West Highlands, 2022 – 7

Tags

Ben Nevis, birching, Bonnie Prince Charlie, C Tarrant, Charles Edward Stuart, Chris Collingwood, commandoes, Comyn, Devil's toenails, Drambuie, Fort William, Glenfinnan monument, Golden eagle, gryphea, Highland Soap Company, Inverlochy Castle, Jacobite rebellion, Loch Lomond, Lord Lovat, Model T, Queen Elizabeth II, Scotch argus, Secret Portrait, silk map, Spanish Armada, Spean Bridge, WEst Highland Museum, Westminster Hall

Saturday, 17th September. My day in Fort William. Jon and Angela dropped both their guests at the railway/bus station, David for his bus to Inverness Airport, me to walk the short distance to the pedestrianised High Street, where my very modest hotel – about which no more will be said – was to be found. It was too early to check in, but I was able to leave my luggage there.

I had thought to take a boat trip on Loch Linnhe, but the facts that: it was once more pretty chilly; that I had done two boat trips in the previous few days; and that I was unlikely to see much wildlife without expert eyes, decided me not to. I wandered up and down the High Street, and first called in at WH Smith to buy a little replacement notebook for my next wildlife /photographic outing. I was delighted also to find a regional map covering the area we had been ranging. I had been trying to make sense from a map at Glenloy Lodge where we had been, but had succeeded only in the broadest of detail. Much of the location detail I have given in the last six blogs has been thanks to that map. I had been noting names, but had often not been really sure of where we were. It has all made sense since with the aid of that map (of which there is a photo of part in the first of this series of posts).

I could not step far enough back to include the entirety of the two churches in this view at the southern end of the High Street. Had I corrected the ‘torsion’, both spire and tower would have disappeared!

I also called in at Mountain Warehouse to buy some inner liner gloves, so useful not only for added warmth, but for taking photos with frozen fingers, when warmer gloves do not permit enough sensitivity. (I had had to do some emergency and very bad darning in the ones I had bought with me, now binned.) I also came away with a ‘folding sit mat’, to the existence of which Jon had introduced me.

I had had a recommendation for a vegan café from Angela, but having had a coffee and a pastry at another café, I had no need of lunch, and sadly the vegan one would not be open in the evening.

The Geopark information centre was shut, but this exhibit in its window was interesting. To me anyway.

I walked up and down the High Street, and didn’t fail to call in at the shop I had been told about, opposite my hotel, where I was able to by some of that bottled bog myrtle scent I had coveted on Thursday. The Highland Soap Company believes it is the only enterprise to make bog myrtle products and I came away with two large bars of soap. (It does other scents as well.)

Fort William High Street is mainly lined with shops selling outdoor activity and Highland tourist souvenir goods, some cafes, and not much else. But it does have the West Highland Museum, which Angela had very firmly recommended me to visit. And indeed it was excellent, and pulled together so much of what I had seen during the week.

This bronze statue outside the museum amused, but also intrigued, me. I wonder how many have had their photo taken sitting beside the driver.

The rest of this post consists almost entirely of photos I took there.

The first room was about those commandoes who had trained in the Spean Bridge area, and whose commemorative monument we had seen on the Sunday.

Silk map issued to help potential escapees find their way to safety

Room 2 was called ‘Local history’.

Inverlochy Castle, built in 1280 by the Comyn clan, a link with Monday’s outing. Can still be visited. Next time…

Birching table. The last such punishment was carried out in 1948.

Signed C Tarrant, 1735

Room 3 was natural history, geology, and a film about Ben Nevis’s creation.

Gryphea, examples of those ‘Devil’s toenails’ I had failed to photograph on Tuesday.

Golden eagle, and other birds for scale

That is, 400 million years ago

Friday’s near elusive Scotch argus

Room 8 (don’t ask) included military history.

The Spanish Armada ‘found an echo here in the Highlands’. This is some treasure from it.

The Glenfinnan Monument, commemorating the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion, which we had seen on Wednesday at the end of our trip on Loch Shiel.

I was delighted to see an old map of the area between Lochs Arkaig, Eil and Lochy, with Glen Loy not far off the centre. This is part of that map. I reckon that Glenloy Lodge (build circa 1930!) was within the area marked ‘Strone’.

Room 4 was small and contained exhibits on archaeology and mountaineering. Room 5 was also very small and had some Victorian costume in it.

Room 6 was a separate room which required payment of a small fee to see. (The rest of the museum was free.) I was happy to pay the extra to see a small exhibition devoted to the Jacobite rebellion, when Prince Charles Edward Stuart, ‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’ and grandson of James II (and VII of Scotland) sought to claim the throne of Great Britain which he believed was rightfully his.

Simon Lord Lovat was one of the rebels, having previously been a supporter of the House of Hanover. He was tried in the 11th-13th century Westminster Hall, and condemned to death.

My own thoughts, on that Saturday, two days before her funeral, were of our late monarch currently lying in state in that very hall, which had seen so much history, (and where in January 1965 Winston Churchill had laid similarly, the last to do so, and when I had had the privilege of paying my respects.)

