July 23 Old fogeys of the New Forest

Thorney Island, Lyndhurst, Beaulieu

Those of advanced years might note in the title a backhanded reference to the book "Children of the New Forest" which was very popular in my childhood despite being published in 1847.  I had thought this was due to Churchill and McMillan's interest in restoring a quasi-feudal society in the UK.  Rather than denying this theory, noting that the BBC last televised it in 1998 makes me reassess Tony Blair's intentions.

It appears that Ms Cambridge provided a third generation of succession about 4:30pm yesterday.  Sky News was full of it (idiomatically, Sky News is usually "full of it" but this was specific not a scatological geeralisation).  It would have been fun to see how conflicted they'd have become if the event had coincided with the finish of Le Tour!  The masses – OK a bit of a crowd – were gathered out the front of Buck House, presumably to read the notice because there was nothing else to see.  I have just watched a guy from a ceramics company talking about all the sales they are expecting.  Apparently it will take them 4 days to get all the stuff made and distributed with the name etc.  So we may be able to find the Engraved Gazunder before we leave

This morning I went for a run around the whole of Selsey.  (In a cryptic crossword, the word 'whole' would be preceded by “sounds like”.)  After getting up to the main street I took off to look at the holiday park area.  There are at least 4 Parks and the one I ran through (West Beach) seemed from a map to have some 1,000 chalets.  This makes sense of the information sign suggesting that the population of Selsey at 12,000 in Winter doubles in Summer.  While it is very much the sort of place we avoid like botulism (although I didn't find the mini-golf I am sure it was in there somewhere) there was at least a reasonable amount of turf between them, unlike the Butlins Camps of the 1950s and 60s which were modeled on 1940s camps (in Eastern Europe).

When having a whinge one should never reject targets because they are too easy.  Yes, I am going to give British Telecom a serve.  I looked up the phone book to find the overseas access code when calling from the UK.  I am told to check on line – great if I had internet access in this country (at less than the £4 a day which BT charge).  Then I could buy – like spoilt kids in Africa, telcos are always crying “Give us money” - a book!  Or I could ring them – at premium call rates to find out.  I took a guess at 0011.

The weather looked reasonable so we decided to:

1. go to the New Forest for a look round; and
2. do a load of washing.  

In fact we did 2 before 1 and while waiting for the machine to finish its stuff went and sat above the shingle.  We observed the meeting of the mass of dog owners 

which was most amusing: the owner of the fox terrier was heard to say that the way his dog pounces on its ball indoors has worn out the carpet.  Just imagine such behaviour from a small terrier.

Moving East to see if there were any interesting birds around we spotted this small trawler coming in.  

It would appear the fisherperson had been chucking guts etc overboard.  When he landed he had two largish boxes of skate bits, which I reckoned to be worth about £100.  Not a great return if he been far out or for very long.

Heading off we zipped along the A/M 27 and M271 and first stopped in Lyndhurst.  This is described as a pretty village in the Forest.  Which it is.  The only problem with this is that two A class roads meet there and as a result it is clogged with traffic.  

What it will be like in a couple of weeks when the holidaying hordes really kick in is beyond belief – and possibly beyond imagination.  From our view the best thing was grabbing some brochures about the area (noting how astonishing it was to have to pay for parking at the Information Centre) which suggested – as well as a lot of retail opportunities - a visit to the Church of St Michael and All Saints.

This pub sign on the way to the Church was the most amusing I noticed while in the UK:

There were two excellent + things about this church:

• Much of the design and glass were by prominent pre-Raphaelites (and I m sure you remember them from Brum);

• An Alice Hargreaves (nee Liddell) is buried there.  She was the catalyst for Alice in “Through the Looking Glass” and “Alice in Wonderland”.

As well as her grave – a simple monument made very picturesque by the rose bushes –

 I had already taken a photograph of this memorial plaque

not realising the guys commemorated were her sons.  She seems to have been a very active and respected member of the local community.

We then headed off towards Beaulieu to a birding spot recommended in my birding guide.  We were barely out of town before finding our first New Forest ponies.  

On my childhood visits, accompanied by an equiholic cousin, I seem to remember having great trouble finding any ponies.  Today they were everywhere, including the place we stopped to go for a walk: as they seemed to be looking longingly at our baguette we didn't get out until we had finished eating.  It was a lovely walk adding a few species of bird (including Stonechat) to the trip list and getting good snaps of a few of the flowers in the heath.

The forest was also very appealing.

