Autumn Walks - The Whitfield Valley Nature Reserve

Now that autumn is here and there is less work to do in the garden and on the allotment, Polar and Grizzly want to try and keep fit by doing lots of walks, and have decided to visit some of the country parks around this area they haven't been to before.

 

 Of course, we like to go with them, even when it is chilly or windy and we need our duffle coats on, as it's always interesting to go somewhere we haven't been before.  One of these places is the Whitfield Valley Nature Reserve, on the north-east side of Stoke-on-Trent.

Like many of the country parks in our area, it hasn't always been so green, as there was a very big colliery close by, but now it is lovely.  There is a large lake here, with geese, swans, ducks and some great crested grebes, including a young one which was still pestering its parent for food, despite being quite big.

After passing the lake, the main path runs along the valley, past the football centre at Bradeley - where Hanley Bear stopped to watch some players practicing - until it reaches the neighbouring Chatterley Whitfield Heritage Country Park, which Grizzly said we would visit another day (and we did!). 

 

Once we had reached the northern edge of the nature reserve where the fishing lake is, Grizzly led us all along a smaller path which went through some woods and followed a little stream back towards the big lake.

This took us into perfect small bear adventure country, where there were autumn leaves to play in and small trees to climb, so we jumped out of our Bear Bag to have fun.

 

You can see that we really enjoyed ourselves and, by the time we had finished scurrying about exploring, we were quite tired and hungry.  Luckily, it was almost lunch time and Polar and Grizzly were ready to go home too.

So, the next time you see pictures on your television of Stoke-on-Trent, looking all built up and run down, remember that there is lots of green space here too.  

You can explore more of it with us bears in another blog soon.