From Pyrenees to Pennines

Brimham Rocks

We’ve had quite a weekend. Our vaguely organised daily lives, with plenty of chances to stand and stare, or at least sit down with a cup of coffee and the paper have been shot to pieces by the arrival, for two days only, of our twin nine-year old grandsons, Alex and Ben.

We had a busy Saturday, full of pancakes, playgrounds, and Ripon’s Prison and Police Museum (recommended). But the highlight of the day was Brimham Rocks.

It’s an extraordinary place. There, slap-bang in the middle of the rolling and verdant Yorkshire Dales, is a 30 acre fantastical landscape. Dry-stone walled fields and charming villages are suddenly replaced by an odd collection of weird and wonderful shaped rocks. Brimham Rocks. These are formed from millstone grit: glaciation, wind and rain have eroded them into extraordinary formations, pierced by holes, balancing apparently precariously, or stacked into tottering towers. Geologists study them, rock climbers scramble up them, but above all, families come to let their children become impromptu explorers, mountaineers and adventurers of every kind.

We’ve only chosen quiet times to visit here in the past, but with Alex and Ben, we had no choice, We wanted to take them there, so a brisk and breezy Saturday slap-bang in the middle of the school holidays it was. The car park was overflowing . Oh dear.

But it was fine. The space is big enough to provide room for all. And it was fun to be amongst children from the smallest toddler to the tallest and lankiest of teenagers, all having an equally good time: all exploring, all testing themselves physically, weaving their own adventures.

Alex and Ben take a pause at Brimham Rocks

And besides, we didn’t come home empty-handed. August is bilberry season. Alex and Ben, particularly Ben, rose to the challenge of stripping the small and rather hidden fruits, becoming ever more purple as time passed. Teeth turned blue, hands indelibly stained, fingernails beyond help from any nailbrush: it was so good to see my grandchildren discovering the pleasures of food-for-free. Bilberry pancakes for Sunday breakfast then…..

Rock climbers

Bilberry gathering.

Bilberries.

Here they go round the mulberry bush….

…. the birds, that is. I’m sitting looking out of the study window. There, almost centre front, is the mulberry tree. I can see why it’s secured itself a place in the history of children’s singing rhymes, even though it’s quite certainly a tree and not a bush. Its densely leaved branches curve down to the ground, leaving a perfect den for small people to spend an hour or two hiding away, playing games away from interfering adults.

There it is, our magnificent mulberry tree

And just now, mid-summer, is the time it fruits. I’ve never lived with a mulberry tree on tap before, so I made the usual deal with the birds: ‘You take the high-up berries, I’ll take the low ones. There are plenty to go round.’ They weren’t listening. I’m watching them now, those pesky blackbirds, swooping in to select a not-quite-ripe fruit and flying away to enjoy in private.

OK, it's not a blackbird, but a crow. They're thieves too. — OK, it’s not a blackbird, but a crow. They’re thieves too.

Mulberries are in fact quite a curious fruit, the size and shape of a raspberry or blackberry, but with quite a pithy core. It’s quite a challenge to find these relatively small berries growing on a fully-sized tree, hidden among large almost heart-shaped leaves. The majority of the berries fall to the ground (where the birds ignore them, it seems), and this is a crop that can only be picked when black, juicy, and very fully ripe. So fingers and clothes alike get quickly and indelibly stained. Purple is the best colour to wear.

A bough laden with mulberries.

They hide themselves pretty well.

Not quite ripe yet.

All my recipe books tell me to use them in any recipe calling for blackberries or raspberries. I’ve discovered I prefer both those more familiar fruits, but it won’t stop me having a go at using the unexpected haul of free berries. I made a coulis for ice-cream yesterday. What next, I wonder?

Hunt the mulberry. It's quite a job. — Hunt the mulberry. It’s quite a job.

Here we go round the mulberry bush,
The mulberry bush, the mulberry bush.
Here we go round the mulberry bush,
On a cold and frosty morning.

