Sure. We know that West Dorset has earned the accolade and reputation of being gifted World Heritage status regarding its breathtaking Jurrassic Coastal locations and, as I write elsewhere on this site, “Its cliffs lie like bookends displaying 185 million years of Earth’s history laid out but, (I’d claim), Dorset is actually embued with a far more abundant embarrassment of riches than just its county wide geology or locally based topography and I’ll use this page to show you an alternate Dorset that most folk don’t ever see let alone appreciate.
Weymouth track leads to decapitated robot head and wildlife paradise.
I was introduced to this remote location while employed as a roaming Local Government Officer back in the 1980’s and, having driven way off grid down a potholed stoney track protected by a padlocked 5 bar gate, was rendered speechless and in awe to discover an ancient ramshackle fisherman’s hut used to store and secure a flat bottomed boat and equipment for harvesting wild oysters.
With a tidal lagoon acting as a nursery for school bass and young mullet, the idyllic spot is the habitat of exotic wildlife including rare visiting migrant birds and fowl found nowhere else along our UK shores.
Fascinating, eh? But like many, though not all, of the destinations of interest I document, (below), please don’t ask for directions or map coordinates because, well, if I told you the location of the giant concrete robot, I’d have to kill you!
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10,000 year old Mesolithic Hunter-Gatherer site just 2 miles from Dorset market town.
While I will go into greater detail of Dorset’s history and prehistory in my Dorset Time Machine section, I’d like to set the scene for another incredible local location that, while only a 10 minutes cycle ride from a Dorset coastal market town, is actually the site of the county’s earliest Hunter-Gather Metholithic site and also the inspiration for the online “Beach Thorncombe” screen name I’ve been using for over 25 years!
And surprise, surprise? As one of my all time top three West Dorset haunts, I’m delighted to share this utterly spectacular local haunt with you.
The views from the top of Thorncombe Beacon will just blow your mind!
Click or tap here for a history of West Dorset
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King John’s 11th century hunting lodge adjacent Powerstock village
Did you know that England’s 11th Century King John spent Dorset summers just 3 miles out of Bridport at Powerstock around about 800 years ago?
King John’s “hunting lodge” was actually a formidable classically designed stone built Motte and Bailey castle with a huge footprint of inner and outer battlement walls that would have, likely, involved a trek of over a mile to walk around.
Here. Take a look at these Google Earth images I’ve tinkered with to gather some perspective regarding the extend of the King’s Dorset retreat and, allowing for a little poetic licence, (I’m no cartographer), view the 2nd image, (below), to familiarise yourself with the pattern of boundary and field markings that still clearly depict the defensive ramparts, walls, moat and inner and outer rings of the Motte and Bailey structure of the castle itself.
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Ancient 3000 yr old Iron Age citidel just a slingshot from Bridport’s Sainsburys
Allington hillfort … hiding in plain sight.
I’d been fieldwalking, metal detecting and researching ancient and prehistoric West Dorset for over 40 years yet I only discovered Bridport’s Allington Hill was a prehistoric ancient just a couple of years ago, having learned that fact after using Google Search to display old maps of bronze and iron age hillforts of Dorset.
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