26^th November 2023

 

Dear All,

Monday was a fairly gentle day starting with a swim then inspecting Merv’s new raised beds followed by sowing winter lettuce and some gardening.

Tuesday by contrast was rather busy. Hutchinson’s came first thing to replace the back garage door then we made an early start on a walk recce from Graveley. We have led a walk from Graveley via Yelling and Papworth St Agnes a couple of times before and thought it would be good to explore a different route. A friend suggested heading west to the Offord’s and River Ouse. The first hour included four muddy fields then it started to rain and the wind got up and the views were basic so we decided that this route was unlikely to be a winner in winter at least. The Offord’s and the river were fine but the return leg was little better albeit with just one muddy field. We decided that it was one of the worst recces that we had done and reverted to the old walk for Thursday.

After lunch I was in Cambridge for “The Balkans” this week featuring North Macedonia and Montenegro. North Macedonia is now in NATO and has a cultural mix with many Albanians speaking a different language and heavy Greek influence in the south. Montenegro only has a population of 620,000, 29% of which are Serbs but scenically looks very interesting. After returning from Cambridge, we had a family Zoom but Ben was still in Cyprus after his marathon (3 hours 59 minutes) and Esther had succumbed to Covid. The day was not finished as John Law was over from Turkey and was staying overnight and we invited the Moldova travellers for a meal for which they stayed past 10,30pm – so a reasonably long day!

 

 

New door on the left

 

Norman Ingle was here for lunch on Wednesday before church group at the Kitson’s David Smith was absent as he was visiting Rita Asplin who had suffered a stroke and bleeding on the brain so the outlook is not good.

So on to Thursday and the walk we were due to lead from Graveley. The good news is that the weather was excellent – sunny nearly all the way and that brightened up the walk considerably. There were 14 on each walk this week and for some reason there were fallers on each walk – 2 on ours tripping over horizonal brambles. Graveley has some interesting buildings and the autumn colours were still showing up very well.

 

 

 Graveley

  

Autumn Colours Papworth St Agnes

 

 

Papworth St Agnes Bakehouse

 

 

Graveley Shelter

 

I had a consignment of seed arrive on Friday donated by Tozer’s for Moldova – all we have to do now is find the best way of getting the seed in legally!

“Biographies” this week was a double header featuring two not well-known subjects. The first was Hans Litten a German Jewish lawyer who in 1931 actually interrogated Hitler for 3 hours about growing violence in the Nazi party, needless to say he did not fare well once the Nazis were in power and eventually committed suicide in Dachau concentration camp. The second presentation was of Thomas Johnson a 17^th century apothecary, botanist and soldier. He wrote some of the earliest herbals but was caught up in the civil war and was killed supporting the royalist cause.

 

 

Hans Litten

 

 

Thomas Johnson

 

On Saturday I had a good bonfire at the allotment while Kate was planting newly arrived bearded irises. I then started digging the extra land we have been given by a neighbouring allotmenteer. In the afternoon I watched Milton 0 v 2 Over in fairly cool conditions! In the evening it was the Christmas lights switch on at the Green together with numerous stalls and carol singing – so evidently Christmas is on the way!

 

 

Lights on The Green

 

 

Carol Singing

Regards

Mike & Kate

 

19^th November 2023

 

Dear All,

The village puts on a good show for Remembrance Day with serious poppy decorations at the war memorial for the ceremony before the 3pm service in the Anglican church and a BL representative at the Baptist 6pm service.

 

 

The U3A Balkans course had a second session on Albania covering the vendettas which still occur in the countryside necessitating the building of Kullas – refuge buildings where victims can flee if threatened. We had a quick look at the main cities and towns: Kruje, Tirana, Durres, Barat, Gjirokaster, Saranda and Korce. Finally, we had a few minutes of North Macedonia.

Adrian is still struggling badly with his back and even fell off his bike this week when he lost feeling in his legs. Consequently, I spent a couple of days sorting out his garden: clearing weeds, digging and mucking.

 

 

Adrian’s Back Garden

 

Wednesday evening it was Over Garden Club on the subject of re designing your garden. You must have a feature at the end of a vista, circles make a small garden look larger and swathes of the same plant are better than single plants!

We had a familiar walk on Thursday starting at Orwell then circumnavigating the Wimpole Estate. There is now a solid path all the way round so no mud concerns this week.

 

 

View of Lake & Folly

 

The Biographies topic this week was Ada Lovelace, Countess of Lovelace was an English mathematician and writer, chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-purpose computer, the Analytical Engine. She was the first to recognise that the machine had applications beyond pure calculation. Her father was Lord Byron who disappeared out of her life after one month but strangely she worshipped him from afar and was eventually buried next to him.