‘The Raising of the Standard at Glenfinnan’, by Chris Collingwood,1997/8, commissioned by the Drambuie Liqueur Company

‘This simplified family tree should help you untangle the various relationships between the various monarchs.’ Indeed. In order: James I (and VI of Scotland), Charles I, Charles II, James II (and VII of Scotland), William of Orange and Mary II (who themselves were cousins), Anne, and George I.

Bonnie Prince Charlie, Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the man who would be King … Charles III.

This was fascinating. A shiny cylinder, and some blobby paint around it, turns into a secret portrait if you look at the cylinder from a certain angle.

The best I could do through glass

Room 7 was Highland life.

Finally, there was a film which explained the bronze statue of the Ford Model T car outside. In 1911, such a car had been driven to the top of Ben Nevis and down again. The descent had been filmed, and here were extracts.

In the snow

Immediately outside was a cinema with a substantial, waiter serviced, café. I had a hazelnut-flavoured coffee, and then went just back over the road to my hôtel, from where I emerged a few hours later to have a pizza in that same café, which projected old black and white films onto the wall, including a full one about that Model T’s descent from the top of Ben Nevis.

A civilized rising time the next day, a gentle wander to the bus station (and a sandwich bought in the Morrison’s there) and a splendid bus journey back down Glencoe, Rannoch Moor and Loch Lomond to Glasgow Airport. Again, I did not listen to the podcasts I had to hand, and just revelled in the scenery for three hours. With no sun, there were fewer reflections, and I was able to grab these photos of the Loch.

Even if Jon and Angela will no longer be in business, I am already daydreaming plans for a return visit to the area, perhaps next year…

West Highlands, 2022 – 3

Tags

Ben Nevis, Caledonian MacBrayne, Corran ferry, Devil's toenails, Gleann Gael, grey seal, gryphea, Isle of Mull, Kingairloch, Loch Aline, Loch Linnhe, Loch Uisge, Lochaline, Lochaline Mine, Morvern, otter, pine marten, red deer, red-breasted merganser, sika deer, Sound of Mull, stonechat, whinchat

Tuesday, 13th September. Today, having passed through Fort William, we went down the eastern side of Loch Linnhe (pronounced ‘Linnie’) to its narrows, where we crossed the loch by the Corran ferry, enjoying the view of the lighthouse on the other side.

After the narrows the sea loch is much wider. We followed it southwards.

Looking back

Looking forward

Red-breasted merganser

Common seal ‘banana-ing’

Distant red deer

At one stop along the loch I was pleased to have my 2007 Open University geology revised. I had never realised that Ben Nevis was an extinct volcano.

We left the Linnhe at one point to visit a small lochan (that’s tautologous) with a very long name in Gallic.

Whinchat and stonechat by the lochan

Back beside the Linnhe, I was delighted to see a seal come in to cavort in the rocks and weed. It was some way away, and rather difficult to photograph, but these are my two best pictures.

Our packed lunch was taken at Kingairloch,

from where we made our way inland on the Morvern peninsula to Lochaline, on the Sound of Mull. We had on the way passed Loch Whisky and Gleann Gael. [Linguistic note!: I wrote ‘Whisky’ in my notebook, because that’s what I thought I was being was told, being assured that it was its real name, and that ‘whisky’ means ‘water’ in Gallic. I was being teased to a certain extent. On the map I find it is spelt ‘Loch Uisge’. And ‘uisge’ does indeed mean water, ‘uisge beatha’, the water of life, being the Gallic for ‘whisky’.]

Distant sika deer, and sheep

Isle of Mull behind the ferry

We walked away from the Sound, and made our way a short distance along Loch Aline off it, past a fascinating sand mine and its works.

There was some waste sand lying around. On picking it up we could see and feel just how very white, fine and soft it was, quite unlike any I had encountered on a beach.

I would love to have had a visit round the works, not to mention the mine itself!

David and Jon (hidden behind his telescope), look at the storage

Conveyor belts

Sand just about to be dumped onto a conveyor belt

We walked on.

Tern of some sort being photobombed from the front by a young gull

I then got absorbed into the next activity and totally forgot to take any photos of it. There were literally hundreds of ‘devil’s toenails’ on the beach. David collected several. Devil’s toenails are fossils of bivalves, gryphea, about two inches, 5 centimetres, long. And here’s a (copyright-free) picture of one found on the internet..

Time to go home the way we came.

This evening a pine marten visited even before our meal, so it was possible to get some semi-daylight pictures through the glass.

Clearly not worried by us, as long as we stayed we we were. We could even move around.

West Highlands, 2022 – 1

Tags

Battle of Mulroy, butterwort, campanula, Commando Memorial, dipper, Eas Chia-aig Falls, Glen Roy, Glencoe, Glenloy, Gloucester old spot, grass of Parnassus, Jacobite, Loch Arkaig, Loch Linnhe, lungwort, map fungus, osprey, Parallel Roads, pine marten, River Turret, Round-leaved sundew, sedge fly, shieling, sika deer, Spean Bridge, stonechat, wagtail, waxcap fungus, wood tiger caterpillar, yellow saxifrage

Saturday, 10th to Sunday, 18th September. I stayed at Glenloy Lodge, our accommodation hosts, Jon and Angela, being our wildlife hosts also. Sadly, they are giving up at the end of the year.

