Out & About …

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

Tag: fishing

  • Port na Cùile

    Port na Cùile

    Or where are all the Basking sharks? A report in The Scotsman on the 18th May 1939 tells of “a great migration of basking sharks into the Firth of Clyde [having taken] place in the past few days“. Large schools of sharks had been “seen passing into the Firth through the Sound of Sanda, at…

  • Whaligoe

    Whaligoe

    Whaligoe is famous for its 330 steps down to its tiny harbour. I say 330, but elsewhere 365 is claimed. I didn’t get the chance to count as the steps were closed for maintenance. The harbour, squashed into the narrow Whale Geo, was inspected by Thomas Telford in 1786 who described it as a “terrible…

  • A’ Chlach Thuill

    A’ Chlach Thuill

    Clear blue skies with no wind for the early dog walk predicting a warm day. This is looking towards the distinction spilt rock of Torridonian sandstone from which the village of Clachtoll gets its name. The name Clachtoll means the rock with the hole, a sea arch, and there was indeed one which collapsed in…

  • Staithes

    Staithes

    Captain Cook, you can’t get away from him around here, it occurred to me as I cycled to Staithes, Yorkshire’s most picturesque fishing village, along what would have been the route taken by the 16-year-old Cook to his new apprenticeship in William Sanderson’s haberdashery shop on the seafront. Kildale, Commondale and Job Cross, the old…

  • “When The Boat Comes In”

    “When The Boat Comes In”

    Come here, my little Jacky Now I’ve smoked my backey Let’s have a bit crackey Till the boat comes in Dance to thy daddy, sing to thy mammy, Dance to thy daddy, to thy mammy sing; Thou shalt have a fishy on a little dishy, Thou shalt have a fishy when the boat comes in.…

  • Larners Lake

    Larners Lake

    This artificial fishing lake seemed to have appeared overnight but realistically it would have been sometime in the 80s when I was not resident in Great Ayton. It takes its name from Larners Hill, a ridge with a bridleway eventually leading up to Easby Moor and Captain Cook’s Monument. For many years I regularly used…

  • Paddys’ Hole

    Paddys’ Hole

    A small man-made harbour at South Gare at the mouth of the Tees. Named after the Irish navvies who built the South Gare from slag from Teesside’s blast furnaces.