 Here we have a carollic image including both holly and ivy!  Possibly they can be regarded as both well grown.

We then rumbled off to Beaulieu where handing over gelt seemed to be required to do anything. We didn't wish to go to the Motor Museum (a working racetrack, or display by a bunch of enthusiasts is one thing but handing out our hard-earned to look at a static collection is very different).  So we moved on, stopping briefly at a small church in Exbury which had a couple of interesting memorials.  We had never heard of this GG of Australia!

The kneelers were also interesting as the first example of this form of community art seen on this trip.

These ponies seemed undisturbed by the distant industry (nor by the dog being exercised in the background).   
I commented on our last trip that the definition of a National Park in the UK is very different to Australia: whole towns are within the Park as are farms and  recreational activities.  (I'd love to see the Head Canophobe from the NSW National Sparks and Wildfires Service react to a dog running around near iconic wildlife!  A defibrillator would be needed.)  Our final pause was a beach at Lepe where we took a hazy image – the camera doesn't lie – of the Isle of Wight.

We then headed off through some very, very confusing signs which I got wrong a couple of times, to the M27.  Our final destination for the day was a site marked as RSPB on our road atlas but try as we might we couldn't find the place.

So we went home for a cleansing Ale or, in Frances case, cider.  My ale was the third sample from Arundel the dark and stronger (5.5%) Old Knuckler: this was a very chewy and complex dark ale indeed.  Well done that brewer!  After this we toddled off to the Seal Pub (in the Good Beer Guide) for tea.

I was initially put off by being asked if we had a reservation, but then things settled down and we had an excellent locally caught crab salad, washed down with a pint of Hophead beer (from Brighton, so nearly local).  It was quite obvious why it is called HOPhead!

Bird of the Day:  Stonechat

Building of the day: Church of St Michael and All Saints

Garden of the Day:  Alice in Wonderland's grave

Bad taste of the Day: The traffic in Lyndhurst

View of the Day: Most parts of the New Forest

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July 26 Sel-see you later?

Head for Shropshire.  After Worcester go to Brockhampton Estate.  Note that we will NOT be following the Google maps route: after Worcester their instructions got rather like like pace notes for a car rally in a dense pine forest.  An alternate route using A-roads looked far more appealing (this judgement was confirmed by our host at Tugford).  

Last evening I went out to the garbage bin beside the front gate and found it empty!  We knew the truck had been by but were surprised to find they had grabbed it.  Perhaps this is because there is no pavement at the Cottage?  While thinking domestically I will comment on the cistern design in the downstairs dunny here.  It is set up with a basin on top and when you flush the water runs into the basin: thus the water with which you wash your hands becomes the next flush!  A great water saving idea.

Review of dog poo signs.

There have been various approaches to fishing noted around the area.  The beach/recreational folk all seem to use this tripod approach to cope with the shingle.  

The boat fisherman was lifting his crab pots.

 At Nutbourne (see below)  it was more like hunting – possibly worms?

A quick walk around the Bill produced Mediterranean Gulls – as soon as spotted one, quickly picked about 6 together with 20+ turnstones.

Pack up and nick off.  I tried to buy fuel at Selsey, as I knew service stations were scarce on the A/M27.  Half of the pumps not working and the folk at others all seem to be in shop, possibly buying stuff, possibly just yacking.  Pass, as I was sure we had enough to get somewhere willing to sell us petrol in less time than a glacial epoch.  Head off on A259 to a birding spot marked in our road atlas.  This was the  local Reserve of Nutborne Marsh.  There was much exposed mud!

If we had had more time and didn't mind getting mucky quite a few waders were visible in the distance.  However they stayed unidentifiable, but I did tick a Linnet beside the seawall.

Back to A27/M27 wherethe traffic was rather heavy.  Get to M3 and very very busy: I began to regret not getting somewhat more expensive fuel along the A259.  Turn off at Eastleigh and find fuel – very good price at a Tesco station.  The trouble is the place is also a mini-Tesco so punters buying stuff block pumps and then chat with check-out chicks.  Grr!  However, it was a long way to the next on-highway servo so I was glad we'd filled up when we did.

Back to the M3.  This was stop-start all the way (about 3 miles)  to the junction with the A34 which was completely clagged.  It appears this was due to an unnecessary cut down to one lane for a turn off to Basingstoke.  