In this map, the Isle of Skye is top left, that of Mull bottom left, Loch Ness top right, and Fort William somewhat to the right of the middle, at the head of the narrower part of Loch Linnhe. Glenloy is just a few miles due north of Fort William. Marked up are all the places we visited in the 556 miles we did in the week, except that we went a little off the map beyond Loch Ness once. Clicking/tapping on the map may enlarge it.

I had, reluctantly but due to several uncertainties about rail travel (and reckoning that I couldn’t actually prevent the plane from flying, whereas I could prevent my car from burning up fuel), flown to Glasgow from Bristol, and then taken a scheduled bus service from the city to Fort William. I had planned to listen to a number of podcasts I had downloaded during that last, three-hour, part of the journey, but in the event was so taken by the beautiful scenery that I just looked out of the window all the time. It was very sunny, and I didn’t think I would be able to take any useful photos because of reflections. But, frustrated all along Loch Lomond, I couldn’t resist any longer, and grabbed my phone to take a few of Glencoe. This is the most successful.

Those geography lessons about glacial U-shaped valleys kept coming to mind.

Jon met me at the bus station, and told me that there was just one other guest, David. It was not long before we had our meal, after which was the evening ritual of looking out, from the comfort of the sun lounge, for the pine martens who came to enjoy the peanuts and peanut-buttered bread put out for them. So strokeable – though perhaps not with those teeth. As long as we stayed indoors they were not fazed by our presence.

Before breakfast on Sunday, we were summoned to see what, if anything, had been attracted to the moth trap overnight. The answer was no moth, but a couple of sedge flies.

Each day, once we had set off at about 9.30, we were out until 6.00. This day, led by Jon, our first stop was in Glen Roy, famed among other things for its ‘Parallel Roads‘, mythically caused by giants racing in competition along the hillsides, but in fact caused by the shorelines of a retreating lake, which finally disappeared when a glacier blocking it melted.

We were meant to be looking for wildlife, but this is the first creature that caught my eye.

Gloucester Old Spot

These sika deer were a very long way away. I could not see them with the naked eye.

Young stonechat, waxcap fungus, grass of Parnassus (shame I took only this out-of-focus photo), yellow saxifrage

The Parallel Roads can be seen here.

These black-faced sheep distracted me. We saw hundreds of them every day.

Here the Parallel Roads can be seen, along with another geological feature, the river terraces of loose deposits left behind as the River Roy retreated. The little houses are shielings, summer accommodation once used by those tending animals, and their families.

The River Turret flows into Glen Roy. You need to cross this very attractive bridge to continue up the latter.

Two carnivorous plants, round-leaved sundew and butterwort

Campanula and friend

Somewhere in here is a dragonfly

Looking back down Glen Roy

The shieling children did not escape schooling in the summer. This is where they went for it.

Wood tiger moth caterpillar

We turned back a way. Views up and down the glen from our lunch spot.

Before leaving the glen entirely, and having seen a couple of exciting golden eagles, impossible to photograph, we saw two old monuments, and at Spean Bridge a modern one.

Said locally to be a communion table used by the Roman Catholic populations after the Jacobite rebellions. Communion cup carved much more recently.

Info on the Battle of Mulroy here.

This memorial to the Commandos, who trained in this area, was inaugurated by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother in 1952. I was to learn much more of this later in the week.

We moved on via the Mucomir Power Station on the River Lochy (which afforded no interesting photos) to the Eas Chia-aig Falls, where the the lower pool is known as the Witches’ Cauldron.

Near there we saw some map fungus and some lungwort.

On to Loch Arkaig, where we took a short walk. The light was not good, and we just made it back to the car in time before it started raining.

Wagtails of various kinds

Very distant adult and juvenile dippers

Osprey. It really does have a head.

The evening’s pine marten

I am very conscious that one of the readers of this blog used to live right by Glen Roy. He will no doubt be correcting any errors I have made!

Focus on Street

Tags

alderfly, Bear Inn Street, Blue lias, buttercups, C & J Clark, Clyce Hole, comfrey, Cow Bridge, Crispin Centre, Hay harvesting, Horse and cart, icthyosaur, Jonathan Minshull, Laura Wolfers, Liz Leyshon, Mendip District Council, oil seed rape, peat extraction, Poldens, quarrying, River Brue, robin, shoemaking, Somerset Council, Somerset County Council, Street, Street Parish Council

Street village, that is. (It prides itself on being a village, despite being bigger than the town of Glastonbury to its north, on the other side of the River Brue.)

On Saturday (14th May) I was invited by my friend Liz, Somerset County and Mendip District Councillor, who lives in Street, to the unveiling of some murals in the Library Gardens, a small green space on Street’s High Street. (How did Street get its name? “The place-name ‘Street’ is first attested in Anglo-Saxon charters from 725 and 971, where it appears as Stret. It appears as Strete juxta Glastone in a charter from 1330 formerly in the British Museum. The word is the Old English straet meaning ‘Roman road’.”) The Wikipedia article on Street, while needing a bit of an update, has a lot of interesting background information.

