LEI Country

Irchester Country Park

Location plan for Irchester Country Park car park - SP912658 - view in Multimap or Streetmap format.

Permanent Orienteering Course available

View details of this and other Permanent Orienteering Courses

Truly the most unusual location we use, it is a pity this country park is so small and at the extremity of our area.

Set in the heart of the Nene Valley, the park was formerly an iron stone quarry - the distinctive 'hills and dales' landscape a testament to its heritage, looking every inch like a ploughed field but multiplied many fold. The furrows can be as much as 30 feet deep.

When the park was opened in 1971, nature and the locals had reclaimed it for their own. However, its history goes back much further: the stunning 'Wembley Pit' shows geology dating back 165 million years - a real Jurassic Park!

The park contains a mixture of mature woodland and grassy open meadows. With its varied terrain overlying ironstone and limestone rocks formed all those years ago, Irchester Country Park is a Regionally Important Geological Site. Quarrying ended in the 1960s.

The planting of over 250,000 trees provides visitors with a chance to see a working woodland - managed for its timber, recreational use and of course for wildlife - from the green woodpecker to sparrow hawks.

The area has been mapped for orienteering for many years and there is a permanent orienteering course. It is one of the few areas where the best route from A to B which are 100 yards apart may be a half mile detour.

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