From Pyrenees to Pennines

Flood

December in the north of England has been the month of the flood. Until Boxing Day, it was Cumbria that saw all the action, with some communities flooded out not once, not twice, but three times. They were told to stand by for more on Boxing Day. They readied themselves…. and nothing happened, because the torrential rains prophesied swept south and east of them, firstly into Lancashire, and then Yorkshire

We were staying with my daughter’s family in that part of Greater Manchester that used to be in Lancashire. They live near a Nature Reserve through which Bradshaw Brook passes. I’d say ‘flows’, but such a phrase is normally far too active a description for this narrow little watercourse.

This was Bradshaw Brook yesterday.

ChristmasBolton2015 029 — Bradshaw Brook, Boxing Day 2015

We were due to travel home from their house to ours, in Yorkshire. Highways England, the BBC, and motoring organisations all had conflicting information on their websites. But they all agreed that our usual route, a scenic drive over the Pennines, was largely impassable.

It would have to be the motorway. Longer, duller, but surer. We’d not long been travelling when we noticed that traffic on the other carriageway was at a complete standstill, for miles…and miles. It was only when we got home that we found out that a 20′ sinkhole had opened up near Rochdale. So much for safer-by-motorway…..

Where to leave the motorway though, for the final few miles home? There were floods in Leeds, floods near Harrogate – there were sure to be floods in Boroughbridge too. What about Knaresborough? It turned out there were floods near there too, as we discovered when warning notices turned us back on the road we’d come on, and sent us back by several miles to look for another route. Familiar fields had turned into lakes, deep and almost unfordable road-side puddles were unavoidable.

ChristmasBolton2015 045 — This doesn’t look too bad. Trust me. It’s deep.

We’re lucky. We were flood-tourists on our journey home, gawping at rivers-become-seas, and roads-become-rivers. Our home wasn’t flooded, nor will it be. Others aren’t so fortunate. They’re either contemplating the devastation of their own home or business – or both, or anxiously shoring up the front door with as many sandbags as they can lay their hands on, in anticipation of the days ahead, when the forecast continues to be grim. We could all do with a bit of an old-fashioned winter cold snap, with a touch of frost, but positively no rain.

FASR&Ripon27Dec2015 025 — You see that bridge, centre left? That’s a bridge over the River Ure, in Ripon. This lake in the foreground is not a lake, but open ground at the edge of the city, favoured by dog-walkers and children.

‘Deck the halls…’ at Castle Howard

CastleHowardChristmas2015 078 — Castle Howard at Christmas time.

You all know Castle Howard, that magnificent 18th century stately home, and one of Yorkshire’s treasures. I’ve even blogged about it. It provides the backdrops in endless films and TV dramas.

This time, though, as it’s Christmas, I just want to show you how its been decorated for the season. A few weeks ago they shut the doors for a whole fortnight, and everyone from groundsmen and gardeners to guides and caretaking staff turned to and spent their time dragging trees into place, painting, placing baubles, candles and foliage, gilding, and generally making the place festive. Then they re-opened. We came away from our afternoon there, admiring everyone’s hard work and enthusiasm, feeling Christmassy for the first time this year. Happy Christmas everyone!

Sunrise on the Winter Solstice

North Stainley, Ripon, 21st December 2015

‘Tuesday’s Tune’

Soon after I started writing my blog, I realised that some of the people reading my posts were … other bloggers. They comment on my posts, and I on theirs. It’s a novel kind of ‘friendship’. We’re unlikely ever to meet, and yet we come to know one another (or those bits of ourselves we’re willing to share in print) quite well. We like and support one another. Not for us the mean-spirited and negative comments that seem to be a feature of the comment columns on many national newspapers, thank you very much.

Even more extraordinary is the fact that these blogging friends live all over the world: in Canada, in America, in France, in Germany. And this week, one of those blogging friends, Clay Watkins: Making the Days Count has asked me to contribute a guest post to his blog.

Clay is a teacher. He’s the teacher you wish you’d had at school: keen to make his students enthusiastic for the project in hand. Whether it’s looking at the skies, or the aftermath of the Second World War, or the principles of physics, Clay wants you to be curious, so you do your very best. He likes music too, and so once a week on his blog, it’s ‘Tuesday’s tune’. Have a look here, and see what I chose to write about on his blog.

An afternoon of no peace… but a lot of good will: a carol service at Fountains Abbey

If the National Trust property where you volunteer has an abbey on site, albeit a ruined one, that’s where a good few of the Christmas celebrations need to take place. It’s fair to say that there are many people locally who regard a chance to hear singing from a local choir at one of the ‘Music and Lights’ events, or at the carol service here, as one of the focal points of their pre-Christmas celebrations.

