Month: January 2022
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On this day in 1950, George Orwell died
On this day in 1950, George Orwell died after a three-year battle with tuberculosis. He was a prolific writer including Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, both controversial books, widely viewed as an attack on totalitarianism. ‘Orwellian‘ is an eponym describing the world imagined in 1984. A dystopian society ruled by “The Party” with lies, disinformation, denial…
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Castlerigg Stone Circle
My early morning run took in the Castlerigg Stone Circle, a 4,500 year old monument built by the earliest farming communities who took advantage of the fertile lands of the valley bottoms. Castlerigg is particularly impressive, giving a 360° panorama of the surrounding fells. This is a view south up the tiny Naddle valley. It’s…
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Blue Monday
“Scientifically” the most depressing day of the year. It wasn’t too depressing in Keswick in the Lake District today. Blue skies, no wind, and feeling a lot like spring is just around the corner. This is a shot from Otterbield Bay on the west side of Derwentwater. Far left is Walla Crag, which Lady Derwentwater…
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Old Wives’ Well
A chance to explore the moorland south of Goathland known as Simon Howe Rigg and into the depths of Cropton Forest in search of a moorland cross and a well said to be a holy well. The two features are just 373 metres apart which may or may not be a coincidence. Old Wives’ Well,…
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A late afternoon wander
A strange sort of day. Blue skies in Ayton this morning but Nunthorpe enveloped in a low lying fog, which by late afternoon was beginning to creep higher. The cottage is known as Airey Holme Cottage, built sometime in the later half of the 19th-century and recently modernised. Most of the census returns are not…
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Billy’s Dyke
So named after William the Conqueror, who was supposed to have passed this way in his harrying of the north. Here he met with a storm and cursed in its face. I’m surprised I haven’t posted about this 4.4km earthwork along the eastern edge of Bilsdale before but it’s not exactly the most photogenic subject. Another…
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When is a moss not a moss?
The answer of course is when it’s a lichen. Now I’m going to stick my neck out and say this is Cladonia portentosa. Folks commonly refer to it as Reindeer Moss but that name strictly relates to Cladonia rangiferina which is uncommon and found high in the mountains of Scotland and Wales. As the name…
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Westworth
When Robert de Brus endowed Guisborough Priory in the early-12th-century, he included vast tracts of somewhat ill-defined moorland. It was left to his son, Adam de Brus, to define the boundaries which named an area of forest known as Westwyth for which de Brus retained his hunting rights. Martyn Hudson in “on blackamoor” describes Westwyth perfectly:…
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Where is the Elephant Hole?
The National park have recently been at worked erectly a new kissing gate, steps and fingerpost below Aireyholme Farm. One ‘finger’ confuses me, it points to the ‘Elephant Hole’. Where exactly is the ‘Elephant Hole’? Some opinion seems to be that it is the large bowl at the top of Cliff Rigg. But if this…
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Cuddy Trail — Tods Loup
On 12 March 1840, the Fife Herald carried an advertisement: LAMBERTON COLLIERY TO LET. To be Let, for such a number of years as may be agreed upon, with entry thereto at Whitsunday 1840, THE COAL FIELD situated on the Farm of LAMBERTON, in the parish of Mordington, and county of Berwick, as formerly occupied…