Industrial life, Nidderdale style

Take a walk through much of rural Nidderdale in North Yorkshire, and almost the only sign of human endeavour that you’ll see is connected with agriculture. Go out into this lightly-populated area, with its apparently nearly barren hillsides, and you’re only likely to meet sheep, with the occasional field of cattle.

Yesterday, we went to Greenhow. It’s a charming, pretty village more noted these days for being the highest village in Yorkshire: a whole 400 metres or so above sea level. It used to be an industrial power-house. It was here and in the surrounding area that villagers used to mine for lead. And the signs of this ancient industry are still here. We set off on a walk across moorland and valley to investigate.

It’s thought that the Romans were the first to mine lead in the area, and by 1225, the abbots of Fountains and Byland Abbeys were apparently squabbling(!) over rights to mine at nearby ‘Caldestones’. This valuable commodity was transported over, for the time, immense distances. In 1365 for instance, a consignment was sent to the south of England, to Windsor: ‘Two wagons each with ten oxen carrying 24 fothers* of the said lead from Caldstanes in Nidderdale in the county of York by high and rocky mountains and by muddy roads to Boroughbridge’. At which point, the journey perhaps continued on water. Indeed, lead was exported as far afield as Antwerp, Bordeaux and Danzig.

An all-but hidden tunnel.

Peering into it. We were too tall to stand upright.

What’s left of an old lead works.

The beginnings of a long journey for that now-smelted lead.

Well, we were on those ‘high and muddy mountains‘, but they didn’t cause us too much trouble. Comfortable walking boots and a bright sunny day probably helped us on our way. What we did see were warrens of carefully constructed and stone-lined tunnels leading to the ancient and now fully-exploited lead seams. We saw, in the small streams now coursing along some of them, how water became a real problem to the miners of those seams. Horse tramways hauled lead , which was smelted on site, off to what passed for major roads at the time. It was obvious to us how very difficult transport must be in this up-hill-and-down-dale area, which even than was not highly populated, with poor transport infra-structure, and unsophisticated wooden carts to carry the goods. Ancient spoil-heaps from now-exhausted seams litter the area.

An old lead-works, spoil heaps, a river and a perfect picnic spot.

And at the end of our journey, we strode up to Coldstones Cut. This is a fine art work, a vantage point from which to see a vast panorama of the Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and beyond, as well as the last working quarry in the area. These days, it’s all about aggregates and asphalt, but the quarry has a long history of providing lead, then limestone as well as other materials. Andrew Sabin‘s viewing area is part streetscape, part brutal stone-block construction. It’s a magnificent intermediary between an immense and busy industrial landscape, and the gentler and even vaster rural one in which it’s situated.

Even at Coldstones you can’t escape the legacy of the Tour de France.

The quarry: hard to convey a sense of its scale.

That qualifies as a mountain round here.

A view from Coldstones.

That’s Nidderdale.

The monumental viewing area.

…and from another angle….

Nidderdale again.

A final view.

* An old English measurement equalling about 19.5 hundredweight.

A solitary and ascetic life

Mount Grace Priory viewed from the cloisters

As you travel round North Yorkshire, you quickly become aware of its Christian heritage, and realise how many abbeys and monasteries there were, from a variety of religious foundations, for Henry VIII to get his teeth into once he’d laid his plans for the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s.

Fountains Abbey, as I mentioned in a recent post, is just down the road, and Jervaulx and Rievaulx aren’t far away: there are at least a dozen more. And each of them is ruined, left waste after Henry VIII pensioned off or martyred the abbots, priors, monks and lay brothers, and all the equivalent females too.

Today we visited Mount Grace Priory near Osmotherly. We’re accustomed to making a tour, when we visit these religious sites, of chapels, refectories, kitchens, cloisters – places where monks or nuns and lay brothers or sisters gathered together in spiritual or physical work for the benefit of their own and perhaps the wider community.