However it then cleared up and it was flat as a maggot up towards the M4.  That lasted until more chaos due to a guy with tractor converting it to 1 lane by filling the kerbside lane at 30mph.  According to our host at Tugford the law is to pull over if have 10 behind you, which is fair enough: however this dude was mucking up 2-300 cars at least.  I presume if he'd driven out of the way on the shoulder Mr Plod would have been unhappy: just one more example of the country being beyond its design capacity.

M4 to Swindon was fine. The  A419 was also fine for many miles then suddenly it was cut down to 1 lane at Cowley and chaos resulted for the next 6 miles at 20mph.  We discussed who was to blame for these innane capacity changes and concluded that the problem is no-one is responsible: it is a worst case situation of mismanagement by committee.  Then onto to M5 which was very busy but OK to Worcester.  

This City began with briliant directions into the Cathedral and nearby parking.  Whoever is in charge of traffic planning in Worcester should run courses for just about every other city in the country.  

They also have a fabulous cathedral. 

It was holding a festival of young singers who were rehearsing when we arrived.  There were at least 300 of them being directed unto doing bell imitations.  Unlike many other places they still let punters in and the kids were doing a great job.

The stained glass was great.  

Here are a few other views of elements of the cathedral.

There were many war memorials (see thematic page for images of those I found more interesting).  Having taken many photos and forming a view that this was just about the best cathedral I've been in, I decided I should get a photo permit.  This cost £3 – as good a value as the Selsey bakery!  I also donated another £2 – they are doing a brilliant job.  

Their (quite restrained compared to many religious places) signs requesting donations said that it cost £3500 a day to maintain the place.  (They also said £5 a visitor, so on average they get 700 visitors a day – I need to think about whether this is a bigger number than I would have expected or not.)  I started to take note of the per capita costs listed in other churches etc: they are wildly variable!

They also had a memorial to Edward Elgar in the Cathedral but I took this photo of his statue in the square outside instead.  He is a big item around Worcester.

We found our way on to A49 (getting out of the city was not as easy as getting in but still much better signposted than many places: Lewes, East Sussex, I am looking at you!).  Hmm not exactly big road, but a lot bigger than the country lanes Google Maps suggested.  We didn't call in at Elgar's house Museum as we still had a way to go and some planned stops. 

We did call in to Brockhampton Estate (NT place). 

Very pleasant in a low key way.  1700 acres of tenanted land including lots of woodland

which we didn't have, nor feel like finding, the time to walk round.. 

On to Ludlow. A quick swing into Tescos  where the biggest surprise was all the vouchers we were given for future visits.  I managed to use these later in the trip saving (from memory) about £6.50. We then headed off into the lanes to the farm.  The most surprising aspect of this was the start of the B3465 which appears to go across the Ludlow race track: by this I mean that when a race was on the horses go across the road, which is presumably shut for the duration of the event!)

We met our hosts who seem most excellent people.  We also met their small dogs who are also excellent, despite being Jack Russells rather than Tenterfields.

Tonights Beer:  Malvern Hills Brewery Black Pear Premium Bitter.  Yep, that covers it rather well.  The hops end up sitting very nicely on the palate.  Another good beer!

I thought I would finish with some reflections on how Australian roads would be classified in the UK:

• The Hume Highway: definitely a Motorway when no at grade intersections.  Otherwise a 70 mph limited A road.
• The Kings Highway (Queanbeyan to Batemans Bay): definitely an A road.
• Captains Flat Rd:: well up to the standard of many A roads we found on this trip and with 1% of the traffic.
• Widgiewa and Whiskers Creek Rds: Both good B roads (higher capacity and better condition than the only road linking Selsey to the A27 or the one from Craven Arms to Bridgnorth.).
• I cannot think of an Australian road equivalent to the lanes around Tugford.  Some forest fire trails are as narrow but they are dirt surfaced.

Bird of the Day: Mediterranean Gull

Building of the day:  Worcester cathedral

Garden of the Day:  The avenue in Brockhampton Estate

Bad taste of the Day: Design of the intersection of the A34 and the M3

View of the Day: Nutborne Marsh. Tidal mud at its most magnificent

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Other things needed

As well as the big ticket items there were other things we needed to do:

• Join a birding organisation
• Join the National Trust of Australia
• Get a road Atlas
• Get the Good Beer Guide!!! 
• Sort out mobile phone coverage;
• Sort out crrency arrangements

Each of these will be covered below.

Join a birding organisation.

My initial thought was the British Trust for Ornithology: I can't remember why I thought this, but on contacting a British birder of very good repute he rapidly advised to join the RSPB instead.  It was obvious from their website that the cost of membership would be way less than the Reserve entry fees (and car parking fees) that we would otherwise incur.  Duly signed up.