The murals were commissioned by Street Parish Council, working in partnership with Mendip District Council (to merge, in a year’s time, along with Somerset’s three other district councils, and with Somerset County Council, to become a new unitary authority called Somerset Council) and Street Library Trust. They were painted by local artist Jonathan Minshull.

When Laura Wolfers, Chair of Street Parish Council, reached out to shake my hand, I realised that this was the first time I had shaken anyone’s hand since February 2020. Whereas in March of that year, I had declined to do so several times, with explanation, it would now have been very awkward to do so, although I am still being very cautious. And I have to admit, it felt good, alongside feelings of worried hesitancy. She didn’t seem to take it amiss when I then took a photograph of her chest, in order to capture Street’s ichthyosaur emblem (since 1894) at the base of her Chairman’s chain. (A parish council does not have a mayor.)

Here she is introducing the artist.

Among the many people taking photographs was her son.

And here are the murals. The captions are as provided in a handout.

“This panel represents the shoemaking process during Edwardian times inside the old C & J Clark’s factory buildings in Street, around 1900-1910.”

“This scene shows summer hay harvesting in the meadows to the south of the Clark’s factory buildings in Street in Victorian times around1860-1880.”

“The image shows the discovery of the ichthyosaur fossil specimens at one of the Street ‘blue lias’ limestone quarries in the 1850s. Here some discoveries have been dragged to near the quarry entrance ready for transportation to the recently started Clark’s collection and a lady from the village has brought her daughter to see the fascinating finds.”

Liz unveiled the fourth:

“This panorama shows the manual process of peat extraction from the levels around Street at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, before mechanisation. The peat was cut into blocks calles ‘”mumps” or “turves” and stacked to dry in tower-like formations called “ruckles”, before transportation by horse and cart.”

There were some very short speeches, including by the artist.

While thanking friends and relatives for posing as the figures in the pictures, he said it was as well that one such, who appeared in each mural, was not there, as he was rather naughty. He was referring to his dog, Stanley.

Liz, who had been very much involved in finding the finance, also was invited to speak.

[Later edit: 33-minute background video on the making, hanging and unveiling of the murals here.]

People hung around chatting to each other, as they do on these occasions, enjoying the lovely sunshine. Then five of us went for coffee and cake in the Crispin Centre’s café.

Liz had collected me from my home in Glastonbury, and volunteered to take me back, but I had already decided that I was going to walk, following the River Brue for much of the way. I had to go along the pavement of a main road for about ten minutes.

Part of Clark’s 19th century building, also seen in the second mural. It is flying the Somerset flag.

Like so many buildings in Street, and wider in Somerset, the Bear Inn is built in Blue Lias limestone.

After a short while, I was able to see my destination, by looking to my right.

Still on the road, and having crossed this rhyne, I had thought possibly to cut diagonally across to the Brue, but an electric fence redirected me.

But in due course I was able to reach the river. What a pleasure to walk among all those buttercups!

I reached the river.

Not buttercups here, but oil seed rape,

and comfrey

Many specimens of these creatures had been flying around for a while, and after extensive research, I think they are probably alderflies, of which I had never previously heard. They fly for just a few weeks each year.

Clyce Hole (or Clyse Hole, depending on which Environment Agency panel you read), a water level measuring station

The River Brue was severely canalised, and indeed its channel to the sea redirected, in mediaeval times, and it shows from here on.

This little fella flew on to the branch, and just stayed there while I cautiously moved past him.

Being south of the Brue, I was still in Street, and this was my view southwards, with the lowest range of hills in Somerset, the Poldens, in the distance.

Not the most exciting bridge, Cow Bridge, circa 1930, of reinforced concrete with stone piers. Could one claim that it is art deco?

Anyway, it was time for me to cross and leave the Brue, and continue on to a rather busy main road. But I leant on the parapet contemplating upstream for a bit,

along with my neighbour, Terry, who I had just bumped into here. He was just out to take photos of buttercups.

Together we watched a rather unusual sight go by, after which I set off for the last, and easily the least interesting, leg of my walk.

They and I were rather a nuisance to the quite heavy traffic in each direction… no pavement…

After five minutes more I came to my turning off the main road. Taking the stile would have enabled me to continue on grass for about 100 yards/90 metres or so, but

I took advantage of a recently installed (local elections anyone?) barrier, the forerunner of a cycle lane to be created, in place of an unofficial traveller encampment.

Door to door it had been an hour, which would have been more like 45 minutes had I not stopped for various reasons on the way. A very pleasant walk indeed, in ideal weather, following a happy occasion for Street residents and visitors.

Uphill, December 2021

Tags

Bleadon Levels, Brean Down, Brownie 127, electricity pylon, Flat Holm, Limekiln, Powder house, saltmarsh, Severn, Steep Holm, T-pylon, teal, tidal gate, Uphill, Uphill Hill, Walborough, Weston-super-Mare

First Friday of the month, so it was time for my next walk with Zoe, and her turn to organise. She chose the nature reserves and environs of Uphill, which is just south along the coast from Weston-super-Mare. For uninteresting reasons my camera was hors de combat for most of the time, so these photos were taken on my phone, with one exception. Despite apparently threatening skies, the weather was kind to us, not too cold, not too windy, and the sun even came out for a short while.

