Fountains by Floodlight

Every October, Fountains Abbey open its gates on Friday and Saturday evenings to allow visitors to appreciate the site as the sun sets, darkness falls, the Abbey is illuminated by floodlight, choirs sing in the Cellarium, and a flotilla of food trucks cater to most tastes.

This year, there was another attraction: a lightshow telling the story of the Abbey, from its early days as a simple place of a life of prayer for a few devout monks; through its successful days as an important religious and wool-trading centre; to its dissolution by Henry VIII; its re-emergence as part of an 18th century water garden; and finally, as a UNESCO World Heritage site managed by the National Trust. All that history, colourfully and dramatically brought to life in 10 minutes or so, projected on repeat throughout the evening! It was magnificent, and a wonderful window on the past. If you live near enough and fancy this kind of evening out, there are two further weekends this October. Find out all about it here.

If the windows shown here aren’t obvious enough, here’s one more:

For Ludwig’s Monday Window, hosted this week by PR

PS. Radio silence for a while, apart from the odd virtual postcard. Off on a rail trip to visit Team Spain, then on to our old haunts in France for a few days before chugging our way home.

‘And Where Does THAT Lead?’

Egidio, for this week’s Lens-Artist Challenge asks us ‘Where does it lead?’ He invites us to be literal, with roads, footpaths, animal tracks, waves and railway tracks, or not-at-all-straight-down-the-line metaphorical I’m going stolidly literal.

‘The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.’ GK Chesterton.

But pushing a route up a mountain demands even less direct route-finding.

Hairpin bends in Cantabria, Spain.

Roads over a thoroughly under-populated chunk of Russia. The ony signs of human intervention – apart from little-used roads is that line of wind turbines. Some of those roads seem to lead nowhere much. Quarries?

But this road is FAR less remote, and also features a a wind farm. We’re in Spain again.

I’ll finish with memories of a dreadful walk with friends. We could have done with some kind of path – any kind – leading across this dreadful field. I hope you feel suitably sorry for us.

A well-placed footpath sign would have helped. The happy wanderers in the featured photo above probably had one. Or at least a good map.

On This Day, 14th October, Over the Years

I thought it could be fun to see what my camera thought worth recording on 14th October over the last few years.

Last year we were coming to the end of our holiday in Alsace. Mooching round Munster, we spotted this stork standing guard over the hotel of the same name.

Two years before that, our area’s very first crop of sunflowers was drying out. I thought the flowers had prospered, but the farmer can’t have thought so, because the experiment hasn’t been repeated.

And three years before THAT, we were having a bit of break from Lockdowns. I must have had a moonlit walk.

Three years before, in 2017, we were entertaining friends from France. We took them, among all sorts of places, to our local Himalayan Gardens: featured photo above. The French appreciate their funghi, so we were pleased to show them these …

Finally, in 2015 (none from 2016), here’s some street furniture from La Rioja in Spain. We’d been there with my son, daughter-in-law, their baby son and her parents. Baby grandson is now in high school.

For Leanne’s Monochrome Madness.

A Window on a Distressed Barn

Not long ago, I showed you a local barn I’m fond of. Now it’s time for another.

I often walk along the river bank towards the next village, and pass an attractive low-key campsite en route. And on this site is this elderly yet still serviceable barn…

Well, when I say ‘serviceable’, that’s unless you need to get through some of the doors. But the windows look fine, and windows are what Monday Window is all about. Every time I pass, I look at the layers of brick and ston , the iron retaining clasps that hold the whole thing together, and wonder what stories this venerable building, once part of a watermill, could tell…

For Ludwig’s Monday Window, hosted this week by Brian of Bushboy’s World fame.

Dancing in the Street

Dancing in the street – music in the street – is part of our heritage. Part of the heritage of just about every nation on earth. Music helps us celebrate moments of spontaneous community togetherness. It provides rhythm and atmosphere for traditional dancers in town streets and squares who’ve come to entertain us, of course, but who would cheerfully make music and dance together even if we hadn’t turned up.

Here in the UK, brass bands appear when there’s a civic or community event to celebrate.

And individuals with guitars, saxophones, voices, even pianos scratch some kind of living by performing to any pedestrians prepared to listen.

My header image – the worst photo on earth – is one I love, for somehow conveying the joy in this community in Barcelona – Gràcia – brought together for one special day of events, singing and dancing to celebrate their love for their own special corner of the city.

So why not get out onto the streeets today and see what music you can find?

Ritva is our host for this week’s Lens-Artists Challenge: Music. Some of the photos I chose were monochrome, so for consistency I made this a post of black and white images. To the undoubted disgust of some of my readers – looking at you, Jo.

City Boats

Boats eh? Brian wants us Messing About in Boats for his turn at the helm of The Good Ship Monochrome Madness, captained by Leanne.

I looked at all my shots of attractive little harbours, busy little fishing ports all along the coast of the Spanish Maresme, where daughter Emily and family live. I thought back to our seabourne days in Sweden. But in the end, I settled for city-centre boats, set against not the wide open skies of the ocean, but with a backdrop of skyscrapers, warehouses and townish busyness.

My header image is taken from near Greenwich, now firmly part of London. I’m not overlooking the elegant naval buildings of Greenwich itself, but gazing across the Thames, with its little flotilla of small boats, toward the skyscrapers of Canary Wharf and beyond.

And here’s another. These busy barges and boats look more workaday. They’ll be conveying goods and services up and down the Thames, which is every bit as busy a highway as any other major route in London. London new – The Shard and London old – Tower Bridge provide the backdrop.

But London can offer quieter scenes, even in the centre. I was only five minutes walk from Kings Cross Station when I snapped this scene at the Regents Canal – houseboats.

Off up north to Leeds now, and the Leeds-Liverpool Canal. Once mucky, rubbish infested and something of a no-go area, the canal basin has been transformed into a relaxing city-centre destination to while away the time with friends, or perhaps to have an informal business meeting.

I’ve got two slightly left-field images to finish with. One’s from Portsmouth (yes, I know it’s by the sea, but it IS a city, and this shot was not taken on the seafront) and shows small boats after they’ve been put to bed at night.

Last of all is from Cádiz, which also sits by the sea. But this shot comes from the city’s museum and shows small maquettes which were, I think, for stage sets at the theatre there. I found them rather charming.

And that’s me done. Why not join in yourself, and link back to Brian’s and Leanne’s posts? Or failing that, hunt down some more posts illustrating this challenge. You’ll find we’re not all in the same boat.