Not so at Mount Grace. This community was a Carthusian foundation. The Carthusians developed their order as a reaction to the lax conditions tolerated by many other religious orders at the time – the late 11th century. Initially centred on Chartreuse near Grenoble, the order founded religious houses throughout Europe, reaching Mount Grace in the later 14th century.

The simple, unadorned architecture of the priory.

Seven years is the time it took to become a full Carthusian monk. Seven years in which to decide whether the full religious life of solitary prayer, contemplation and work was for you. Seven years in which you would only ever see your fellow monks on a Sunday, at Chapter meeting. For the rest of the time you lived completely alone in your own little house which gave onto the large Great Cloister. Here you had a room in which to sleep and pray at the proper appointed times, a small living area with a large hearth, and upstairs, a room where you would work. Perhaps you would weave, or write out or illustrate manuscripts. Sometimes you would grow vegetables or fruit and herbs in your little patch of garden. You might walk or meditate in your very own mini-cloister. Even mealtimes were solitary. Your (vegetarian) food for your twice-daily meals would be pushed through a space in the wall by a lay brother whom you never saw. Bedtime was 6.00 p.m. and there were two extended times of prayer through the night. What you also had, though, extraordinary for medieval times, was a privy regularly flushed from springs in the area, and cold piped running water.

The monk’s bedchamber and personal chapel.

His sitting and dining area. There’s a large hearth here too.

His upstairs workroom, with weaving loom and table.

His privy.

His vegetable garden.

The writing equipment a monk was issued with on arrival at the priory.

The monastery site includes a prison to confine brothers who became disobedient. At a time when mental illness was little understood, surely some must have reacted badly to this life of extreme solitude, and become ‘problems’? Any yet there were always far more men wanting one of the 25 places at this austerely- run yet comfortable priory than could be accommodated.

The lay brothers who did much of the ‘housekeeping’ led similarly solitary lives, as far as their working day permitted. They farmed, made domestic pottery ware, looked after working animals, and the fish ponds: fish were apparently sometimes served as part of a vegetarian diet.

Naturally women were never permitted on site. Both male and female pilgrims would stay in what is now the Manor House from time to time, as monasteries have always had an obligation to offer shelter to travellers.

Since the Dissolution, the priory and its surroundings have been abandoned and fallen into ruin. The surrounding farmland was sold off, and the Manor House was converted and adapted for family life at various times in both the 17th and 19th centuries. The refitting of the house in the popular Arts and Crafts style at the turn of the 20th century deserves a post of its own.

Mount Grace is a lovely site. Malcolm and I were happy to visit it together, to have the chance to talk to informative and enthusiastic staff, and to wander around at our leisure. Living there for an entire adult life, under strict Carthusian rule? Not a chance.

This is the Manor House as it appears today, viewed from the garden and fishpond. — This is the Manor House as it appears today, viewed from the garden and fishponds.

Nature at Nosterfield

Not far from here, only about two miles as the crow flies, is a nature reserve, Nosterfield Local Nature Reserve. And ‘as the crow flies’ is an appropriate way to measure the journey there, because above all else, it’s a bird reserve. Even more than that, it’s a wetland reserve.

Until the 1990s, this was a landscape quarried for its sand and gravel, exposing the underlying limestone and fluctuating water courses. Even as the land was worked birds flocked here in search of insects. Once the quarries closed, the land proved unsuitable for agriculture: the intermittent flooding saw to that.

Wildlife took the site over. Wading birds adore the muddy margins and insect-rich grasses. Natives such as lapwing and curlew breed here, whilst many other species, such as sandpipers and godwit drop in as they migrate. Dozens of other species of bird make this their home, holiday destination, or stop-over site. At the moment, harvest time, Canada geese are exploiting the riches of the harvest. If they’re not noisily camping out in the wheat field just behind our house, you can be sure they’ll be at Nosterfield.

Great crested grebe.

Oyster catcher.

