Walk Details:
Start Point: Corner of Eastgate Street/Brunswick Road (outside Argos)
Ordnance Survey: Landranger 162 - ref SO 834-184
Distance: about 2km (1.2 miles)
Time: around 1-2 hours
Short Walk: The Gloucester Trail
This walk is the easier of the two routes because it follows a path around
the centre of Gloucester, spotlighting building stones which hold significant
natural history interest.
Requirements:
As the walk is based in the city centre, casual clothes would be fine.
All locations mentioned in route one are accessible by wheelchair.
Walk Conditions:
All of the paths on the Route One walk are a mixture of
the typical paved and tarmac surfaces found in a city centre. Some of
the surfaces in places may be slightly uneven.
The first point of interest is Argos Extra on the corner
of Eastgate Street and Brunswick Road.
The facing stones either side of the entrance are made from Shap Granite and feature some large Feldspar crystals that date date to the Devonian period some 390 million years ago..
Take a short walk down Brunswick Road and you'll see the City Museum on the opposite side of the road. Cross over and take a look at the walls of the building. These building blocks are made from Cotswold Oolitic limestone and feature some unique geological treasures such as vugs - pockets of crystals formed over millions of years. This stone dates back to the Jurassic period and the time of the dinosaur!
Head back to Eastgate Street and turn left. You will now see a large glass topped exhibition space just in front of Boots where you can see the medieval remains of the Gloucester East Gate.
Walk along Eastgate Street and look out for the Lloyds TSB bank on your right hand side. Closer examination of the stone here will reveal a pink/brown granite with more feldspar crystals embedded within. These granites are an example of igneous rock - rock which formed deep within the Earth.
Continue along the road until you reach The Cross. You'll notice a large church tower on your left - this is St. Michael's Church Tower. Check out the side nearest the Starbucks Coffee and you'll see more Oolitic limestone and an example of cross-bedding - this proves that Gloucestershire was underwater millions years ago because cross-bedding is an example of tidal forces in action.
N ow head towards the HSBC Bank on the corner of Westgate Street and Northgate
Street. Close examination of the Portland stone (which was quarried just
off the Dorset Coast) reveals yet more evidence that southern England was
underwater. You can see fossils of 170 million year old oysters embedded
in the stone!
Head down Northgate Street you'll see a pub called the New Inn on you right. This pub dates back to the 15th Century and has some notable history. The Inn was home to a vast retinue of knights, gentlemen and yeoman who lodged at the Inn to pronounce the accession of Mary Tudor to the throne. Announcements such as this were usually made on The Cross, but in bad weather the Inn would have been preferable.
Continue along Northgate Street until you reach St. John's Church on your left. Take a left along St. John's Lane and follow the signpost for Cathedral Via Sacra. You should see a strange spire in front of you which rises about four metres from the ground - this is St. John's Spire and it's made from Cotswold Ragstone. This stone shows how the ragstone was susceptible to weathering over time.
Travel a short distance back the way you came and you'll see Cathedral Way Via Sacra - head down this passageway and you'll find yourself in front of Gloucester's historic cathedral. Approach the Cathedral and follow the wall around the corner to the left - now take a look at the limestone blocks at the base of the building. The sandy coloured stone is Oolitic limestone which was quarried in the nearby Cotswold hills. Again you'll see a great example of cross-bedding in the base stones.
Head into College Green (the area in front of the mani entrance) and move towards the buildings to the left of the main entrance gate. If you examine the pavement outside Nos 3 and 4 you'll see two distinct patterns on their surface. The patterns are a snapshot of the surface of the Earth around the Forest of Dean about 300 million years ago and, again, they tell of an area beneath water. The linear patterns are believed to have been made in river beds where water flows in one direction while the more erratic patterns are oscillation ripples which were formed by ebb and flow of the tide.
Now move over to the Cathedral and go inside. Head over to the choir altar and look at the brown/pink step just beyond the rope. The step is crammed full of crinoids - these were creatures which lived on the sea bed some 200 million years ago. Go into the Cloisters via the East Door and follow the passageway around - you might be interested to know that these corridors were the location of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Head out via the East Door and back into the main chamber of the cathedral. Facing the West Door, take a look at the memorial plaques to the left of the door - the centre one is a monument to Charles Rudhall and, if you look closely, you'll see it's crammed full of brachiopods. These shellfish lived during the Silurian period some 400 million years ago.
Head back out into College Green and follow the pavement around to the right. Head through the archway to the right. You're now in Miller's Green. The wall just by the telegraph pole has a wide range of stones from vastly different time periods and there's also a rock in the path that was from a volcanic explosion!
Return through the archway back into College Green and take a right. Head through another archway and you should see a grand monument to Bishop Hooper in front of you - this unfortunate soul was burned at the stake in 1555 right in front of the cathedral. Beyond is church of St. Mary-de-Lode.
Take a left after the church of St. Mary-de-Lode and head to the end of
the road. You're now on Westgate Street. Take a left here and look for Nicki's
Taverna which is just opposite the church of St. Nicholas. The stone beneath
the windows is Rapakivi granite and is the oldest stone you'll see on this
walk. It's igneous and dates back to Precambrian times beyond 543 million
years ago.
Continue along Westgate Street and look out for the Shire Hall on your right. The front of the Shire Hall, designed by Sir Robert Smirke in 1816, is made from Pennant Sandstone from the Forest of Dean. Facing the Shire Hall, head right and follow the building around to the side. You'll now see the modern part of the hall, added in the 1960s.The green panels that stretch down the side of the building were once volcanic ash deposited in the Lake District about 460 million years ago in the Ordovician Period.
Return to Westgate Street and resume your journey up towards The Cross. The last stop before you reach The Cross is the Halifax building society on your right. This building is faced with a material called Serpentinite.
Finally you've returned to The Cross and the end of this walk. The Cross is the meeting point of the four main streets that follow the original Roman foursquare plan laid down around 45AD. Gloucester city centre was subsequently developed by following civilisations but the original Roman basic design of four-squares from The Cross still holds true.