They have sent us a nice little welcome package including a book of their top Reserves.   They enter the list of good guys.

Join the National Trust of Australia

 Frances found out some time ago that they have reciprocal rights with the UK NT but charge about 1/4 the annual fee an this should get us, gratis, into all sorts of stately piles in the UK.  If, of course, we should come across stately piles we wish to enter!

Unfortunately the ACT Branch of the NTA seem to have learnt their marketing strategy from some dodgy Merchant Bank.  In addition to the advertised $95 subscription - roughly double that of the RSPB - they were going to slug us a $35 joining fee.  This makes it no more expensive to join the UK NT! 

Get a Road Atlas

The deal seems to be publications of the Automobile Association.  For reasons I cannot comprehend it is about half price to get them through Amazon than the AA.  Whatever, done.  The book has duly arrived and looks rather good.  It even has the village I grew up in (Mayland) shown and n the right place - in the past the village was either not shown at all (the usual situation or positioned) at the primary school about 2km from the main cluster of huts.

Get the Good Beer Guide

To anyone that reckons this should be a big ticket item I will only say "I know where you are coming from" but then add that I hope the UK has advanced as has the USA where good beer is available everywhere in large and interesting amounts.  (It is always good to hope.)  To assuage the tender sensibilities of beer fanciers I will ask you to note that I have created a Pommie Beer page in this blog.  It will be rather empty until we get there since British beer is damn expensive in Australia.

At first glance it appears that the Good Beer guide is like the AA Road Atlas: it seems to be cheaper to buy through Amazon than from CAMRA!  Which is nuts.  On second glance I have actually ordered the 2009 edition which cost Stg 1p (plus Stg7 postage) through Amazon rather than the 2010 edition through CAMRA (Stg15 plus Stg7 postage).  As I said, this is nuts!

On studying the tome  the reason for cheapness appears to be that it is a used copy!  I came to this conclusion on noticing a few pencil comments against a couple of items.  This then explained why several hundred brews had been highlighted.  I counted 89  highlighted brews from the breweries beginning with 'W' (assuming this is a more less representative sample that means well over 2,000 marked in total). My conseqent questions are if the previous owner tried all of these,

1. how come the book was in such good order?and 
2. was the owners liver in equally good shape?

Mobile phone coverage

Both Frances and I have VIRGIN mobile phones which offer roaming in the UK.  However, they also seem to offer a subsidy (approximately covering the entire cost of the project) to Richard Branson's space shuttle program in the charges to each call.  The sensible way to go seemed to be to buy a pommie SIM card as soon as we can.  The other alternative - relying on UK Telecom phone boxes - is obviously ridiculous, both from our expectations of:

• the likely charges; and 
• the probability of finding one that works anywhere that we are likely to be going.  

One of these is high and the other low: guess which is what.

This topic appeared to advance a bit when Frances got an email from the Visit Britain folks spruiking a Global SIM card for which you paid Stg43 and got Stg25 of airtime.  Unfortunately they didn't give any info about the call charges other than an assertion that their charges were "up to 75% less than standard mobile charges".   This is sort of like "Trust us, we're from a Telecom company!". I suspect that

• this company learnt their trade flogging "genuine Swizs watches" off a barrow in the Strand; and
• was founded by C M O T Dibbler from the Discworld.

We will see how the plot develops when (or if) I find out what their charges are.

Surprisingly I have not got  a response from Visit UK so I explored the vendors website.  It is full of that which you find after a herd of bovines have passed through a paddock, which does of course confirm the views expressed in the previous paragraph.  Their rates for calls within the UK are 37P per minute, whereas Virgin UK are 20P per minute!  The only problem is to find a VIRGIN store - to my astonishment they don't have one in Manchester airport!

In fact Virgin shops turned out to be very hard to find.  However on our first day of touristing I spotted a Vodaphone shop in York and as their rates were similar to Virgin I acquired a SIM card from them.  The next issue was that my phone was still locked to Virgin Australia, but fortunately there are many shops in the UK that specialise in unlocking mobile phones! 

Currency arrangements

We have in the past shown great skill in stuffing up conversions between currencies, in that we have moved money from one to another in such a way that we got the worst rate in both directions.  However at the time of writing this the Australian dollar was doing rather well against Sterling so we thought we'd get some £ Sterling while it was cheap. 

