Hollinshead Hall Well, Lancashire

The rain lashed down as we crawled along the Tockholes Road looking for the car park alluded to in a our research. Not what you'd call perfect well-hunting weather, but it didn't put a dampener on our enthusiasm. After parking up, we followed a track through the woods in the direction I guessed we would find the well house. The rain was so heavy now that the track downhill actually had streams of water running down it. Reaching the bridge at the bottom, we saw - just uphill - the ruins of Hollinshead Hall and a handy signboard with historical info and a map. The well house was visible just up the slope, in amongst the trees, and we scrambled our way up to it.

Note mysterious hooded figure.

The overcast sky meant it was pretty dark inside the well house, so hard to take a decent photo through the barred side windows. You can just make out the lion's head which the waters are meant to emerge from.

Scrambling up the slope to the side of the building, we found what is suspected to be the original holy well.

We had a poke around the ruins of the old hall for a bit, as the rain had eased off, and then headed back to the car park, avoiding packs of hounds and live role-players on the way.

Hollinshead Hall Well on The Megalithic Portal

Rivock Well, Riddlesden

A last minute diversion due to ill-omened dreams led us to Rivock Well in the mystical realms of West Yorkshire. We parked up with some other cars by the side of the road, climbed the dry-stone wall and headed off on the path across the sheep fields. Poo and bogginess were hazards as we headed towards the cultivated conifer woods surrounding the summit of Rivock Edge. Indeed, the gate we use to enter the woods had a massive puddle in front, requiring some fancy manoeuvring to get through without wet feet. The atmosphere in the woods was eerie to say the least: no sounds, no movement - just a deadening carpet of brown pine needles and dense tangles of tree limbs. We followed the path to a viewpoint with a poem carved into two slabs of sandstone and realised we had missed our way somewhere. Back-tracking to the stream we had crossed, we steeled our nerves and plunged into the woods, carefully threading our way along the high bank of the crystal clear stream. There was generally a couple of feet of space to walk along and I noticed that some of the tree limbs appeared to have been pruned back at some point to allow access. Rounding a bend, we saw a couple of (fairly rotten) bits of wood bridging the waters and leading across to a rather brown-looking pool - we had found the well.

Reading up later, it turns out we would have had an easier trip if we'd followed the broad bridlepath that led through the middle of the wood. But even that had its dangers - shadowy hooded spirits have been seen there...

Rivock Well at The Northern Antiquarian

St Winefride's Well, Holywell

Excited by our visit to Hampston's, we headed for the most likely looking nearby site we could find on the crappy road atlas in the car. St Winefride's was the other end of the scale: a major pilgrimage site for centuries, it advertises itself as 'The Lourdes of Wales'. We paid a small fee and entered through the museum into the grounds of the well itself. There were a fair few pilgrims around, considering it was a wet Sunday afternoon, with children running around and people lighting candles in the chapel.

Official St Winefride's website

Listing on The Megalithic Portal

Hampston's Well, Burton

Nicola came up with the idea of visiting another well and suggested this one. I think the idea had been gestating for a while. We packed the kids and the ingredients for a picnic into the car and headed down the M56 towards the Wirral. With only one missed turning we managed to spot the tiny parking spot and buried columns with engraved signs on that mark the way to Hampston's Well. Pushing our way through the nettles, we came upon a flight of steps that led down to a square open area bounded by a heavily overgrown brick wall on two sides and a stream at the end (the other side was trees). The well was in here, though we had to confirm it with some research when we got home, as it was so heavily overgrown and muddy it didn't look like much at all. Despite this (and the rain), it was a great experience and a lovely, peaceful atmosphere.

[Photos courtesy of Tim @ www.historyandmystery.co.uk]

Hampston's Well on The Megalithic Portal