The Abbey hasn’t had a roof since Henry VIII’s men came and removed it. Only the cellarium, which the monks used for storage, specifically for vast quantities of valuable woollen fleeces, is still under cover. It’s a little draughty too, as the windows remain unglazed, but the acoustics are amazing. The monks who used to call the abbey home might be rather surprised to find that their storage facility is nowadays, from time to time, a concert hall.

Picture the scene before the service began. Here’s the cellarium at 1.30 p.m.

FASRMusic&LightsDec15 048 — The cellarium, empty at 1.30 p.m.

For two hours after that, though, there was a batallion of volunteers, with a couple of members of staff cheerfully mucking in to transform the place. Some of us hauled ranks and ranks of folding chairs out from storage and arranged them neatly. Some protected scores of candles with little cardboard collars so nobody would be burnt by molten wax when the time came to light them during the service. Others uncoiled lengthy snakes of cable for the sound and lighting systems. And the largest team of all arranged the refreshments: coffee, tea, hot chocolate, mulled wine.

By 3 o’clock. members of the public were already choosing their seats, and the refreshment stand was very much in business. ‘One coffee, two teas and four mulled wines please!’ ‘Two hot chocolates, a mulled wine and a coffee’. On and on we worked. Suddenly, someone said she thought she could hear ‘Oh come all ye faithful’ in the distance. The service had long since begun, and we’d been too busy to notice.

FASRMusic&LightsDec15 057

The carol service continued, service of refreshments continued. By half past 4, things finally started to quieten down as the event drew to a close. Time for the team to snatch a refreshment break, and do a little accounting. We’d sold far more than £1000 worth of hot drinks, including 66 bottles-worth of mulled wine. Not bad for a couple of hours’ hard graft. And as the congregation proved willing to do a whole lot of chair shifting, clearing up didn’t take too long.

Even if we didn’t hear many carols, we felt we’d had a good start to the Christmas season. It hadn’t been very peaceful, but there had been plenty of cheerful good will from staff, volunteers and visitors alike.

And meanwhile, up at the entrance to Fountains Abbey & Studley Royal, two other volunteers had been busy. Here’s Sharon, Volunteer Elf, welcoming visitors to meet Father Christmas – a volunteer, of course. FASRMusic&LightsDec15 003

Comfort cooking: Snow 4

Eighteen days to go, and entirely typically, I haven’t started my Christmas shopping. I have made the cake, the puddings and the mincemeat though. And today, we made some Christmas presents too. I can’t recommend this panforte recipe too highly: It’s quite hard to make yourself give it away. If you decide to make some for your nearest and dearest, they’ll love you forever. The halva’s pretty good too.

When we first made this recipe, we were in France, hiding from the snow. Now we’re in England, hiding from the rain. You’ll know about the devastating floods that have hit Cumbria. We too have flooding, but nothing like so serious. Closed roads, large lakes where there ought to be farmers’ fields, and mud, mud, everywhere. Just the weather for licking the bowl out after a serious session in the kitchen.

From Pyrenees to Pennines

I’m getting a bad case of cabin fever at the moment. The snow is turning to hard packed ice and/or slush and is not much fun to walk on. We’re not getting out much. So I’ve turned to comfort cooking.

About a week ago, my favourite food blogger, David Lebovitz wrote about his take on that wonderfully decadent Italian treat, Panforte. Two days after that, Kalba’s blog dropped into my in-box. She’d been tweaking his recipe whilst hiding from the snow on her side of the Ariège. Today it was my turn- and here’s my tweaked recipe

40g unsweetened cocoa powder, plus extra for dusting the tin
200g chopped toasted nuts- I used the hazelnuts I gathered with some friends early last Autumn, and the last of my walnuts
100g chopped dried prunes
110g flour
200g chopped candied orange peel
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1…

View original post 701 more words

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Fox_study_6 — A fine red fox. Wikimedia Commons.

There I was, in the middle of the morning, chatting on the ‘phone and idly staring out of the window, across the lawn and the newly-bare winter trees.

A fox appeared. He walked under the mulberry tree, across the grass, and disappeared into the undergrowth some distance away. He was magnificent. As large as a labrador, with a sleek tawny-red coat, he was very fine as he strolled the full length of the garden, some small item of prey wedged between his jaws.

He was so very different from the urban foxes we see when we go to stay with my son and his family in London. After dark, we enjoy peeping through the curtains, watching them as they prowl up and down the street and stop to examine that unfamiliar car – ours. Compared with our country fox, these urban types are small, with duller coats that are ochre-red, rather mangy and bald in places. But look at what they eat. Our fellow will have feasted on a plentiful diet of rabbits and pheasants. Town fox investigates dustbins and fast-food litter, looking for the remains of a greasy, salty fried chicken meal, or a few crusts of pizza. He won’t starve, but he’ll be pretty ill-nourished.