Obviously we didn't want to schlep around large amounts of folding stuff - we may pass close to Bradford (for example).  From reading the consumer information - I should probably get an award for slogging through the 50 pages of PDF this involved - about our Mastercards it appeared that Westpac also had a space shuttle subsidisation program with each transaction attracting charges like a candle in rain forest attracts bugs (not forgetting the arbitrage which is never going to be in our favour).  However our financial adviser mentioned an ANZ Travel card as a good thing.  Indeed it did so appear on reading another 50 pages of PDF: other than the fact that ANZ get to have our money, earning interest for them while we aren't spending it, the charges are quite minimal (although there is a nasty little 1.1% of each reload, so we worked out what we thought we might spent and put it all in the initial transaction). 

Background to Birding

I have had a number of Field Guides to European Birds for many years.  Unfortunately I feel obligated to minimise the amount of stuff to schlep for this trip so I am planning to use "The Hamlyn Guide to Birds in Britain and Europe" Brunn et al .  This is primarily because it was printed in 1989 (after a revised text in Swedish in 1986) whereas my other favourite "The Birds of Britain and Europe" Heinzel et al dates from 1974!

So I should be able to identify the birds subject to the limits of my competence.  Where are the little blighters?  I am hoping that joining the RSPB will assist me to find them (as well as saving a number of $ on entry fees and car parking.  My basic planning source will be "Birdwatching in Britain A site by site guide"  Redman and Harrap.  Reference will also be made to "Wild Britain" by Douglas Botting.

Although this isn't going to be a twitching trip (apart from anything else I am too idle for that) I thought it would be good to sort out what birds I have previously seen in the UK and which I have not.  My first thought was that my Birdinfo software would have a good list for the UK: not so it was only 146 species rather than 530+ on the official list from the British Trust for Ornithology.   So I am creating my own using the BTO list as a base (fiddled with according to my memory of which birds I have seen in the UK).   It is interesting that even though the BTO shows 'International names' for some species they are not always the names I am familiar with.  For example they:

• list 'Baltimore Oriole ' which has been  known in the US as the Northern Oriole for many years (unless talking about the baseball team);
• translate the UK Great Northern Diver as the 'Great Northern Loon' while the usual name in North America - where they are far more common - is Common Loon.  (In this case the BTO appellation is somewhat egregiously wrong since the more Northern loon is the Arctic Loon.)

Oh well I guess I'll just stop kvetching and update my own list myself.

19 June: To Ingleby

Arrive Manchester, drive to Ingleby Manor.  Probably do sleep!

The immigration guy was very chatty and friendly. No way was he a jobsworth!  In fact Manchester airport was very good in all respects.

The hire car was picked up in a very friendly way. It is a turbo diesel Skoda and rolls along very nicely (especially as it has cruise control.) As predicted by the AA Atlas we are using there are speed cameras everywhere, including a long stretch on the M56 which used average speed. Despite all this many cars went past me, who was sitting on 70. (I assume that is still the motorway limit – there are no signs to say so! ) As we have driven around it is very difficult to work out where the speed cameras are.  There are many signs - in some cases 4 or 5 within 2 miles - but rarely do I spot a camera.  In fact these are mainly the equivalent of "speed cameras may be used in this area" and not an indication of a fixed item: however I am still amazed that anyone in the UK who travels more than 10 km from home has a driving license.

While trying to work out where we could park in Middlesbrough I spoke to a couple of Middlesbrough Wardens. They said they didn't do parking, so couldn't help me but were very friendly.

Our visit to Middlesbrough was generally a bit fraught as I had basically had it – by this time we'd been travelling for 38 hours with not much sleep so I was stuffed. We got some cash and some groceries and that was about it. We found our way to Ingleby Manor where we were greeted by our very charming and friendly hostess and introduced to the Gun Room which is excellent.

A fair number of birds were seen on the way. First was a wood pigeon, and the best a kestrel (defined as best because I like them)!

The weather was ungood. 13C , overcast and windy. Our hostess said that the previous week it was 26 and sunny! No particular linguistic items, but the average denizen of Middlesbrough has an accent that could break rocks. (On the flight to Dubai we spoke to a young guy from York and, when speaking to us, he had a strong accent but when he was talking to another bloke at full speed I could not understand a word!)

21 June: Flamborough

The main business is Flamborough Heads and other cliffs in the area.  There are a few other spots on the way back and forth,

We woke fairly early and by 7am were on the road heading towards Bempton Cliffs. We took a route along the Northern and Eastern side of the Moors. This was quite an interesting drive as we actually got to see some heather! (Most of the North York Moors National Park appears to be farmland of one sort or another: presumably there are some limitations on what the owners or tenants of the land can do.)  Here is a piccie of the moors, followed by a close up of the cottage.