Heron

Since 1996, the area has been a nature reserve. A group of local naturalists succeeded in buying the site, having formed the Lower Ure Conservation Trust. They manage the site to exploit its already abundant resources. The fluctuating water levels – up to three metres a year variation is not unknown – means that there is everything from muddy shallows to small shallow pools to deeper sheets of water. There’s something for everyone, if you’re a bird who likes water. Or even if you’re a bird such as a wagtail, linnet or twite, who doesn’t.

The site supports a huge variety of wild flowers and grasses. That means there are insects, butterflies such as common blue, brimstone, wall brown and white-letter hairstreaks and moths too. There are rabbits and hares: while voles and shrews are preyed on by kestrels and barn owls. Summer-grazing cattle and sheep assist in managing the landscape: one way or another, this is a success story.

We simply aren’t birders. Not yet. But this reserve is doing much to help change all that. There is a series of well-managed hides, and best of all, a comfortable unstaffed information centre, with piles of illustrated leaflets and books to help us identify what we’ve seen. It’s a serene and beautiful place to spend a quiet couple of hours watching the soap opera of bird life unfold, as they feed, raise young, quarrel, swim and wheel about above. We love visiting at different times of day, and look forward to coming throughout the seasons to see how the local bird population changes. By this time next year, we may be able to identify much of what we see. Maybe.

The Old Grange

As we’ve been four months back in England, it’s perhaps time to introduce our home, which answers to the name of ‘The Old Grange’. I’ve already mentioned that it’s in part of an older building which forms part of a large, mainly Georgian house. To understand how it came to be built, we’ll have to pay a quick visit to UNESCO World Heritage site, Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal, some 5 miles from us as the crow flies.

The nave of the now ruined Fountains Abbey

Back in 1132, there was no Abbey. But there were 13 monks anxious to build one. These particular men had joined holy orders in order to live a simple, strict and holy life, and were dismayed by the lax conditions they found in the Benedictine order they had joined. The Archbishop of York offered them his protection, and the gift of some land near Ripon on the banks of the River Skell. This area now is a fertile place, with pastureland, woods, stone for quarrying, and the waters of the Skell. Back then, it was a hostile, overgrown and thoroughly unpromising environment. The monks joined the Cistercian order which they felt offered the structure and discipline they sought, and strove to emulate the lifestyle promoted by its founder Bernard of Clairvaux. A tough life of manual labour, self-sufficiency, and prayerful spirituality was the order of the day.

A view of Fountains Abbey: Wikimedia Commons

To cut a very long story short – one which I will tell in a future post, because it’s a fascinating one – the Abbey the monks built prospered, to the extent that it became one of the largest, most successful and wealthy monasteries in the whole of Europe. When Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in the 1530s, the buildings and lands belonging to Fountains Abbey sold for over £1,000,000 – unimaginable wealth at the time: the monastery had acquired land over much of Yorkshire and Lancashire. The simple life of those early monks had changed over the years. The monks themselves devoted more of their time to their spiritual life, with prayerful ritual being an important part of their routine. The day-to-day work, mainly with sheep and cattle and all the other work associated with farming, both at Fountains itself and at all the other sites, was done by the so-called ‘lay brothers’. Less educated, they had far fewer spiritual obligations. And they lived communally in ‘granges’.

All those older buildings you’ll see as you travel around this part of the world, which include ‘grange’ as part of their name owe their existence to the fact that once they housed those lay brothers, mainly from Fountains Abbey. The room where we sleep once formed part of the dormitory where the men working at our ‘old grange’ once slept.

In truth, it’s hard to believe. We live in a stone building of traditional design, but with all mod cons. One of the few signs of the building’s age is the huge fireplace on the ground floor which is now simply an alcove, though we gather it wouldn’t take much to reveal the old spit mechanism. We have only one room downstairs. The other spaces, which we have no access to, are now, as then, workspaces and storage areas.

Upstairs, where the bulk of our living space is, was once a single room, as long as the building itself. In Victorian times, the owners of the larger property which had been built onto the original Old Grange in Georgian times, decided to break up the space into a number of rooms, to make it convenient to use as servants’ quarters. And this is where we now live.

