles onto our trip, meaning so far 314 miles for our LQ adventures.