September 2017 It was 5.30am, dark, a chill in the air. I had to force myself out of bed. Dan looked at me in horror as I herded him out into the car in the drizzle and half light (he is not a morning dog). It was either now or wait another year. I have wanted to attend the Horn Dance at Abbots Bromley in the Forest of Needwood for over 30 years. This was the day! The horn dance…
September 2017 It was our new Barefoot caravan, Mollie’s, maiden voyage and we had driven through pouring rain up into the wet Welsh mountains of Snowdonia to find that the pitch we thought had been reserved for us was no longer available! It was getting dark and folk were coming down off the mountains due to the awful weather and we were feeling dejected and wet. Then the blessed sat-nav took us down a blind lane and I had to…
September 2017 ‘In the Oxford country there are great stones, arranged as it were in some connection by the hand of man. But at what time this was done, or by what people, or for what memorial or significance, is unknown. Though by the inhabitants that place is called Rollendrith’ 14th century With Chris, David and two dogs, I made the long(ish) journey down to the Cotwolds to pick up my new Barefoot caravan – how excited was I? This…
August 2017 After a drizzly start the sky was clearing as myself and Dan, the dog,started up Titterstone Clee Hill or, according to one seventeenthcentury map, Stitterstone Hill, one of the Clee Hills, (Housman’s‘Blue Remembered Hills’ of Shropshire). Shropshire is blessedwith a number of Holy Wells and I wanted to visit John the Baptist’sWell at Hope Bagot, on the other side of the hill. But, as the carstarted to climb up the hill we came across a…
Welcome to my new blog! I have uploaded a few earlier pieces I never got round to posting partly because they are favorites but also because my ramblings have been curtailed this summer due to a broken ankle! So here is the first from August 2017…. Mix a few old tales, some archaeology and a dash of pre-history and you’ve got my attention! A warm and sultry morning in early August seemed like a good day to drive over to…