We find all this thoroughly exciting. We enjoy noticing other granges as we explore Yorkshire, and we appreciate the connection that we now know we have with Fountains Abbey, a wonderfully beautiful site, whose history has touched the area for so many many miles around.

The Old Grange seen from the walled garden which most certainly was unknown to those lay brothers. — The Old Grange – the top floor dormitory – seen from the walled garden which most certainly was unknown to those lay brothers.

The bells of Saint Wilfrid

Ripon Cathedral: image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Last week, I got the chance to climb the bell tower at Ripon Cathedral. How could I refuse? Hearing the full peal of bells joyously announcing Sunday worship, and at other times too, is one of the privileges of being near Ripon.

It was Wednesday evening. That’s when the team of ringers always meet to practise and learn new changes. I knew bells were rather heavy things, and imagined that tugging on the bell-ropes to make them chime must be a young person’s hobby – preferably a burly, muscular young person. But no. Bell-ringers are young, old, male, female, slim and rangy, tall and chunky, small and wiry. All that’s needed is an enthusiasm for this particularly British pursuit.

It was a fine thing to watch every member of the team as they got each bell going. That did look hard work. Holding the rope high above their heads, each ringer tugged to bring it low down, again and again, till the bell had acquired its own satisfying momentum: till indeed, it was turning so far that the bell reached the top of its 360 degree swing, paused momentarily, and could be controlled. Each bell sounds a different note in the scale, with each ringer sounding his or her bell in harmony with the rest.

There may have been bells in Ripon cathedral since the 13th century. Over the centuries, bells have been replaced or recast. The bell tower itself has been refurbished several times to replace ancient, beetle-infested timbers. By the early 20th century, the cathedral at Ripon acknowledged that its bells were no longer really doing a great job, so in 1932, ten of them were recast by John Taylor and Co. of Loughborough – one of only two bell foundries left in the country. Three more bells were added in 2007/8. At the same time as the main recasting, the bell tower was strengthened with steel and concrete. Since the heaviest bell (and it’s one of a team of 13) weighs in at one and a quarter tons, a good strong and safe bell tower seems essential.

Bell in the belfry, almost fully turned.

It was a wonderful thing to watch the ringers working in rhythmic harmony (pull, pause, pause, pull), but what made the evening even more special was the opportunity to climb the bell tower itself. We had to put on thick ear protectors. Then we climbed the twisting narrow stone stairs, with almost impossibly far-apart treads, to find ourselves on what amounted to a walkway around the majestically swinging, harmoniously clanging quite enormous bells. We felt the tower shudder and sway and assumed it was our own fantasy. No, apparently it really does move with the momentum of all those bells. Despite the ear protectors, our ears felt sore from the auditory assault. Eyes and ears feasted on those bells swinging, sounding and reverberating.

Reluctantly, we ventured down the stairway once more. The ringers were well into their rhythm now, guided by the somewhat arcane instructions of their leader, which meant absolutely nothing to us. But I can see the attraction of being part of such a well structured and purposeful team, using skills that have changed little over the centuries. I can understand why they like occasionally to give themselves challenges such as ringing a full three-hour peal, why they welcome visiting bell-ringers, why they enjoy the chance themselves to ring different bells in different churches. And why, apparently, at the end of a hard-working practice, they like nothing more than to get down to the local pub and sink a well-earned pint.

Thanks, North Stainley Women’s Institute, for organising this visit, and to the bellringers of the cathedral for allowing us a glimpse of their Wednesday evening practice.

The Crackpot Trail

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If you drive through Kirkby Malzeard and take signs to Dallowgill, you’ll find yourself leaving rolling green Nidderdale countryside for a more open and bleaker moorland landscape. There’s a place called Tom Corner where you can park, and that’s where you can start the Crackpot Trail.

