Camping & Convoys at Tranwell Woods - August 20th ~ 23rd

RAF Morpeth Perimeter Drive - Morning, Friday 21st

Our camping trip to Tranwell Woods near Morpeth, was an attempt to salvage something from the Covid devastated 2020 season. We were camping on the old WAAF site of the former RAF Morpeth, a WW2 Gunnery Training Base. The tents were spread out, as we were; but it didn't stop us from having a great few days away with our toys, making the most of a weekend tinted olive drab.

We got there on Thursday and didn't have have a great start to the weekend. Lynne put a 2 foot rip in the tent trying to fit a roof pole. We suspect UV damage as it tore and spread so easily. An emergency trip to Go-Outdoors got us some patch tape. While Lynne was away, I spotted one of the trailer tyres decided to split between the tread and side wall in several places around the circumference. I think age is a factor again here as the trailer was made in 2008 and the tyres dated '06. New ones for next year. Due to the problems, I never got to visit the Royal Flying Corps station at Cramlington, next to Northumberlandia. I had planned on visiting that evening.
 

On Friday morning, before the rest of the party arrived, I went for a drive around the outside of RAF Morpeth, looking for surviving concrete and buildings. It was around a ten mile trip that revealed some interesting structures, all of which could be seen from the roadside. Many of the photos have a small map with the area or structure marked. The overall location should be identifiable from the general arrangement maps of the airfield and accommodation sites shown below.
Since there wasn't time to visit RFC Cramlington on Thursday evening, I did a little photoshoot of the Jeep in its Ordnance Depot markings, along with the ammo boxes I made to store some of our camping gear. After that, I explored the two buildings next to our camp site. These turned out to be part of the WAAF Officers Mess and what I believe to be latrines with water tower. The part of the officers mess that survives is the central part of a three part structure, joined to the outer buildings by a corridor. The two larger side buildings have been demolished.
 
 
 
So after breakfast on Friday morning, I took "Jessie" out for a drive around the roads that encircle the airfield. I began by heading away from the airfield, towards the water tower we'd driven by the day before while going to the camp site. The tower dominates the road side and is still an impressive structure, 75 years later. From there, I turned around and headed back to the airfield. Driving down the public road to the East of the airfield, the only surviving hangar can be seen, a Miskins blister hangar. Back in 1988, the aviation company I worked for, dismantled the last of the T1 hangars for re-use at Newcastle Airport.
 
 
 
A little further down the road, a surviving blast shelter can be seen. An air raid sanctuary for personnel working in the area. On the other side of the road, another blast shelter. Next was a road from the public road, that leads to a blister hangar on the right and a T1 hangar on the left. Beyond that is the perimeter track. The last picture is the overgrown concrete base for hangar 3.
 
 
Beyond the T1 hangar is another blast shelter. It was difficult to get a good shot due to the thick hedge line along the roadside. Luckily, the road along side the airfield was very quiet and I was able to leave it parked on the edge at a number of places along the airfield.

Further past the hangar and lost in the woods on the left, one of two firing butts remains. The giant brick structure had an earth bank facing the airfield to allow test firing of machine guns on the aircraft. A muddy track led from the road to the rear of the wall, allowing a much better view of the structure and its size.
  

 
There's a gate onto the airfield at the end of the East-West secondary runway. The runway itself is overgrown, but significant stretches remain. To the South of the flying area, there's a second firing butt which looks fairly intact, but on private land I didn't have access to.
 
 
From the second firing butt, we continued South, heading away from the airfield in order to loop around to the West and return North up the other side of the site. It was quite bright for most of the trip and we stopped at a few places for pictures. This was near to an old Romney hut. It isn't on part of the airfield site plan, so I suspect it had been relocated.

Heading North again along the West side of the airfield, the first area we reached was one of the underground fuel stores. There's no signs of the concrete road or turning loop, but not far away was a large steel tank on the surface, so I wondered if the tank had been part of the fuel store, but had been unearthed. A little further along was the now gated off entrance to the loop of frying pan dispersals hidden around a wood. There were three blister hangars located in here too.
 

 
Opposite the dispersals, the perimeter track crosses the road and heads back onto the airfield for a few tens of feet. I think it continues to the perimeter encircling the runways, but much of those appears to be grass covered now.
 

Further North along the Western road brings you towards the technical site to a surviving building which appears to have been the Towed Target Store. These were windsock type objects, towed on a long cable behind another aircraft for gunners to practice shooting at. It was then only a short drive to the main gate onto the technical site. We'd just finished looking and photographing this when we heard a Jeep siren behind us letting us know Derek and Andy had arrived. Our external tour of the airfield was done now, so they followed us back to base camp.
 
 
By the time we got back to camp, Chris had also turned up on site in his hard cab GMC. A recently vacated camping pitch allowed Derek, Andy and Chris to set up camp with the rest of us, rather than on the meadow. Later that day, we'd all return to the airfield.
 

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