From where we had parked our cars, we set off across a not very interesting golf course, and arrived at the beach. Despite my September holiday in Cornwall, I couldn’t actually remember the last time I had been on one, (though in fact I had crossed one at Marazion, as I walked back from St Michael’s Mount). We looked north to Weston.

We looked out to see the sea. Which we couldn’t, but saw Brean Down, Steep Holm, (owned by the Kenneth Allsop Memorial Trust) and, faintly in the mist, Flat Holm (which I’ve just learned is part of Wales, and managed by Cardiff Council).

The sign says DANGER, SINKING MUD. Many a life has been imperilled along this coast by those ignoring the warning.

And we looked, and then walked, south.

At about the level of Brean Down we left the beach but continued parallel to the sea.

You’d think that the mound ahead gave the area its name, but “The manor is recorded in Domesday Book as Opopille which derives from the Old English Uppan Pylle meaning “above the creek”.^[13] The Pill is a tidal creek which joins the River Axe near where the river flows into Weston Bay to the north of Brean Down. The Pill is connected to the Great Uphill Rhyne which drains the moors to the east of the village.” (Wikipedia)

Whatever it is called, there is somewhat less of the hill left now. The sun came out as we reached the old quarry…

… and the old limekiln. The panel explains that this was a particularly fine example of the species, which were mainly built between 1780 and 1850, and that at the time lime was used for liming acid soils, as a basis of mortar, and for whitewash.

The nineteenth century powder house was considerably further on. Its explanatory panel told us that explosive stores were usually situated well away from quarries, in case of explosions caused by sparks or other sources of flame there.

At one point I looked back over my right shoulder to see Brean Down, now well behind us.

Ahead the sun was low and bright, almost too much for the eyes, as it reflected off the briefly tarmac-ed path. I mused on the fact that you would never have taken a photo straight into the sun at the time of my grandmother’s Brownie 127.

In the course of our relatively short walk we found ourselves on at least three different nature reserves: Uphill Hill, Walborough and Bleadon Levels. At this last, we turned right in the direction of the sea, for a hundred yards – or metres – or so. Had we continued south at that point we would have taken this path.

It would have been foolhardy to attempt to cross the saltmarsh to get nearer the sea.

We started northward again toward Brean Down.

Taking great care to avoid puddles – specially as I had forgotten to put my wellies in the car – it was nevertheless possible to raise one’s eyes to look inland from time to time, and to see Uphill Hill, the quarry, the Old Church of St Nicholas, and a beacon lit for various national celebrations. It is what remains of an old windmill, and probably 18th century, says Wikipedia.

Ahead lay the dock area which we had passed on the way out.

I obliged my camera into action to zoom in on these very small ducks which flew into our view. They are teal.

Beside us in due course appeared the creek (right to left) used, when the tide is in, by boats wishing to leave the dock. That silty mud, swept down the River Severn from the Welsh mountains, is why walking on some parts of the beaches in the area is so dangerous.

This sliding wall of concrete beyond the dock is explained …

… by its label.

We stopped at a café by the docks for a coffee, and in my case a custard tart as well.

It was a 15-minute walk back to our cars through the village, during which this pretty bridge from road to a private garden caught my eye.

On my drive home across the Somerset Moors (Levels), trying in vain to avoid a long detour caused by a road closure, I noticed first an enormous erect pillar, with further bits bits lying on the ground by it, which I assumed was to end up as a new wind turbine – nice and blowy I thought in that vast open space. I couldn’t stop to take a photo, but as I went along I saw more of them, more elaborated, and it became clear that, while they were indeed to do with the generation of electricity, they were not some new design for producing power by centrifuge, (I’ll patent that I think), but a new model of electricity pylon.

In due course I was able to stop for a photo.

More information, by the National Grid, about these new T-shaped pylons can be found here, including a two-minute video of one being erected. It shows how monstrous they are in size – though they are apparently a third less tall than the traditionally lattice shaped pylons. They will carry electricity produced at Hinkley Point C Nuclear Power Station.

Cornwall 3 – 8. Truro Museum

Tags

beam engine, blister copper, Chalcedony, copper mining, Cornish language, Cornwall gold, directors' vehicle, Dolly Pentreath, fluorite, Fool's gold, Frank Brangwyn, goethite, iron pyrite, Philip Rashleigh, Roy Billingham, Royal Cornwall Museum Truro, Tetrahedrite, tin mining, Tony Foster, Trewinnard coach, Truro Museum, Vicar and Moses

Wednesday 8th September was one of my ‘un-pre-planned’ days, but my wishlist was long. High up it was the geology section of the Royal Cornwall Museum in Truro.  My knees, unaccustomed to so much strenuous walking over the previous few days, and which had much disturbed my sleep the night before, pushed it even further up. The weather forecast for the day cemented its new position.

St Michael’s Mount was nowhere to be seen as I drove along Penzance’s Western Promenade in the morning. Rain and/or heavy mist accompanied me to Truro, (as did much very slow traffic in the city itself). I was pleased that it was only a few minutes’ walk from the car park, (found courtesy of satnav), to the Museum. The main hall:

set out Cornwall’s history, and the very impressive and beautiful geology collection was in the first room off to the left.

