The Run, Jamestown
The Run is a stream on St Helena running from the hills and down through Jamestown to the sea.
It originates as a natural river on Diana's Peak and it is this stream which plunges over the famed Heart Shaped Waterfall. Below the waterfall though, as it comes to the town, the stream is swallowed by a cistern by the hospital that supplies the town, and the outflow is turned into a leat, running through a brick channel behind the houses on the east side of Market Street.
The whole course of the river is used locally as a footpath.
One road bridge crosses the run, but may footbridges – some just informal crossing s made by householders using planks or old doors.
The Run is frequently dry, its waters having been diverted to supply the town. However every day at 6 in the morning the gate at the sluice behind the hospital is opened, and a surge of water bursts down the channel to clear the previous day’s accumulated debris: the job has been done by hand before, when the water dried up.