1024px-Red_fox_crossing_road — An urban fox. Wikimedia Commons.

We always enjoy our glimpses of those town foxes in London. But how much more excited I was yesterday when I saw the beast who, unhurried, stepped regally past.

And no. I haven’t got a photo of him. I’d have had to leave the window and miss those few special moments.

Life of Brian

I don’t really do dogs. There. I’ve just lost more than half my readership, just like that.

It’s not that I don’t like them though. I can think of few greater pleasures than a tramp over the hills on a cold and frosty morning with a cheerful dog bounding ahead, truffling around the undergrowth and enjoying all the sights and sounds and experiences of a fresh new day.

It’s just that hell can be not other people, but other people’s dogs. You know the sort. The ones that leap up and knock you sideways, muddying your nice clean jumper in the process. They’re the ones whose owners smile indulgently. ‘He’s just being friendly’, they explain. These are the very dogs that may also try to lick your face. Then there are the ones that are left alone and bark, bark, bark, as the dog-next-door in France did. Or the ones that bare their teeth and frighten me half to death. Or the smelly ones.

I think there’s a pattern here. It’s not the dogs. It’s the owners. And I seem to have raised three children who apparently think much the same as I do on the dog question.

And then, the other week, Daughter Number One announced they’d decided to get a dog. Not just any dog. But a puppy. One that would become a big (ish) dog. An active dog. A feisty dog. A dalmatian. Ellie’s is a family of two busy working adults and ten-year-old twin sons with the sort of after-school schedule for which you need a very large calendar, and a smart phone that reminds you at frequent intervals who has to be where when, with whom, and wearing what kind of kit.

They did their research. They chose and visited a breeder and looked at a litter of ten newly-born pups. And they chose Brian. He’s been living with them for ten days now. This week, we went to stay, and we met him.

We’re converted. I’ve never in all my life been greeted with such enthusiasm as I was by Brian when I turned up in the kitchen the other morning to get some breakfast. Look at this wagging tail. I remind myself he’d probably have greeted a burglar with equal joy …. but still.

BrianNovember2015 009 — Brian’s so pleased to see everyone in the morning.

He’s charmed us all. But he’s not going to get away with simply being charming. Right from day one, training began. No leaping up on furniture. No leaping up at people. No shoe-savaging. He learned immediately to ‘sit’ on command, and Alex’s first party trick was to teach him to shake a paw. We’re all busy keeping him entertained in these slightly restrictive weeks when he can’t go out and about because he hasn’t had all his jabs yet. But everyday pleasures are enough for this young chap. There’s a garden to explore. Rotting leaves and springy grass. Rustling dried-up autumn plants. Tantalising glimpses of birds. Misty-moisty autumn smells. And there’s a whole tick-box in the training manual to worry about. Checklist: he must meet a baby (no), children of various ages (tick), the elderly (tick), someone in glasses (tick), someone bearded (no), someone in uniform (no), and so on, and so on.

BrianNovember2015 006 — Project Exhaust-a-pup bears fruit.

Dog-training proper starts next week. And then before long he’ll be a dog-teenager. And then an adult, prepared to offer many years of companionship and pleasure to Ellie & Co. and who knows? Maybe to us too.

And here’s to you, George Frederick Robinson

St. Mary's Church, Studley Royal (Wikimedia Commons) — St. Mary’s Church, Studley Royal (Wikimedia Commons)

When I started out as a National Trust volunteer, when I began as an Information Assistant at St.Mary’s Church, Studley Royal, I didn’t expect to sort out a little mystery that’s continued to exercise my brain from time to time, ever since my first and only visit to India, 8 years ago.

Let’s begin there, back in 2007. It was my first day, all by myself, after a night flight into Bangalore. I was far too excited to sleep, and already over-stimulated by a city, busy since well before 6.00 a.m., alive with cows, horses, donkeys, sheep, chipmunks, dogs by the thousand, monkeys, parakeets, eagles …. and auto-rickshaws, always auto-rickshaws, and the unending sound of motorhorns constantly in use on every car and lorry. I’d already allowed an amiable rickshaw driver, who could doubtless see ‘arrived this morning’ tattooed across my forehead, to take me on a conducted tour of the city. We served each other’s purpose. I got a decent sit down and a running commentary in broken English on the city sights. He was probably paid over the odds by a very appreciative customer who knew a decent bargain when she saw one. When I left him, after a thoroughly entertaining morning, I found myself wandering towards London Road. And then Robinson Street. Robinson Street? Who could Mr. Robinson be? I finally found out ….. the other week. If only I’d wandered just a little further on that first day in Bangalore, I’d have been offered a clue. I’d have found ‘Ripon Street’.

