Elsenham Sand Quarry, Elsenham, Essex.  The Red Crag Nodule Bed is exposed in this working quarry under Chillesford Sand. Meet in the quarry car park [TL 547255[ by the works at 10 a.m.; directions of how to get there are available. Joint visit with the Essex Field Club and Tertiary Research Group (TRG).

Don't forget your Hard Hat, High Visibility Vest, and Strong Boots. You will not be allowed entrance to this working sand quarry otherwise. (RC 13 February 2008)

[Leader: Gerald Lucy].

The Naze, Walton, Essex. An opportunity to collect Red Crag molluscs and London Clay fossils. Meet at 11 a.m. by the cliff top tower [TM 264234]. Low water is at 11.41 a.m. Joint visit with the Essex Field Club and TRG.

[Leader: Gerald Lucy]

The Gower Coast, South Wales.   A geological weekend, arranged by the Open University Eastern Region, visiting sites including Cliffs Bay, Caswell Bay and Ogmore-by-Sea.  The group will be staying at the Carlton Hotel, Mumbles, Swansea (tel. 01792-360450). For further details email Wendy Hamelton at wendy@hwlabs.freeserve.co.uk. Joint visit with the Open University Geological Society East Anglia Branch..

[Leader: Gareth George, Greenwich University]

Thrislington, Ferryhill, Co. Durham. Our tenth visit to this outcrop of Permian Marl Slate, where fine fossil fish can be found. Meet at 9.15 a.m. at the Lafarge Aggregates Quarry [NZ 307327], Thrislington, West Cornforth, Ferryhill. Joint visit with the Medway Fossil and Mineral Society (MFMS).

[Leader: David Turner]

Peterborough, Cambridgeshire.  A long weekend, arranged by the Kent Geology Group, visiting sites in the Lower Oxford Clay, Middle Jurassic limestone and Pleistocene gravels. One day will be spent at the British Geological Survey in Keyworth near Nottingham. 

[Leader: Cliff Nicklin.]

East Mersea, Essex. A channel filled with Pleistocene interglacial sediments dating from OIS9 is exposed on the foreshore at Cudmore Grove Country Park. Freshwater molluscs and teeth of small rodents may be recovered by wet-sieving samples at home. Further west, near the Restaurant [TM 053136], an OIS5 deposit containing Hippopotamus occurs under beach-sand, whilst the extensive London Clay foreshore forming Mersea Flats yields a few sharks' teeth and Bronze Age flint artifacts. Meet in the car park [066146] at 3 p.m. Low water: 8.21 p.m. Joint visit with the TRG.

[Leaders: Bill George and Graham Ward]

Maylandsea and Steeple, Essex.  Foreshore exposures of London Clay at both sites yield numerous stem-fragments of crinoid Isselicrinus subbasltiformis, lobster Hoploparia gammaroides and sharks' teeth. Meet on the seawall [TL 907037] on the E side of Lawling Creek, 1km N of Maylandsea, at 10 a.m. Low water 1.15 p.m. Joint visit with the Essex Field Club and TRG.

[Leaders: Graham Ward and Bill George.]

Stutton Ness, Stutton, Suffolk. Elephant bones, teeth and tusks, as well as freshwater molluscs, may be found here in sediments dating from the Pleistocene OIS7 interglacial. Further west there is a fine section in London Clay containing seams of altered volcanic ash. Meet at 10.30 a.m. outside Stutton Community Hall [TM 143348]. High water: 17.30 p.m. Joint visit with the Tertiary Research Group.

[Leaders: Bill George and Graham Ward]

Eastchurch, Sheppey, Kent.   London Clay fossils as well as baryte, selenite and pyrite crystals can be found on the foreshore at Eastchurch Gap. Meet at 10 a.m. in Fourth Avenue [TQ998724], Eastchurch . Low water is at 10.40 a.m. Joint visit with the TRG.

[Leader: David Turner]

Ipswich, Suffolk.  A morning visit to the museum followed be a walk around the town and docklands area. Meet at 11 a.m. at Ipswich Museum in the High Street. Parking is difficult in the town so we advise you to use the Park and Ride near Tesco's, off the "Toys R Us" roundabout. Joint visit with the Suffolk Natural History Society.

[Leader: Bob Markham]

The Kent Geology Group have arranged two visits, on Sunday April 27th and September 14th, to Smokejacks Brickworks, Ockley, Surrey, to collect fossil insects and plants from the Weald Clay. Dinosaur bones, including Baryonyx, have also been found here. Members are welcome to attend. Please phone Peter Austin (01322 899237) at least ten days before the visit if attending.. Meet at 10.30 a.m. in the works car park [TQ 116372 - O.S. map 187]. Charge £2 per person.

Please sign the relevant attendance sheet, available at monthly meetings if you wish to come on any visit, or contact the Field Visits Secretary to reserve a place. If subsequently you decide not to come, please inform the Field Visits Secretary so that participants will not be kept waiting unnecessarily. if you get delayed and expect to arrive late, there is now a telephone number available to members (see your paper copy of the Field Visits Programme) were a message may be forwarded to keep the leader informed and avoid unnecessary delay at the beginning of a field visit. This mobile telephone will be switched on for only 30 minutes before the start time of each field meeting.

Members are expected to make their own travelling arrangements and are responsible for insuring themselves and their equipment. You are advised to wear old clothing and bring waterproofs, stout boots or wellingtons, hammer, chisels, eye protective goggles, trowel, Ordnance Survey map, notebook, pencil, paper tissues, newspaper, collecting bags, specimen tubes, packed lunch, first aid kit and a hard hat for visits to quarries and cliff sections. Access to quarries be allowed only if steel-capped boots, hard hat and a yellow tabard are worn. (Yellow high visibility vest.)

All geological sites are potentially dangerous. Members and guests are reminded that they attend field visits at their own risk and the attention of all participants is drawn to Sections 11 and 12 of the Society's Constitution. Children are welcome to attend field visits provided that they are accompanied by an adult, but access to working quarries may be refused.

New members are urged to record information relating to their finds in accordance with procedures described in Fossils, Minerals and Rocks: Collection and Preservation by R. Croucher and A. R. Woolley, published by the British museum ( Natural History) in 1982 but out of print at the present time ; there is a copy in the Society's library. The leaflet A Code for Geological Field Work, issued by the Geologists' Association and available from the Field Visits Secretary, should also be read and the general points observed. The availability of all geological material is limited and inadequately-labelled specimens are virtually useless; only the collector knows precisely where and when each specimen was found , and this information should be written down when it is collected. The ability to work out a national grid reference from an OS map is essential. Experienced collectors are always willing to advise beginners and help to identify specimens.

Home Page