But first there was a showcase of Cornwall gold.

Middle/Late Bronze Age arm ring

Gold lanula, Beaker period (2000-2300 BC)

Water-worn nugget, largest ever found in Cornwall, 1808. It’s about 5cm/2 in long.

I  have no idea how many of the world’s minerals were represented there. I  just enjoyed the visual feast. For real scholars it must be a treasure chest.

As you enter the room, there are firstly some paintings on the wall to your left. I found this one particularly striking.

Roy Billingham, ‘Wheal Maid, the Majesty of the Morn brings with it Hope.’ The painting was made in response to local grief as the falling price of tin made mining it unviable.

The title of this display cabinet is ‘Rocks and Minerals of the Lizard Peninsula’.

Vince had explained at the Levant Mine on Sunday how minerals separated out in a lode. This diagram shows how the various grades of copper settle out.

Tin smelting

Miners’ tools

I took dozens of photos. Here are just a few. (I have no specialist knowledge. When I did my Open University module on geology in 2007/8 it was the macro stuff that interested me most, and in any case, in one basic module, you don’t get much detail on individual minerals.)

Hopefully detail on labels can be seen by clicking, then clicking again, on photos.

(‘Fool’s gold’)

The museum also commemorated individual mineral collectors.

Chalcedony – theological associations?

This photo does not give fully replicate the rich purple colour of the ‘Blue’ John.

Blister copper, ‘partly purified copper with a blistered surface formed during smelting‘

Finally in this room there were models of a beam engine.

Moving on round the main hall:

I ‘did’ the rest of the Museum, with lesser or greater intensity,

Earliest surviving passenger rail vehicle in the world, dating from about 1810. It was used to transport the directors of the Poldrice to Portreath (horse-drawn) railway in Cornwall.

Trewinnard coach, c. 1700. An ‘obvious statement of wealth’ which took 15% of one family’s household expenses.

Not all the exhibits came from Cornwall.

‘Vicar and Moses [the clerk]’, Staffordshire, c 1760.

So Dolly Pentreath (see post on St Michael’s Mount) did not speak only Cornish…

I went upstairs.

and walked round a room whose theme I could not diagnose, but where I much enjoyed this painting,

‘Work’ by Frank Brangwyn, 1867-1956

and this piece of pottery, about which I have no details.

In a separate room was a temporary (to 24th December) exhibition called ‘Fragile Earth: Watercolour journeys into wild places’, featuring the paintings of Cornish painter, Tony Foster. He travels the world and comes back not just with paintings he has made, but mementoes of each location which he incorporates in each work. A little map,

samples of vegetation,

a twig,

models of what is harming the relevant environment,

or paintings of leaves and seeds.

The last wall of the museum downstairs marked more recent times, the 19th and 20th centuries.

A resined felt hat, such as shown us by Vince on Sunday.

So that was Wednesday morning.

Cornwall 3 – 3. Levant Tin Mine and Beam Engine

Tags

Bal maiden, Beaker people, Geevor mine, Levant Beam engine, Levant mine, Miners' dry, National Trust, South-west Coast path

The National Trust tour I had pre-booked for the Sunday afternoon of my Cornwall holiday was of the Levant Mine and Beam Engine, in the St Just area on the north coast of the Penwith peninsula. As requested by the Trust, because of the earlier start of the Tour of Britain, I had allowed plenty of time to get there, and, also at their request, parked not at the Mine itself but a 20-minute walk away at Geevor mine, open to the public, but not NT property.

It was a very grey day, with rain threatening all the time.

As I had thought, the Tour of Britain had no impact on access, having passed surely three hours previously – but thank you, National Trust, for having alerted me to it! I had therefore, even allowing for the walk to Levant, some 30 minutes in hand, so I wandered around the desolate landscape for some while.

I was surprised to see how little nature had taken over from the abandoned terrain, but later learned that Geevor had only closed in 1991.

My first, but not last, sight of the South West Coast Path, here going north-east. But I had to go south-west and make my way to the Levant Mine.

The name of this valley is Trewellard Bottoms.

Arsenic processing buildings

L to R: Compressor house chimney, Stamps chimney and Arsenic chimney

Vince was our volunteer guide, a geology teacher of both aspiring mining engineers and of A level students. (In reply to a question from me, he said that the future’s in lithium, indium and gallium apparently, although the first two are running out, especially indium, essential for our touch screens to work, and that will be all mined out by 2030.) From his style, I would guess that Vince is an excellent and passionate teacher.

He gave us full and fascinating explanations, and was also a mine (sorry) of historical anecdotes. I was very conscious that I would manage to hang on to very little of what he said, which is perhaps fortunate, since this post would be very long if so. But I do recall that he said that mining in this area had started some 4500 years ago. Beaker people from Switzerland had brought the skills here, but it was not known how they had acquired those skills. Here is a full account of mining in Cornwall and Devon.

The only piece of 20th century equipment in the mine, which closed in 1930.

