First report from me for a while, (certain members will be aware of the reasons), so I thought I’d make it something new.
I’ve had my eye on Meldon Quarry for a long time now, and had originally planned to visit over Christmas, but the snow put paid to that.
A nice sunny day and I was off, and visited with Lectrician, incognito, and a non-member.
History on the quarry is a bit scarce, but it is still very much live and working, producing over 150,000 tonnes of railway ballast grade granite every year.
Whilst alot of this is still transported by rail, most of it thunders along the narrow country lanes in the area in lorries.
The area has alot of other nice features, including a preserved railway adjacent, a superb cast iron viaduct, and nearby reservoir.
The site consists of two quarries in the Meldon Aplite with an associated suite of rare minerals, several of which are not found elsewhere in Britain. The southern quarry shows a major dyke in hornfelsed shales and tuffs. The northern quarry comprises several dykes up to 2m in
width with many offshoots into the surrounding cherts and shales. The more common minerals are also of interest in the more pegmatitic parts of the dyke. Red-a-Ven mine upstream from the quarries, including a variety of metamorphic minerals including rare tin-bearing garnets, which is only the second known locality in the world. The Red-a-ven
valley shows a number of geomorphological features of interest including waterfalls and plunge pools and a boulder fan. The Meldon area also contains a wide range of features of industrial archaeological importance.
Anyway a few pics, unfortunatley every door in the place was locked, but it was still a nice little mooch. I've added a couple of the surrounding bits for good measure!
I’ve had my eye on Meldon Quarry for a long time now, and had originally planned to visit over Christmas, but the snow put paid to that.
A nice sunny day and I was off, and visited with Lectrician, incognito, and a non-member.
History on the quarry is a bit scarce, but it is still very much live and working, producing over 150,000 tonnes of railway ballast grade granite every year.
Whilst alot of this is still transported by rail, most of it thunders along the narrow country lanes in the area in lorries.
The area has alot of other nice features, including a preserved railway adjacent, a superb cast iron viaduct, and nearby reservoir.
The site consists of two quarries in the Meldon Aplite with an associated suite of rare minerals, several of which are not found elsewhere in Britain. The southern quarry shows a major dyke in hornfelsed shales and tuffs. The northern quarry comprises several dykes up to 2m in
width with many offshoots into the surrounding cherts and shales. The more common minerals are also of interest in the more pegmatitic parts of the dyke. Red-a-Ven mine upstream from the quarries, including a variety of metamorphic minerals including rare tin-bearing garnets, which is only the second known locality in the world. The Red-a-ven
valley shows a number of geomorphological features of interest including waterfalls and plunge pools and a boulder fan. The Meldon area also contains a wide range of features of industrial archaeological importance.
Anyway a few pics, unfortunatley every door in the place was locked, but it was still a nice little mooch. I've added a couple of the surrounding bits for good measure!
Big boys toys....