The last several miles were through villages again which were merely tiresome and made life navigationally stressful.

However we eventually arrived at the cliffs, and used our RSPB membership to sally forth. What a fantastic place. 

Frances made a call at some point that it was like an Amazonian claylick with heaps of birds flying around and sitting on the cliffs (or the sea below). The two most notable species for me were Kittiwake and Fulmar because both were lifers:

• the kittiwakes were in tens of thousands - many with chicks;

• fulmars were much less common, but once the eye was in (thank you UK birder for pointing out the stiff wing jizz) they were quite easy to pick up on the wing and the beak was very obvious when sitting.

Also excellent were the gannets and auks:

• Razorbill (with a big fat dark bill);
• Guillemot (with a fine pointed bill); and best of all (see entry for Day 18 for a close up of these at Portland Bill).
• Puffins with a very colourful bill when not hidden under a wing).

Another person was heard to comment that in total there were 250,000 birds on the cliffs.  I would have thought there were more, but it is a good number.

After about three hours we left and headed back along the coast road home. This was quite scenic but villages and towns every few miles. It was rated an A road but made the older bits of the Princes Highway look like a freeway. I cannot imagine what it will be like in a few weeks when the holiday season is in full swing with every second car towing a van or boat.

After a few bits and pieces, and reflections on how signs at crucial turns do not have the name of the place you are heading for, we got to Middlesbrough where I got my cell phone freed from the influence of Virgin Australia so that I could use a UK SIM card. This was done successfully (although I am not sure how legally, but since I am well past my contract date with Virgin I don't care).

The weather was excellent.  Lots of sunshine and topping out at about 24.  Is this really Northern England?

22 June: Durham and Salthome

Leeds is Kultur: Art Gallery and Fairburn Ings (birds) and the Yorkshire Sculpture Park!

The first day of the BIG 3: high success with buildings, birds and beer.

After an exercise walk around Ingleby Greenhow we headed off for Durham, principally to check out the cathedral. En route we stopped to buy our first fuel ( I keep wanting to call it petrol – fortunately I stuck diesel in the motor). Fuel consumption has worked out at 49.6 mpg, not bad with a mixture of motorway, urban and very rural roads.

A pretty simple drive into Durham, and by following our eyes got a park close to the cathedral. This was in a private park and was a tad cheaper than the council one in York. However, this place let you pay post hoc (so you didn't have to guess how long you'd be) and gave change so you didn't get ripped off. I don't see this as a public/private distinction, just that York Council employs some jobsworth prats.

Durham cathedral was magnificent. Possibly the best cathedral I have ever visited anywhere for magnificent architecture. Unfortunately photography was not allowed (presumably because it reduced guidebook sales). It was huge in every dimension and followed Norman designs: according to Francs' guidebook it was the first place to use pointed window arches which were subsequently used everywhere. We read that a service has been given every day for more than 900 years!

We thought the glass was better than Chartres (ie it actually was clean enough to let light through) and much better made than York (which was very cluttered with lead). However the space wasn't full of light but dim enough to feel impressive. By clicking my tongue I rated the acoustics as very good- I'd love to go to a full on choral service here.

The two most impressive memorials were:

• 
  
  the tomb of the Venerable Bede (about 900 years old); and
• 
  
  the miners Register which recorded the names of miners killed in accidents at each mine. 6 July 1951 was not a good day at one mine, to which the book was open as they lost 10 guys that day. Its a tough area.

On our way to the cathedral I had stopped to scope out some cormorants in the river and felt a dog brush against me. On looking round it was 3 fat skinheads in police uniform with a very scruffy and old looking pooch. We came across them later and they seemed to have some plain clothes colleagues emerging from the market with 'substances' which the dog was detecting. The dog also snuffled some citizens but didn't detect whatever they were carrying.

I met the first jobsworth, in the shape of a woman who said very officiously that the courtyard of the castle (now part of the Uni) was closed. I merely said “yes” in response, rather than “go tell someone who gives a damn”.

Our next stop was Salthome Reserve run by the RSPB. This was a stunning place where everything was well set up and managed but they had avoided turning it into a zoo. It was quite bizarre to find such a great place in the middle of a very heavily industrialised area. They had quite a lot of punters there – my guess was 60 cars at any one time in the car park (and June/July is the worst time of the year). I recorded about 28 species in the two hours we were there, with many of them breeding. 17 of these were additions to the trip list.