The Crackpot Trail? Well, back in 1996, Rural Arts worked with a group of villagers in Kirkby Malzeard to devise and make a series of 22 mosaic plaques to distribute over the route of this circular walk. They chose subjects to celebrate what the walker might see en route: animals, birds and flowers such as sheep, curlews, fungi: local features such as the Potato House, where potatoes used to be stored: and there right at the beginning of the walk, a Roman centurion, to commemorate the fact that many years ago, Roman bones were excavated at this rather wild and windy spot.

It’s a wonderful walk to see the varied landscape of this part of the Dales. From the moorland, where at this time of year heather is just beginning to burst into bloom….

…. the path takes you back to gentler, farmed countryside, with views of stone-built farms and hamlets across the hillsides.

You’ll cross peaty streams…….

….. and walk though ancient oak woods which at the right time of year are carpeted in bluebells. There’s a bit of everything, even a lunch spot about half way round, at a former pub, the Drover’s Arms, which sadly burnt down in 2013. But the fire didn’t get the picnic tables: they’re still there for you to sit and eat your sandwiches.

Our drama for the day. This poor sheep was well and truly trapped. Somehow, we extricated her..... — Our drama for the day. This poor sheep was well and truly trapped. Somehow, we extricated her…..

....while her companions looked on. — ….while her companions looked on.

A perfect, easy and enjoyable day, because this varied, pretty and scenic walk is a mere six and a half miles. You’ll be home in time for tea.

That's Ripon over there. We've just finished our walk, and it's about to rain. — That’s Ripon over there. We’ve just finished our walk, and it’s about to rain.

A midsummer night’s play

It was 4.30. We were not pleased. The rain – no, the downpour – had started, and was battering at the windows. That evening we had tickets for an outdoor performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at nearby Ripley Castle. The idea was to get there early, with all the rest of the audience, picnic in the grounds of the castle and then stroll from scene to scene in the woodlands as the play’s plot unfolded and night descended. By 5.00 this seemed an unlikely possibility.

On the net, we found a single forecast that suggested the rain might blow away, leaving a clear evening. We decided to believe it.

We passed one of the 'sets' on the way in. — We passed one of the ‘sets’ on the way in.

By 6.30, we’d got to Ripley, joined our friends, and the sun was shining. By 7.00, the sun was still shining, our picnic was spread out, and the lawns were crowded with a waiting public enjoying an early supper. And at 7.30, costumed figures started to roam the grounds, some beating noisy rhythms on a whole variety of instruments.

Our picnic 10/10 for flavour. Nul points for presentation.

The audience enjoys its picnic.

Oyez! The play’s about to start….

What an evening. This Midsummer Night’s Dream sets the standard by which I’ll judge all others. We spent the evening eavesdropping on the fairies who inhabited the woods we wandered through, watching enraptured as they manipulated the lives of the four lovers – or would-be lovers – Hermia, Lysander, Helena and Demetrius, involving as they did so Bottom, one of a company of ‘rude mechanicals’ – tradesmen – who are rehearsing a play which they hope to perform at the wedding of yet another noble pair, Theseus and Hippolyta.

I can’t now imagine the play in any other setting. The woods provide an eerie, threatening backdrop for lovers fleeing from planned marriages they don’t want, or would-be lovers they don’t love. The ancient and characterful trees of the forest are, on the other hand, also home to the King and Queen of the fairies, Oberon and Titania, and their ‘knavish sprite’ Puck. Here, disappearing into the hiding places the forest provides, hanging from branches, concealed by leaves, Oberon and Puck watch their plot unfold with all its unintended consequences, as pools of coloured light illuminate their very own version of fairyland .

One of the sets, as night falls and we all set off home.

Surrounded by so much space, the characters can give true vent to their feelings. Brawling Helena and Hermia scratch and claw, get grass in their hair and mud on their dresses, whilst the men pursue each other wielding sticks and branches, tumbling in leaves and soil. The ‘rude mechanicals’ are in danger of stealing the show as they rehearse in the forest, particularly the arch-clown Bottom. Puck though, is the real fairy. She truly makes the woods her home, cackling from high branches, drumming wildly on a succession of instruments which even include tin plant pots and a bath, energetically making gleeful mischief wherever she lands.

