The Invisible River

We have been enjoying so many adventures that it's becoming hard for this small bear to keep up with writing about them.  I have a long list of special things to tell you about so I think I will have to start with what we did yesterday and work backwards..

Yesterday, we went for a very long walk with our humans along a disused railway line which is now part of a long-distance cycle route.  Most of it runs along the valley of a river called the Manifold, although we walked from Waterhouses along the part that follows the river Hamps and joins the Manifold near Weags Bridge.

It runs through a lovely part of the Staffordshire Peak District quite close to Ilam and Dove Dale, which we visited about a month earlier. 

When we started along the path, safely tucked into our bear bag over Polar's shoulder, we could hear water splashing and gurgling over the rocky river bed, even when we couldn't see it behind trees and bushes.  But then, it went quiet.

When we looked to see why the river was so quiet, we saw there was no water in it!

'Where has all the water gone?' asked little Endon Bear.

I didn't know what to tell him but Hanley Bear, who likes learning about science and nature, knew the answer.

'It's underground!' he said.  'Unless there's been very heavy rain, all the water disappears down sink holes into limestone caves and flows along where we can't see it.'

We could see the plants on the dry river bed were muddy and all bent over in the same direction, where there had been water flowing over them a day or two earlier, after the stormy weather on Saturday, but there was no water now.

'How very strange,' I said.  'I wonder how wild animals find water to drink if it all sinks underground?'

'Maybe they buy cups of tea at the farm, like Polar and Grizzly are going to do,' suggested Endon.

They did oatcakes and homemade cakes, but Polar had made us a picnic as she didn't know there was anywhere to buy food along this part of the walk, so we will have to sample the farm's goodies another day.

Polar carried us quite a long way furtheralong the valley, towards a long ridge of land.  As we got closer, we saw big caves high on the rocky hillside.  Although our human guardians tell us there are no wild bears here, we were not sure we believed that now - these were obviously bear caves!

Then we had another surprise - we could hear running water again!

'We've reached the River Manifold,' said Grizzly.  'This is where we've got to turn around and make our way back. 

Before we set off, Polar said we could have a run around on our own while she and Grizzly had a little rest and a drink of water.

We climbed on a farm gate, then did some running and jumping on the bouncy turf among all sorts of pretty spring flowers.  There were lots of new smells to investigate and plants to nibble to see if they were good to eat, but we enjoyed scampering about most of all.  Soon, we had tired ourselves out.

We were very glad that we were going to be carried back along the trail in the bear bag, rather than having to walk all the way on our own small paws.  Hanley and I decided we were going to have our afternoon naps!

Endon said he was going to stay awake to look out for wild bears in the caves when the humans got back where he could see them, but he is only a small cub and he soon fell asleep too and none of us woke up until Polar lifted us out of the bear bag and tucked us into our cosy bear basket at home.