River Tees downstream from Low Force

After the nice rest at Cow Green I stopped again at Bowlees Visitor Centre and had a walk from Low Force downstream towards Scoberry Bridge where I crossed the river. The fossils can be found on the rocks below the bridge (#photo 9 and 10). The curved white shapes are fossil shells of an extinct brachiopod called Gigantoproductus. You can also find corals and crinoids (animals related to modern starfish). These creatures lived here about 330 million years ago, in the Carboniferous Period, when the North Pennines was covered by shallow tropical seas. You can see why past quarrymen and miners named it Cockleshell Limestone. I wentback through a small woodland with wonderful blue bells in full blossom.