A warm day with a light westerly breeze and mostly blue sky, I take the Spurn Explorer bus to Easington. Today's aim is Out Newton. A hamlet on the edge of the cliff made of four scattered farms. I've planned a circular route, north along the coast then west and then south towards Skeffling. Although there are some anglers off Easington caravan park, the way down looks a bit perilous, so I decide against walking on the beach for a while. High tide is only a couple of hours away so it's a clifftop walk today. Last time I walked this route I did it on the beach so this stretch is a new route for me. I walk through the caravan park and then reach the clifftop. Sand Martins fly around the cliffs. Easington's gas terminal and storage facility means it is defended from coastal erosion by almost 1 km of rock armour. I walk between the facility and the defenced coast. Rabbits hide between the rocks. At the beginning of the defence there is a small sandy beach. I descend and I'm pleased to fund some Sea Holly and Lime Grass. Linnets, Reed Buntings and Skylarks. An Oystercatcher calls from atop a building.
Woodpigeon mid hop. They always hop when approaching a potential mate to court.
Easington beach.
The edge of Easington Caravan park, looking back.
Sand Martins.
Young Rabbit by the rock armour.
Silver Y.
Whimbrel. It was on the Easington Defences.
One of a pair of Shelduck that took off from the cliffs.
The end of Dimlington Road.
This is the only remain of Dimlington Farm. The couple of buildings represented in this 1771 map are now gone.
The hamlet may be no more, but Dimlington survives also as the name of a period of advance of the ice during the last Ice Age Maximum, the Dimlington Stadial, which deposited the high boulder clay cliffs just over 30 m high. The cliffs are also a SSSI due to its geological interest. Dimlington High Land and Dimlington Road from Easington, which sharply turns west just before hitting the sea, are the other indications on the ground of the existence of the hamlet.
Shortly after I start the walk, I find the first Painted Lady. I couldn't photograph it, but dozens were active and steadily moving north on the light westerly breeze. Later I find several egg-laying on spear thistles. They appear to be using the coast to navigate as in my return, which I do inland, I don't find any.
Ovipositing Painted Lady.
An alarmed Meadow Pipit. This species is characteristic of the coastal strip of grassland.
A slippage of the edge of the cliff has taken some recently ploughed and seeded field with it.
At midday I stop for some lunch. The only place to sit is the ground, so I choose a spot with a view of a patch on the field edge where the crop has failed to grow. Soon a Yellow Wagtail lands and starts feeding. A man is walking south along the coast. He stops to talk briefly and says he's on his way to Easington from Withernsea. He is on a long distance walk and will return to Withernsea to catch the bus to Easington tomorrow. He's been walking from Blyth.
Yellow Wagtail.
Cliff Farm cottage.
I take Out Newton Road and then Balk Road. I'm surprised by its heavy traffic, for a single track road with passing places in the middle of nowhere! I'm glad when I left the road to take the humorously called Three Foot Lane, which runs parallel to a wavy drain, probably originally a beck draining Dimlington high land. A cream-top Marsh Harrier quarters along the field and past a small copse, Broom Plantation. Soon I get to Hodgson Field NR, originally farmed land which a farmer had left to revert to nature. One of the fields is now scrub, the others are grazed or meadows. I make a note to come back with more time. I realise there is a bus coming and I can just make it at nearby Skeffling.
Marsh Harrier.
Hodgson Fields information board.
Entrance to Hodgson Fields.
Yellowhammer.
Swallow at Skeffling.