So much more protective than a modern geologist’s plastic helmet, this miner’s hat is made of felt and rendered rock solid with resin.

Vince explained about lodes and the way their valuable constituents separated themselves out, into tin, copper, arsenic and silver, and how they went for miles out to sea.

The turquoise reveals the continued presence of copper.

The picture shows a pony being lowered into the mine. It would then live there for four years before being brought up, gradually accustomed to the light, and put out to pasture. Apparently the conditions the law insisted on for ponies were much better than those it prescribed for miners.

The tools used by bal maidens to break up the rocks. Their conditions were even worse than those of the men down the mines.

After a while, Vince took us to the beam engine, and handed us over to Peter, the engineer, who explained how steam was raised and worked the engine. For various reasons I was able to follow little, and just concentrated on the sheer beauty of the thing, and loved seeing it set in motion.

Entrance to the Beam engine house

The beam from the top.

What the wheel turned. I was just outside in time to see them in action.

Looking back on the various buildings

Ahead was the Miners’ Dry. a huge room where the miners dried out at the end of a shift. But before that, Vince explained why some parts of the land were so dangerous.

When a shaft was closed, it was just covered with wooden boards which were grown over and just rotted in due course. Tread on one of those areas and…

In its heyday this was the Miners’ Dry:

Just the floor remains now, with the Compressor house chimney beyond.

Next and last we descended to the start of the the man engine shaft. The man engine was an ingenious but very dangerous mechanism for lowering the miners to their working areas. It broke in 1919, killing 31 people, after which mining the lowest levels was abandoned.

Botallack mine (also National Trust, though not part of this tour) was just a kilometre further down the coast. I was shattered, and had a 15-minute climb back to the car park ahead of me, so I decided I would not join a couple who were planning to visit, but returned to my car tired, but very happy, at the end of two excellent days.

I had planned nothing yet for the Monday, but had lots of competing ideas.

Travelling again – 11. More friends

Tags

automaton, Bramley Fall grit, ghost hunter, Kirkstall, Kirkstall Abbey, Kirkstall Museum, Leeds, Victorian street, Westminster bridge

Hitherto, the photos in this series of posts have been dominated by the colour green. In this one they will be predominantly browns and greys, being manmade buildings.

For my full day with them, 18th June, Hazel and John wanted to take me to a local National Trust property, but of all days to close, it closed on a Friday. So instead they took me to Kirkstall, north-west of Leeds city centre, to see the ruined 12th century abbey there, and also Kirkstall Museum, in Abbey House, the old gatehouse of the abbey. We started with the latter.

The ground floor of the museum is a series of Victorian streets. Here is a selection of photos I took of the shops and houses.

This reminded me of the Somerset Rural Life Museum, where in normal times I am a volunteer. It has a similar display of washing out to dry.

Upstairs was mainly given over to a temporary exhibition, ‘Sounds of the City’ [of Leeds], which, as it seemed to me, was mainly given over to pop music, with groups I had mainly not heard of, did not excite my attention nearly as much. But I did rather enjoy this:

I may also have been rather biased in my observation, since this online visit seems very much more interesting than I found the physical one.

There was also a collection of (working) automatons, not part of the temporary exhibition, I think, of which here is one:

And here is another (the voices are those of staff on walkie-talkies):

I was interested to read this history:

Fortified by a coffee, we crossed the busy main road to the ruined Cistercian abbey.

West end

Hazel and John, called unexpectedly by me

I know it’s not good for the stone, but I do find vegetation growing in ruins very attractive.

East end

There were informative panels everywhere.

The chapterhouse

I loved this tree.

I wondered out loud what stone the abbey was built in. John told me it was Millstone Grit. Further research tells me that it is the Bramley Fall variety of the grit – and that Westminster Bridge also is made of it.

We wondered whatever this curious thing was – and then realised it was just one table and bench set stacked on top of another!

Even more curious was I, at why this man needed five cameras (one is hidden). He introduced himself as Mark Vernon, ghost hunter. He invited me to look his website up on the internet. I have found a few references in local media, for instance this one. But no personal website – perhaps it’s an invisible ghost.

In the evening there was some football match on the TV. Hazel and I sat in another room, knitting and nattering. Every now and then, John reported the score. It didn’t seem that much was happening, as there were no goals. I think it was a match between England and Scotland.

Homeward bound the next day, to include one more visit.

Travelling again – 2. South of the Border

Tags

Common Spotted Orchid, Hadrian's Wall, International Dark Sky Park, Lanercost Priory, Northern Marsh Orchid, Northumberland National Park, Renault Zoe, Walltown Crags

The Langholm walk had just been the start of an interesting day with Tom and Ally. They knew I was wanting to know more about the implications of having an electric car, and they had had a Renault Zoe for a couple of years now. So morning coffee at their place was dominated by discussion generally about electric cars, and then we went out for the rest of the day in their vehicle. Until now, she had only been used for very local journeys, so this was going to be a test of range – and nerves. (Apparently range-anxiety is a common phenomenon among electric car owners. Certainly I have two incompatible desires for any car I buy – a good range and a very small size.)

