Author: Fhithich
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Old Meggison
I’ve heard that some new fencing has been erected at Old Meggison on the River Leven. So that was a good enough excuse for me to head over to Kildale Woods for a wander. Old Meggison is a lovely waterfall, accessed by a “Concessionary Footpath” which is awaiting the confirmation of an order to upgrade…
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A changing pastoral scene
We are all familiar with flocks of sheep grazing on the hills and moors. They were first introduced by the Romans and we are now by far the largest sheep and lamb producer in the EU with a quarter of the total flock. We have 14 million breeding ewes here in the UK which last…
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Staithes and Cowbar Nab
A view east from Boulby Bank. The sea looks quite benign from this height but beyond the lee of the cliffs the westerly winds were whipping up the white horses. It was much worse on this day in 1885, 135 years ago, when the North Sea coast was battered by a severe storm. Whitby, just…
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Burton Howe
The largest of four tumuli on a low knoll on the long ridge of Ingleby Moor. The other three are 60m to the north. It’s tempting to assume the name derives from the Old Norse ‘Botn’ meaning a hollow, as does the name of the hamlet of Greenhow Botton which it overlooks. Burton Howe is…
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Stanch Bullen and Round Hill
I’ve always thought this was Fairy Cross Plain but that is not strictly correct. That name belongs to the col just off to the right, where Little Fryup Dale becomes Great Fryup Dale, where the myth persisted through the centuries as the home of elves and fairies. The small rounded knoll has a more descriptive…
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Roseberry summit
Roseberry was quiet this morning. What more can I say? So I’ll digress. The other day, I came across a new word and stored it in my memory banks for a suitable occasion. The trouble is it’s a Dutch word ‘struisvogelpolitiek‘ but I think it’s worthy of it slipping into common usage just as we…
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Whorl Hill
I am on Live Moor and looking across to the conical hump of Whorl Hill, the glacial outlier that is a distinctive landmark on the western fringe of the Cleveland Hills. Behind me is the ditch and ramparts of the pre-historic promontory fort, so this is a view that our Iron Age ancestors would probably…
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Baysdale Abbey Bridge
A single-arch bridge crossing Baysdale Beck, near to and contemporary with the small Cistercian nunnery of Baysdale Abbey. Which puts its construction in the 13th-century, although “the attached piers and parapet are probably 17th-century in origin with later alterations”. Which begs the question of which bits are original? No trace remains of the abbey, its…
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Pilgrimage of Grace
On the 19th October 1536, Henry VIII lost his patience at the rebels on the Pilgrimage of Grace. He wrote to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk: “You are to use all dexterity in getting the harness and weapons of the said rebels brought in to Lincoln or other sure places, and cause all the boats…
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Sleddale Farm
A shaft of sunlight falls upon Sleddale Farm, an island of cultivation in a sea of dull heather moorland. The name itself means “a wide flat valley”. The farmhouse is probably Victorian but it’s been cultivated since at least the 16th-century. At the dissolution of Gisborough Priory, Henry VIII granted its grange, Sleddale Close, to…