And we, the audience, are cheerfully cajoled from place to place, lugging our blankets and picnic chairs, lured by the frenetically drumming, calling and singing company : from fine lawns in a walled garden fit for nobility, to welcoming woodland glades, to threatening forest – onwards, onwards, see the plot unfold!

I’m only sorry not to have seen one of these wonderful Sprite productions before. Every year they take over Ripley Castle grounds for several weeks to offer us their production of a Shakespeare play. Rarely has the Bard seemed so accessible, so rumbustuous, so much fun. And after this year, the company’s taking a year out, to re-group and consider the always knotty problem of funding. Please, Sprite, let it only be a year. We’ve only just found you.

Understandably, photography wasn’t permitted during the show. These then, are a few ‘before’ and ‘after’ shots.

Ey up le Tour

North Lees, the hamlet after North Stainley, welcomes the Tour.

The final post about le Tour de France. I promise. Because it’s actually over, as far as Yorkshire’s concerned. And as far as poor old Mark Cavendish is concerned too.

But Saturday was all about Stage One of the Tour. Up early, I dashed over to the next village, West Tanfield, to buy a paper before the road closed for the day. Six mini buses were disgorging security guards who immediately took up positions round the streets. What could be going on? Later, I found out. ‘Wills and Kate’ ( the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to you, please), due to open the Tour at Harewood House between Leeds and Harrogate, were to be helicoptered into West Tanfield at 1.00 o’clock. Later still, we discovered that my friend Penny was among those who had been presented to the Royal couple – and to Prince Harry too – since her husband’s Chair of the Parish Council there.

West Tanfield would have been a good place to be for other reasons. The riders swoop down a hill into the village and make a sharp turn over a narrow stone bridge before the long straight run into North Stainley. So there were vans from radio stations, cranes ready to hoist TV cameras aloft, and would-be spectators galore, already taking their places at prime spots and keeping the local pub and shop busy.

The busy streets of West Tanfield, 8.00 a.m. , Tour Stage One.

But we’d decided to stay put. Daughter and family had come over from Bolton and we decided that we should profit from the fact that the Tour actually passed the end of the drive. We sauntered down to the village to the stalls on the cricket pitch, and watched a little of the early action on the big screen in the village hall. Back home, we spent a happy quarter of an hour chalking ‘Ey up, Laroque’ on the road to greet all our friends in France when the TV cameras passed over. It worked, as my camera shot of the TV screen proves. But it only lasted a second and nobody but us saw it. Ah well.

If you'd watched the TV attentively, you'd have seen our greeting. — If you’d watched the TV attentively, you’d have seen our greeting.

What we saw though were billboard adverts that appeared for the duration all along the roadside for companies that don’t exist in England – PMU, Carrefour – and which had already disappeared an hour after the racers had passed through.

Ellie, Phil, Ben and Alex welcome the publicity caravan.

Then, finally …. tour officials in their Skodas…. British police on motorbikes….. French gendarmes on motorbikes….. support vehicles… and the publicity caravan. It wasn’t as extensive as it had been in France, but there WERE vehicles advertising French companies we don’t have in the UK, as well as British ones too. The total haul of freebies my grandchildren had thrown towards them consisted of two Skoda sunhats and a key ring. And then …….. the riders. Amazingly, after five hours up hill and down dale they were still riding in a solid phalanx, whirring towards us as a purposeful army. And then…. they were gone. Team vehicles loaded up with spare bikes aloft, more police and ambulance support followed…. and it was over. For us. Time to switch on the television and follow the action into Harrogate.

My shockingly bad - and only - photo of the riders passing our gate. — My shockingly bad – and only – photo of the riders passing our gate.

Disappointingly, my crop of Tour photos is exceptionally poor. So I’ll focus on a final look at North Stainley, which took the Tour to its heart, and delivered a very special homage to France and the Tour de France.