Creech Barrow Viewpoint - Isle of Purbeck, Dorset, UK - Scenic Roadside Look-Outs on Waymarking.com

This viewpoint is one of our favourite spots in the world. There is ample parking and a view over the surrounding countryside encompassing the coastline towards Portland Bill to the south west. To the north a view over the tank training area can be seen in the Army Ranges, to approach this view it is necessary to cross the minor road and stand oon the verge, so be careful. The southern view has its own information board in the vast car park.

DorsetLife Magazine describes the viewpoint:

'Looming above, at 634 feet above sea level, Creech Barrow Hill is my all-time favourite place-name and viewpoint. Three times its name says the same thing – ‘Creech’ is from crich, the Celtic word for hill, ‘Barrow’ from the Saxon for mound, and with ‘Hill’ itself in our own currency, ‘Hill-Hill-Hill’ is the translation. The Creech element is a particular rarity, as only a dozen Celtic place-names have been traced in Dorset. Criz of the Domesday Book and crich of 1280 derive from the Old English cryc.

Conical in shape, Creech Barrow looks like an extinct volcano, but its origins are relatively recent. This uplifted section of strata comprising clay, gravel and sand was raised along with adjacent chalklands by a collision of tectonic plates as Africa collided with Europe. Creech Barrow is just high enough to peek over the chalk ridge of the Purbeck Hills. It is an intimate view of Purbeck: from Lulworth to Shell Bay with a glimpse of Corfe Castle and the whole sweep of the heath northwards to the River Frome, Wareham and beyond.

It is and was a classic viewpoint. Medieval maps show King John’s hunting lodge on top and there are still the foundations of floors and walls, though these may be from a parkland feature for nearby Creech Grange Mansion. Much older, there is a Bronze Age round barrow burial mound smothered by bracken on the lesser twin peak just before the summit. In the last century it acted as a magnet to Wareham landscape photographer LF Pickford and his successor, Herbert Stevens.

In the foothills, scrub covers the remains of Arthur Cobb’s Creech Brickworks. This dated from Victorian times. Grass at Cocknowle hides the course of a 19th-century two-track incline railway that brought marl down from a hilltop quarry. Chalk is still dug from across the valley, for its part in the clay processing industry, by Wareham Ball Clay Ltd.'

Describe - Highway or Road number: Grange Hill Road Closest town or city: The hamlet of Steeple or the town of Wareham and the village of Lulworth Number of parking spots available: 50 Name if a website describes this location.: [Web Link] Winter View: yes Summer View: yes Year around access ?: yes Comfort station on site: no Is a photo of an "Information Sign"included?: Yes

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