Loose Ends and Coincidences

We returned to the High Street, as Jackie had read on a website that there has been an archway to Leighton House by No 28. No 28 turned out to be the entire building of Wilkinsons plus Cancer Research and Wilkinsons used to be… The Co-op! The latter, of course, is where Leighton House and its grounds used to be. (I hope you are following this!) We have found out since our last entry that The Cistercian Monastry became Leighton House in 1823.

We did indeed find the remains of an archway over the top of Lauren’s café in High Street Mews, but it doesn’t seem to be very old. We kept going on down the mews and came out in a car park by the area we had been dowsing only the previous week, which was the garden of the Cistercian/Leighton House. We were definitely in the right place. In this car park is the famous Co-op sign and if we turn right we end up at Popes Corner, which is exactly where we started from! We also noticed that the upper wall of the cottages at Pope’s corner is made of old Leighton sandstone, which makes these cottages older than we had originally thought. We had now gone completely round the entire boundary of Leighton House.

We now feel the mystery of Leighton House is finished. Mission accomplished.

We then went to All Saints churchyard to take more photographs of the gated passage (see previous blog dated 9th October 2009)) to see if, this time, the farthest gate could be seen. As you can see from the photograph you can see the gate quite clearly. So this mysterious anomaly has not been solved.

We adjourned to Room No. 9 for a bowl of soup and a pot of tea, when, would you believe it, sitting on the next table was the lady we had met whilst dowsing for the Rowriddy Stone in Adams Bottom. Talk about a coincidence. And even more of a coincidence; her house backs on to Adams Bottom and is only next door but one from where we think the Rowriddy stone actually stood! We think that this was meant to be and no coincidence at all but the Universe showing us our next step. We found out that her name is Denise and she is a local artist, who’s work is being displayed at the moment in Room No. 9 and can be bought from there. She has very kindly agreed to let us dowse in her garden. So watch out for that another day.

Exploring Adam's Bottom

We thought we would thoroughly explore Adams Bottom. No – that doesn’t sound right! We thought Adams Bottom had a large stone in it – No, that’s not right either!

We had seen on several old maps, mention of the Rowriddy Stone. This seemed a really good, exciting thing to dowse for. Jackie knew that the Rowriddy stream ran through Adam’s Bottom, a recreation ground off Heath Road and was the obvious place to start. Ah! That’s a better way of putting it.

The first thing that hit us when we arrived at the recreation ground is an embankment (see photo above) on 2 sides of the area. We have no idea if this is a modern man-made feature or has been there for generations or even centuries. We asked our dowsing rods about the embankment and they said they were old but not ancient. Very intriguing. We will have to find out more. The bridge over the Rowriddy stream at the Heath Road end is extremely long and sturdy for such a tiny stream; indeed the actual opening is very small, not much bigger than a wide drainpipe.

Why is the bridge so big? By the side of the bridge is an entrance to the park leading to Heath Road and there is a pile of very old, large lumps of sandstones.

Why they are there, we do not know. Yet another unanswered question about this place.
Back to the Rowriddy stone! With our backs facing the bridge we asked our dowsing rods where the Rowriddy stone had been located. They pointed towards the right hand side boundary of the park. Walking back towards Plantation Road we encountered a lot of energies. We turned right into Plantation Road and happened to meet a lady who was interested in what we were doing and was informative about the area being on Saxon land. Again very, intriguing. Was the stone Saxon?

We walked further up Plantation Road continuously asking our rods where the Rowriddy stone had been, and they kept pointing to our right and led us up Hillside Road until we got to a house called Burnden House and the rods pointed directly to this property. We feel this may well be the site of , or very near, the Rowriddy stone.