The two images show the visitors centre (with the cooling towers from a “power from waste" station in the background) and a flock of Grey lag Geese sailing off with a petrochemical plant as background. It says something about the importance of the place that signs started on the A19 about 5 miles (and 4 major intersections) away. Perhaps this is the sort of thing to which some folk aspire for Kelly's Swamp in Canberra. Other than the 'Field of Dreams' approach – if you build it they will come- the first job is to get reliable water in the place and the second is to staff and manage the place properly. I would say that Salthome would be a good model to follow., and the RSPB would be a good source of expert advice.

We then moved on a tad to the Teesmouth National Nature Reserve to see the nesting avocets. It astonishes me that when I was growing up there was huge excitement about a pair of these nesting at Minsmere in Suffolk, and now they are in a heavy industrial area several hundred miles North. We also saw 38 seals (a mixture of common and grey seals) hauled out on a mud bank a tad further away.

All of this had induced thirst so we repaired to the White Swan in Stokesley for refreshment. Frances had a cider while I inhaled two good brews from the Captain Cook brewery: Black Porter and Slipway Ale.

A few linguistic and cultural observations.

• A Burger King in Durham was offering the chance to watch the World Cup final with Jimmy Greaves. I hadn't heard of him for many, many years but he is obviously still big news in the UK.
• An advertising sign (for beer) in the heavy industrial area on the North of the Tees; “Same colour as a footballers wife. But better tasting.”
• When in the pub we couldn't eavesdrop as we couldn't understand the locals talking between themselves. However when they talked to us they slowed down and the accent greatly reduced.

23 June: Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Durham.

That was yesterday and today was the day our plans from yesterday got implemented. As I found that the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) didn't open until 10am and we were awake etc and breakfasted by 6:30 I thought we could slightly vary our route and swing by Fairburn Ings (an RSPB reserve) on the way to YSP.

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This turned out to be a great idea as we saw lots of birds at the Ings (I think basically a set of revegetated waste heaps). Everyone we met there as frindly and I added 5 species to the trip list. (Another 2 were added at YSP, bringing the total for the trip to 68.) The best bird was a Whooper Swan, of which I had only seen 1 before (at Jamaica Bay in New York, where its 'tickability' was questionable at best). On checking with a local this one was quite sound.

After a brief thrash down the M1 past a power station – surely the inheritor of Blake's approbation of “dark Satanic mills” we got to YSP. What an absolute blast! I rate the place at least as good as Storm King in upstate New York. I will not add any images until I get back to Carwoola and can resize them, but I took 60 snaps today and they are mainly quite interesting. A special page will be created.

There was a special exhibition of the work of David Nash who does things with wood. The things done include

• setting fire to it,
• assaulting it with a chainsaw (and I suspect various other mechanical devices); and
• letting it fall into a river and filming it over a number of years as it rolls downstream. (This one is weird as he lost it for a while and thought it had gone out to sea, but it re-emereged from a sand bar so the project is ongoing.)
• Building a set of steps on commission by YSP 

Other highlights were

• 3 Andy Goldsworthy walled things (the Hanging Trees were my favourite);

 

• many Henry Moore's
• Barbara Hepworth's Family of Man series; and
• a set of Caros.

One issue about the place was finding out what works were: it was frequently a problem finding the labels which could be several metres from the work.

The works of Elizabeth Frink featuring male nudes were quite fun. It was livened up by the visit of a horde of schoolkids (of rather tender years and non-Caucasian backgrounds) who proceeded to touch 'sensitive' parts of  the art work in a fair number of inventive ways, which I will not go into here, to keep the porn police at bay.

There was quite a trek involved in viewing this place. I would guess we covered about 6kms (horizontal, and fair bit vertical) at a minimum. I was interested to see that here, like most everywhere else was well supplied with molehills. I suspect ths means that agricultural chemical use has been got somewhat under control. As a general comment it was very pleasing to find that dogs were largely welcome in most parts of YSP. as long as they were on a lead this included the areas with grazing cattle and sheep.

The distant view include a huge concrete tower/radio mast On asking a passing local this turned out to be Emley Moor Tower: the tallest free-standing stucture in Europe. It replaced an earlier steel version that had succumbed to cold and strong winds and crashed. I have put in a link to this in Wikipedia.