My first friend in Bangalore: the rickshaw driver who took me on a tour of the city

Eagles fly above Bangalore

Bangalore street scene.

Fast forward to an early session at St. Mary’s Church, Studley Royal just a few months ago. My fellow-volunteer Frances was taking some visitors round. I tagged along, because Frances has an apparently bottomless fund of knowledge, and a way of engaging her willing listeners’ attention. She’d already told them that the church was the design of a noted exponent of Gothic Revival architecture, William Burges. She’d pointed out several examples of its inventive design, of its richly coloured decorative detail, of its religious symbolism.

Burges famously loved animals. There are 16 of thse parrots.

Starting outside the church…..

First glimpse of the richly coloured interior

Now she was telling us that it was commissioned in 1870 by the deeply religious Marchioness of Ripon, and her husband, the Marquess. His full name and title was George Frederick Samuel Robinson, 1st Marquess of Ripon, 2nd Earl of Ripon. She thought we might like to know his story. She was right.

The Marquess of Ripon had an impeccable pedigree. He was born in No. 10 Downing Street, and as an adult, served as an MP in various northern constituencies. Shortly after succeeding to the title of Earl of Ripon in 1859, he became first Undersecretary to India, and later Secretary of State for India. From 1868 he was highly valuable in a variety of roles in William Gladstone’s government.

Then, in 1874, he converted to Roman Catholicism. His strong sense of duty prevented him from continuing to serve in government. The Church of England (the Established Church) and state are linked in the United Kingdom. He withdrew from public life.

However, in 1880, Gladstone persuaded him to take the post of Viceroy of India. The Indians grew to honour him: the British rather less so. Here’s why.

He expanded the powers of locally elected Indian governments, and liberalised internal administration. He lowered the salt tax. He gave local language newspapers the same freedoms as English ones, and enacted some improvements in labour conditions. He allowed Indian judges the same rights as European ones when handling European defendants. And he achieved all this in only four years. No wonder Indians felt the least they could do was name a few roads after him.

George Frederick Samuel Robinson, 1st Marquess of Ripon (Wikimedia Commons)

He went on to serve in other capacities before becoming leader of the Liberals in the House of Lords, and died in Ripon in 1909.

So – thank you St. Mary’s, Studley Royal. And thank you Frances, National Trust volunteer. An eight year old mystery is solved.

The Horniman Museum

I’ve loved the Horniman Museum since I was a small child. We would make the long and slightly awkward bus journey there from our home in Victoria, over the Thames at Vauxhall Bridge, through dingy Brixton and elegant and well-heeled Dulwich to spend the day at this special place.

I can’t remember those visits in detail really. I’ve got memories of awe-inspiring and crowded cabinets of strange birds and unfamiliar animals, collected and stuffed many years before: of colourful displays of traditional costumes and artefacts from Africa. Somewhere or another I probably still have the odd sepia-and-white postcard, bought as a souvenir of our day out.

And now it’s set to be a go-to destination for new grandson William. He too will be able to enjoy the bus journey there and back, and a Grand Day Out, as we all did last Sunday.

The museum is so much more than I remember from those days in the 1950s. Those collections – and more – are still there. They’re still arranged, particularly the Natural History collection, with a nod to the days when simply everything was displayed, all the better to fascinate you. There’s that wonderful walrus, stuffed by a Victorian taxidermist who hadn’t had the benefit of watching David Attenborough’s wildlife programmes. He filled out the creature full to bursting, not a wrinkle in sight. Everyone loves him.

Horniman Walrus — One very generously stuffed walrus.

But the African Worlds gallery reflects more modern ideas of interpretation. You’ll find, alongside objects from traditional African cultures, more modern artefacts from countries strongly influenced by the African populations that arrived there during the years of slavery, such as Brazil and Trinidad.

A colourful collection of parakeets.

Ijele: masquerade of the Igbo

We were keen to see the griffon vulture because we’d seen so many in la Rioja, in Spain.

Surely that aquarium wasn’t there 50 years ago? And all those wonderful things happening in the gardens – I can’t even remember any gardens. I can’t remember the spectacular views across London. Even if I could, I wouldn’t remember this view. Look.

London skyline. If you try really hard, you can find St. Paul’s Cathedral.

I’m sure there wasn’t an Animal Walk. This is where William got the chance to come face to face with an extremely short-legged goat, a large and very industrious white rabbit, a couple of hens and an alpaca. Now there are flower beds showing plants that give us dyes for cloth. There’s an exciting space full of – are they sculptures? No, we can all go and make music there, strumming, pounding, plucking, experimenting. And so much more …. so much more. I’d happily go and explore this wonderful outdoor and indoor site every time we go and visit… and I know William will want to come too, when he’s old enough to have an opinion.