Swiss Miss

I spent a lot of time in a place called Little Switzerland.

The name conjurs up all sorts of wonderful vistas, sparklingly clean air, towering snow capped peaks above neatly laid out handerkerchief meadows strewn with daisies, bracing hillside walks above steeply sided valleys and twinkling watercourses cavorting in white water like a meringue topping.

Unfortunately my version was little more than a large hole formed from mineral workings which periodically smelt rank and fetid, regularly flooded, often suffered from landslip to the eroded precipices and I hold personally to blame for the death of our Pointer dog, Toffy as the most likely source of the Weils disease that cut her short in her prime years. 

Whoever first named that pit to allude to the beauty and majesty of an Alpine paradise must have not travelled very widely or was drunk at the time. The only possible link between the Swiss nation and the hole in the ground is loose and tenuous in that on the rare occasion that sunlight penetrates the swamp gas and algae infused hazy mist the residual chalk face could possibly and with squinty eyes resemble, perhaps, a light covering of snow, maybe.

I have seen photographs of the place in its heyday as a quarry in the latter part of the 1800's. Considerable activity from men and machines with the raw chalk being dug, chipped, blasted and coerced from its prehistoric resting place and then run out onto the bank of the River Humber where barges and shallow draught vessels waited at wooden quays to be loaded.

The black, bitumenous tower of a windmill remains as a sole surviving structure of what was a small community of houses and works. The operations on the site will have ceased sometime in the early part of the twentieth century and with many subsequent decades of the reclamation by nature back to a wilderness. In less sensitive locations, being close to the river and upwind of a town the large void will have formed a good resource for landfill for a few years at least and it's sister quarry within half a mile inland was commandered by the Council for such a purpose.

A few events transpired to salvage the quarry.

The Humber Bridge was built and the quarry , overlooking the structure, was ideally placed for transformation into a Visitor Centre with childrens play area and a large landscaped bowl shaped public park. The task to make the place hospitable was on a large scale. The only level access point was from the river bank and obstacles included a main line railway and, at that time, a dual carriageway forming the principal approach to Hull from the west. Tunnels were formed in smooth dressed concrete although now heavily disguised in what passes for urbanised art of dubious origin and showing that biology and human anatomy have not been taught in our local schools for some years.

Volunteers and possibly those on community service for urban art atrocities dug into the floor of the quarry and carved out paths and steps, laid down walkways in railway sleepers and cleared a good few tons of litter and deposited waste as a consequence of a free for all fly tipping  practice.

The lowest parts were shaped into lagoons and pools but on chalk they invariably filled up and emptied at will. The startling green colour of the stagnant water did serve to warn off those intent on paddling but dogs and even a few skinny dippers could be at first heard and then seen splashing around in the murky shallows.

In the twilight hours and beyond the park was taken over by the youth wing of the society of Arsonists with the charring and collapse of many of the wooden bench seats, picnic tables, sculpture carvings and playground apparatus.

Still, in reasonable daylight and dry conditions it was a regular destination of choice for our young family with buggies, bikes and dog sled team. It took a good 1 mile uphill slog to get there from the house but we would spend many an hour circling the base of the cliffs, dragging sticks, skimming and throwing pebbles into the gaseous flouresecent mire and rescuing the dogs from face offs or worse with those squat ugly breeds and their killer mongrels. For our education there were information points through the park with pictures of dinosaurs, fossils and other illustrations of the local history aspects. It appears that the minerals in the quarry had origins in the carcasses of small crustaceans which had accumulated in the bed of a tropical sea some considerable millenia ago. Whosoever had dumped them in the quarry should have been prosecuted in my opinion.

It was also a place to take sunday visitors and with favourable weather it could be quite a pleasant family and social experience. The children, when small, enjoyed clambouring up the banks and undulations. A shortcut we regularly took skirted the contours up the inner eastern face and over a few years we established a well worn path inspite of the treacherously loose ground, sheer drops and protruding and snaking tree roots that could easily catch out the inattentive. As with most regular haunts they do have only a finite attraction and use and we gradually drifted away from Little Switzerland  in favour of lazer quest, bowling and hanging about in shopping malls which the children, now much older, also enjoyed.

A lasting memory is of Toffy the Pointer in her element chasing down a rabbit or squirrel but always and thankfully in vain. Her activities will have been watched by a cautious rat in a hole before its ultimate contribution to her untimely demise.