The beer report for today is not good. We went to the Dudley Arms in Ingleby Greenhow to find they sold commercial beers. I tried Calders 70 (an average mild) and Tetleys Midsummer madness which was flat warm and tasteless – a summary of what CAMRA set out to overcome.

As usual we could not understand much of the local conversations. One bit – by a young male person could be reproduced as “Hour mooch cud yer erve ud?” which we think translated to “How much could you have had?” Also on the linguistic line, Frances invented a new collective noun: 'an inadequacy of road signs'

24 June: Cook memorial, Nunington, Helmsley; Fountains Abbey and Masham

Touring NW Yorkshire including Masham (so Frances may well be driving back to Ingleby).

24 June started with a bit of birding around the Manor. This added 2 species to the trip list and was all the birding that was done today.

After breakfast we headed off to visit the Captain Cook Memorial on top of the Moors. After a few misunderstandings of the map we scaled the initial part of the Cleveland Way (it was rather steep through a farm) and turned off on a track (also part of the Way) through a forest. I noticed some local was sitting at the intersection and once we had turned, he nicked off: was he watching us or am I just parnoid? This was pleasant walking. After a couple of kms we ascended once again to the memorial positioned on the edge of the moors.

The plaque really boosted Cook as a paragon of everything. Interestingly the only other country which got a mention was the Friendly Isles which is I think Fiji. A small quarry was nearby, indicating that the stone was not carried a great distance. Being on the edge of the Moor the view was pretty good. It was also rather exposed to the increasingly strong wind and gave one a closer look at the approaching cloud. We retreated.

We headed South towards Helmsley on a small and scenic road. This was far less busy than it had been on the Sunday. At some point we stopped to check out the Church of St Hilda, in honour of Frances' Mum. I think Durham had some some information about her (the Saint, not the Mum) but left off the 'a': I will check when we get back to internet contact.

On,on, and a descent to look at Rievaulx Abbey from the road. The village here was very pleasant with another old church and our first thatched house. Back up a steep hill (hoping we don't meet a tour bus coming down) and on to Helmsley. We sorted out the parking situation, where the warden, a jobsworth if ever I saw one, was engrossed in the racing pages of his newspaper. We spent quite a bit of time in the excellent church with great murals (inter alia listing all the vicars since 1129).

The Castle seemed to be a charged entry ruin, so we just peered over the wall and left. Getting back to the car, the jobsworth was no longer evident: I presume that he was either in the pub or, having made his selections, in the betting shop investing his day's take.

The reason we had come to this area was to visit Nunnington Hall, a National trust property. I rated it as OK, but rather run down. There were heaps of people there and I suspect we made a reduction in the average age! There was a nice display of photographs by a female singer who was performing there in the evening (and seemed to be a big deal, but I had never heard of her - and cannot now remember her name). The entry hall featured an array of endangered species mounted on the wall – I suppose that is why they are now endangered! The gardens were very interesting especially in the way the orchard was allowed to remain natural (apart from the fruit trees). They also featured some industria size compost bins, in a part of the garden accessible by backhoe.

There were other places to go so off to Ripon and Fountains Abbey. This included a descent of Sutton Bank (the Western edge of the Moors here) with all sorts of injunctions against taking caravans down it: it is always a good thing to ban caravans from anywhere but this road didn't seem unduly alarming.

Getting through Ripon was a challenge since it seemed to be the town that roadsigns forgot. (We did see a sign to the 'Dog Sanctuary at Catton.) However we got to Fountains Abbey (another National Trust site) eventually. It was a huge place and rather well set out. It was interesting that while the lawns were manicured, weeds were growing in the ruins which were the reason for the whole thing. Perhaps there is a NT rule that weeds make it look like a real ruin? A small church we found near the end of the walk – about 4 km if we hadn't wimped into the shuttle bus - was very elaborately decorated inside. A herd of deer were grazing nearby and provided many photo opportunities.

We then did a blat to Masham to visit breweries. Make that singular since Theakstons shut at 4:30. Ban Old Peculiar Ale! I certainly think it is peculiar for a beer outlet to close at that time. The Black Sheep Brewery was still open so I had a couple of halves of excellent beer (but not Riggwelter as we had too far to drive).

I might as well have had another few ales since the next village seems to have been where the sign-post ignorers practised their craft. We eventually found our way back to Stokesley where we had a meal and a couple more ales in the Spread Eagle . Quite a few people in the pub, many of them old ladies (ie females who looked about our age). They seemed to be in two classes: those who were drinking spirits and those who were drinking tea.

That is it for this day.