Out & About …

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

Month: January 2019

  • Wayside cross, Black Hill

    Wayside cross, Black Hill

    After a great exploration of Glaisdale Rigg, my final photo of the day. A stone’s throw from the where the car was parked, a Medieval wayside cross. Situated at the crossroads of Yarlesgate, the north-south pannierway linking Lealholm to Rosedale, and the east-west track from Glaisdale to Great Fryup Dale, down the very steep Beanley…

  • Low Bride Stones

    Low Bride Stones

    You might believe these squat sandstone stacks were laid down in seas long ago when dinosaurs ruled the earth. Their curious shapes the result of the wind and the rain. But A.J.Brown* suggests it was Wade who placed them during a game of duckstones. Now, this is not so unfeasible, for Wade was a giant…

  • At the South Gare

    At the South Gare

    Enjoyed yesterday’s stroll on the beach so much, headed to the South Gare. Of course, by the lunar clock, an hour earlier. Two hours off high tide. Wave height only 7 foot but the lighting superb. Open Space Web-Map builder Code

  • An afternoon stroll along Saltburn Sands

    An afternoon stroll along Saltburn Sands

    Nine-foot waves, the surfers’ website had said, and a “mekkin’ tide“. So a stroll along Saltburn Sands at dusk might be interesting. And a few cobwebs blown away to boot. There was no beach nor surfers. A coulpress of waves breaking over the sea wall leaving seafoam in their wake. A surprised seal found itself…

  • Sleepy larch

    Sleepy larch

    On the col at Roseberry Common. The larch looks windswept and battered. I wonder if it were a young sapling in 1904 for it was on this day (7th January) in that year that the radiotelegraph company Marconi introduced its new distress signal, ‘CQD’, CQ standing for ‘seek you’, and D for ‘danger’. This was…

  • Cross ridge dyke, Skelderskew Moor

    Cross ridge dyke, Skelderskew Moor

    An evocative alignment of standing stones continuing down to North Ings Slack between Commondale and Skelderskew Moors. The stones are part of a dyke, an earth bank with a ditch dug alongside both of which have mellowed over time. The dyke extends for some half a kilometre from the Hob on the Hill boundary stone…

  • A lone Redshank amongst a flock of sleeping Oystercatchers

    A lone Redshank amongst a flock of sleeping Oystercatchers

    A mooch around South Gare at the mouth of the Tees. Twitchers were twitching over a black-throated diver. Apparently. But it was so far away I couldn’t make out any detail. Could well have been a cormorant as far as I knew. Instead, a lone Redshank amongst a flock of sleeping Oystercatchers caught my attention.…

  • Jack Sledge Road

    Jack Sledge Road

    Ever get that feeling of lethargy during the dark winter months. It hit me today. Must have melatonin to spare. And a wee sniffle didn’t help. So a potter around Danby Rigg. This is the Jack Sledge Road as it descends into Little Fryup Dale. It must be an ancient track linking the dale with…

  • Prehistoric linear boundary, Bridestones Moor

    Prehistoric linear boundary, Bridestones Moor

    A small section of the 930m long prehistoric earthwork forming the boundary between Bridestones Moor and Dalby Forest. The archaeologists are concerned that encroachment of the forest is causing damage to the ditch and earth banks. So the winter job of clearing the trees is now in its third year, and the end is in…

  • Sir Michael Tippett

    Sir Michael Tippett

    Today, Sir Michael Tippett, perhaps the leading British composer of the 20th-century, would have been 114 years old. He is most famous for his oratorio ‘A Child of Our Time’, which was inspired by the murder in Paris of a German diplomat in 1938 by a Jewish refugee teenager. The murder led to the attacks…