Out & About …

… on the North York Moors, or wherever I happen to be.

  • Highcliffe Nab from Percy Rigg

    Highcliffe Nab from Percy Rigg

    This must be a first. It’s rare that I take a photo from the same spot I’ve used previously but to find myself in exactly the same place on consecutive days is unheard of. So yesterday was a view south-east, today north-east, from Percy Rigg on Great Ayton Moor. Ahead is Highcliffe Nab. The tracks…

  • Rivelingdale

    Rivelingdale

    240 years ago today, in 1778, Captain James Cook made landfall on the Hawaiian Islands, the first European to do so. Did he pass any thoughts about his younger life in the Cleveland Hills? It’s highly likely that there would have been snow on the moors on that day. England was gripped in the Little…

  • Ruined wall, Easby Bank

    Ruined wall, Easby Bank

    No snow on the North York Moors, well maybe a just a skith, as some Southerners would say, a light dusting, barely enough to cover the paths. But very cold through with a bitter, lazy wind. Lazy because it goes straight through you without swirling around. The wall divides Little Ayton Moor and Easby Moor…

  • Botton Head, site of a WW2 air crash

    Botton Head, site of a WW2 air crash

    Climbed Botton Head onto Greenhow Moor in search of the site of a WW2 air crash. On 21 October 1940 an Armstrong Whitworth Whitley Mk. V was returning to its base at RAF Linton on Ouse, just off the A19 north of York, from a raid on the Skoda factory in Czechoslovakia, crashing into the…

  • Little Roseberry/Big Roseberry

    Little Roseberry/Big Roseberry

    Finally, after a week of grey, sunshine and blue sky. A classic view of Roseberry.

  • Hob on the Hill cross ridge dyke

    Hob on the Hill cross ridge dyke

    The heather moorland between Commondale and Guisborough are among the quietest on the North York Moors yet it is rife with prehistoric remains, round burial barrows, ancient field systems and a cross ridge dyke marked by this alignment of standing stones. The dyke is a Middle Bronze Age earthwork, a little over 400m long and…

  • Scarth Nick

    Scarth Nick

    The road from Swainby to Osmotherly climbs Scarth Nick, a col on the escarpment of the Cleveland Hills. The name itself derives from the Old Norse ‘skarthi‘ meaning a notch or cleft. This view is looking down on the cleft from Whorlton Moor. The road is following a route dating from antiquity, following the old…

  • Litter picking at Bridestones

    Litter picking at Bridestones

    Volunteering with the National Trust at their Bridestones property. One of the tasks today was a litter pick. Now you might think that as it takes a bit of an effort to get to these fascinating wind shaped sandstone outcrops, £8 entry into Dalby Forest, resisting the temptation of the visitor centre, a mile walk…

  • Motherly love

    Motherly love

    Motherly love Motherly love Forget about the brotherly and other-ly love Motherly love is just the thing for you You know your Mothers’ gonna love ya ’til ya don’t know what to do Frank Zappa From the Mother of Invention’s debut album. Not really my music but an apt quote for these heelin’ coos at…

  • Daldinia concentrica

    Daldinia concentrica

    A dull and miserable day, so my eyes were drawn to the forest floor. I came across these turds on a log. Actually, I know them as coal fungus, excellent for use as tinder for lighting fires. The 1-2 inch hard balls need to be dried out and scrapings from the inside can then be…

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