I was very happy to go along with the suggestion that we visit part of Hadrian’s Wall, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which I had never seen before. Amusing ourselves with observing whether the car was using (uphill) or making (downhill) electricity, we made our way to Walltown Crags, in the Northumberland National Park, and just north of Haltwhistle on the map on this web page, and ‘arguably the most spectacular part of Hadrian’s Wall’. While the England/Scotland border runs diagonally from south-west to north-east, the Wall runs almost exactly west-east, so land on both sides is in England.

This rotating board indicated that we had arrived in an International Dark Sky Park. (The Zoe is the middle car – I would normally have cropped the vehicles from the photo.)

Great excitement when Tom found that there was a very newly installed car charging point available.

Or not. Sadly, it could not be made to work, neither was there anyone on the end of a helpline to advise.

Having eaten filled baps for lunch, we sat off on the recommended route, though I didn’t see this map (red dotted line) until we got back and were buying an ice-cream.

Tom leads the way

Northern Marsh Orchid

Common Spotted Orchid

Tom risks joining the wrong group.

Remains of a tower

On the way down, I spotted a tree I liked.

I looked back and saw that Tom and Ally had spotted something that interested them.

And another tree I liked.

Lots of Northern Marsh Orchids

And a few more, with some Not-dandelions.

I do like a clump of flowering grasses.

We moved in the car on to another part of the Wall, under skies beginning to glower, but with beautiful views ahead of us, and saw a less incomplete version of a tower, with explanation.

The plan had been to go on to Kielder Water, but there were concerns about remaining charge in the Zoe, especially given that, despite her maturity, no long journey had yet been experienced. So instead we planned to go round, pretty well on our direct route back, Lanercost Priory, dissolved and much mutilated by Henry VIII, but still in use as a parish church.

The vicarage. Not too shabby, eh?

Covid obliged, booking to see round it was necessary, and we established that we could book for the next timed entry. However, the technology of this proved so time-consuming and frustrating that we opted for a nice cup of tea in the sunshine instead.

To the holiday lets… and the café.

Where my tiny mind was much amused by this:

A leisurely drive back to Langholm, via a garden centre for Ally, and I was invited to join in a Zoom meeting of the five Tom siblings, all of whom I had met at least once over the last half century. It was very exciting for me actually to see Mary, with whom I have had many phone calls since the beginning of the pandemic, but of whom I had not actually had sight all that time.

This was followed by a quiet evening in the hotel, where over a light dinner I met, quite coincidentally, a researcher/filmmaker who was due to meet up with Ally two days later to interview her about a community project she is involved in.

Many thanks, Tom and Ally, for a lovely day. (Tom’s blog on the day is here.)

A long drive tomorrow – good job my car is not electric.

Follow-up. I have since learned that Tom and Ally have now done the full round trip as originally planned on one ‘charge’ and also, though it was not necessary, succeeded in ‘filling up’ at a similar chargepoint some miles further on from the one which was not working. Satisfaction all round.

Benter NGS

Tags

Benter, National Gardens Scheme, NGS, Radstock, Somerset coalfield, William Smith

Last weekend I visited two National Garden Scheme gardens. On Saturday it was to two adjacent gardens in the village of Benter, near Radstock, Somerset. Radstock celebrates Somerset Coalfield Life in its museum. Coal-mining flourished in Somerset in the first two decades of the twentieth century, the last mine closing in 1974. It is believed that mining went on in the area as long ago as when the Romans were here. The ‘Father of English geology’, William Smith, was working as a surveyor in these coalmines when he made his observations leading to the understanding of geological strata.

Apart from the occasional relic, you would never know of the county’s coal-mining past, though stone-quarrying still flourishes in some parts. The whole area is now almost entirely idyllically rural once more. And that is certainly true of the small village of Benter. These two lovely gardens were those of two generations of the same family, (and there was evidence of a younger third generation!) There was no clear boundary between them.

This flower bed is one of the first to greet you, and the picture also shows the two very different houses.

Another bed …

… tried to draw me into a formal area, but I was soon enticed away to the woodlands. The background in this first image is outside the properties.

The tree house was out of bounds to visitors, sadly!

This was quite a lengthy walk, and I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to walk all the way back, hoping not as some of the path had been a little tricky by the stream. But no, after a while I found myself approaching open space again, and on my way to the planted gardens.

I was very excited to know the name of this: hydrangea arborescens ‘Annabelle’. It had featured on Gardeners’ World the evening before! It had only stuck in my mind – I who know nothing of botany – because of the ‘arborescens’ bit, which meant something to me from my schoolgirl Latin days. Moreover, the younger generation host was standing by – this her in-laws’ garden apparently – and she said she just knew it was called ‘Annabelle’.

The cock was crowing loudly as I stopped to observe this strutting group.

None of them volunteered to demonstrate how to use their swing.

I was now definitely in the younger generation’s garden.

The kitchen garden was a great mixture of edibles and decoratives.

I admired how the spiky plants were grouped together, united by the flat-headed ones.

The wingspan of this colourful day moth was just 15 millimetres (1/2 inch).

A pleasant hour spent in two lovely ‘domestic’ gardens. A pity the sky had been overcast all the time, but it had been warm. The next day’s visit was to a very different kind of garden – and the sun was out.