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Unfinished millstone on Kildale Moor
A short excursion to look at the unfinished millstone just off the Baysdale road. I’ve been before but the same old questions remain. Why was it abandoned? Who abandoned it? And when? The NYM Historic Environment Record dates it to “post medieval” which is anytime between 1540 and 1799. The bedrock at this location is…
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Erica cinerea
The moors will soon be a profusion of lilac with the blooming of the Ling, but for several weeks now the deeper purple blaze of Bell heather has been taking the glory. This swathe of Bell heather is the largest I’ve seen. Normally it prefers to grow in small clumps on drier ground, the tops…
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Leave No Trace
Leave No Trace is an American initiative to educate and encourage users of the outdoors to converse, protect and minimise impact on the environment. 7 principles are urged: Plan Ahead & Prepare Travel & Camp on Durable Surfaces Dispose of Waste Properly Leave What You Find Minimize Campfire Impacts Respect Wildlife Be Considerate of Others…
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Dunsdale’s Tin Tabernacle
Sometime last week, I posted about a young girl’s letter from 1913 about her village of Kildale. I’ve come across another letter in the same newspaper this time from Ida Sanderson who lived in Dunsdale in 1917: DUNSDALE VILLAGE. Dear Daddy — l was very much pleased when I saw my name in print. In…
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Paddy’s Hole
A small man-made harbour on the river side of the South Gare Breakwater. Brightly painted boats bob in the breeze and ‘quaint’ boat-houses, once the home of salmon fishermen, align the shore. It is assumed the name, Paddy’s Hole, comes from the large number of Irish navvies that helped build the breakwater between 1863 and…
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‘The Ancient British Druidical Logan or Rocking Stone‘
A couple of weeks ago I posted about the ‘Immense Landslip’ of 1872 on White Hill. And in that post I quoted from a newspaper article which suggesting paying a visit to ‘The Ancient British Druidical Logan or Rocking Stone‘ when viewing the landslip; ‘only distant a few hundred yards‘. I racked my brain trying to…
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Blakey Topping standing stones
Could this group of standing stones be the remains of a stone circle? Although only three stones are visible in the photo, there is certainly a fourth in an old field bank and one source says a fifth, although I didn’t spot either of these. In addition there are two or three hollows in the…
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Park Nab
The Northern Weekly Gazette was published in Stockton-on-Tees between 1895 and 1932. Its byline was “A Home Journal Written by the People for the People“. The price in 1913 was one old penny. One of the regular sections was the “Children’s Circle — Conducted by Daddy” in which letters written by children were published. On…
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Thing
Last week, I was fortunate enough to be shown around the Scottish Parliament Building in Edinburgh, designed by Spanish architect Enric Miralles. It’s a Marmite type of building — you either love it or loathe it. It certainly has some idiosyncrasies, but, on the whole, I liked it. The central communual area has an outdoor…
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After the downpour
Colours are brighter, there’s a freshness in the air, and that earthy smell you get when rain falls on dry soil — petrichor. A word constructed from petra, Greek for ‘stone’, and ichor, in Greek mythology the fluid that flows through the veins of the gods.
Care to comment?