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NZ1726 : Ford through River Gaunless West Auckland

This track led from the former West Auckland Brewery (founded 1840) to arable fields east of Spring Gardens. The spent hops were scattered on those fields as a mulch for crops. The brewery site, which is now a health spa behind the house of the former owner (Mr Syd Monk) - itself now the Manor House Hotel, used to employ a bevy of young women to trample the hops to extract the flavouring for the beer. As a boy pre-WWII I remember those lassies disgorging en masse from the lane onto Front Street at the end of their day's work, still dressed in their self-provided uniforms of wellies and pinnies. Following the end of the war the brewery was absorbed into the Cameron empire, and shortly thereafter on-site production was terminated.