04-Mar-2022
We weren't supposed to be doing this walk today.
Inspired by the spiffing forecast, we had decided that this would be the day we climbed Cronk ny Arrey Laa to see the sun rise. Well, the forecast didn't mention anything about the low cloud...
When we arrived at the place where you can park, we found that the mountain had pulled its hat well down over its ears, and was making it absolutely clear that no rising, or indeed anything else, would be seen from its apex today.
So, looking out onto the murk, we polished off our portable breakfast (excellent: duck and orange pate sandwiches, plus a hunk of oak-smoked Manx Cheddar), and invented a Plan B.
Which was Langness, the shoe-shaped peninsula that sticks out of the Island's flank just down by the airport.
It's seen a fair bit of action, this place: mine workings, ship wrecks, gun batteries, and a number of fortifications -- not to mention various leisure enterprises. It's also splendidly scenic.
We parked at Derbyhaven, and set off clockwise round the peninsula, crossing over the causeway to St Michael's Isle (aka Fort Island) and back en route.
Setting off
This is why we didn't climb the mountain...
Not quite sunrise, but beautiful anyway...
This chapel was established by Norse-Celtic Christians in the 12th century
Behind the chapel is Derby Fort; beefed up by the 7th Earl of Derby in 1640, its origins lie 100 years earlier
Back on Langness, there are numerous interesting structures:
The Herring Tower, built in 1811 as a landmark for ships at sea
The remains of the dynamite store used by the copper mines
Fabulous light today...
Langness lighthouse
The fog horn
The remains of Langness farmhouse
As you walk up the western edge of the peninsula, you're constantly accompanied by the whistling and cheeping of all the birds going about their business on the rocky foreshore:
Common shelduck
Green-winged teal
Mountains still not coming out to play...
Back on the mainland, this is Hango Hill:
As an execution site it goes back a very long way, but its most famous victim was perhaps Illiam Dhone, who was shot there in 1663 as punishment for the part he played in the 1651 Manx rising against the Derby family. The ruins currently visible on the mound are of a former "castellated summerhouse". Not sure I'd want to be summerhousing on such an inauspicious spot, but hey...
Finally, to bookend the walk, here's Derbyhaven again, but with water this time:
So, while regretting the unobliging mood of the mountain, I have to admit that Plan B turned up real gold.