 

 

Ada Lovelace

 

Kate has been given a large bucket full of daffodil bulbs and iris rhizomes by Philip Shaw which she has planted in her fresh allotment area. She has also been busy turning frozen currants into jelly.

Winter vegetable harvests this week included brussels sprouts, red cabbage, parsnips, celeriac, swedes and leeks.

 

 

Over lost 2 v 1 to Great Shelford who are the reigning champions and least popular team in the league!

 

Regards

Mike & Kate

 

12^th November 2023

 

Dear All,

Back to a normality week this week: Monday a swim then a Zoom session during which I had two interruptions: Adrian called then 2 guys turned up to change our TV aerial. Garden wise I planted Broad Beans and collected 6 bags of peat-based compost before it goes off limits. On Tuesday afternoon I started a new U3A course on the “Balkans”. I had missed the first two classes on the Definition, history and geography of the Balkans but the tutor had put a PowerPoint with 66 slides onto the U3A website. This week it was the first of two sessions on Albania where he had taught for two years. We learnt about Gjergi Kastrioti, King Zog, Enver Hoxha and Norman Wisdom.

Our Thursday walk started at Chrishall and took in Duddenhoe Grange and Duddenhoe End. It was fine overhead but a bit sticky underfoot. We caught a distant view of a herd of deer but not as many as we have seen before.

 

 

Leaving Chrishall

 

 

Basidiomycete Fungi

 

 

Roman Road

 

On Friday it was my turn to present in “Biographies” and my topic was going to be “Thomas Cook” the travel agent but the more I looked into it I felt I needed to include his son “John Mason Cook” as well as he was so vital in growing the company.

Thomas left school aged 10 and after having two bosses who were drunkards became a keen promoter of the temperance movement. He started his tours as an alternative for people rather than relying on drink for entertainment. His philosophy was helping the working classes to see the world and he had great vision in developing destinations all round the world. His son John was a hard headed businessman and thought business and religion should be separate and targeted the upper classes. The two had serious arguments and Thomas was retired on a pension. For more details I am available to elaborate at serious length!

 

 

In the afternoon I cleared the last of the Tomatoes and fertilised and dug the top glasshouse. On Saturday I finished digging the allotment then watched Over lose 2 v 1 to Whitchford.

Later I sorted through my vegetable seeds and reordered the gaps – the bill was over £100!

 

 

 

 

Regards

Mike & Kate

 

5^th November 2023

 

Dear All,

Going to Yorkshire at the end of October/beginning of November we did not expect to need sun tan oil or dark glasses and so it proved but although the weather was challenging it was not as dire as the forecasts.

We set out on Monday and stopped off at the RHS garden at Harlow Carr on the way. The autumn colours were spectacular there so it was very worthwhile despite grey and threatening skies.

 

Harlow Carr

 

The holiday was a special offer at an HF hostel called New Field Hall, Airton near Malham. They are keen to keep staff going between the summer and Christmas so our U3A group had taken advantage of a special cheap offer arriving Monday, walking Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday departing Friday. HF is an excellent organisation with skilled volunteer leaders offering walks of differing lengths and challenges, good food and transport to the walk venues. Altogether there were 53 of us from Cambridge so instead of the usual three choices they offered four walks each day.

 

 New Field Hall

 

Kate and I opted for the medium walks on the first two days which were 10 and 9 miles but included climbs which the fens do not necessarily prepare you for!

On Tuesday we headed for Appletreewick in Wharfedale. We climbed up to Trollers Gill then followed Trollers Beck down to the River Wharfe to Bolton Abbey. It rained for the first two hours then cleared up. When we were last in the area with Philip Shaw in 2009 one of our aged ladies slipped off of the stepping stones outside Bolton Abbey resulting in a hurried strip tease – this time the water was so high the stones were completely hidden!

 

 

Trollers Gill

 River Wharfe

  

 Wharfedale

  

Happy Walkers?

 

On Wednesday we were in Ribblesdale starting at Horton in Ribblesdale taking in three peaks and a view of the Ribblehead Viaduct. The three peaks were Pen-y-ghent, Woldside and Ingleborough. We set off in dry weather but at 1 pm the wind got up and at 1.30 pm were hit by a violent hail and rain storm while we were in the middle of open moorland. Not altogether pleasant but very atmospheric and my new waterproofs did a reasonable job!

 

Sink Hole

 

 

Woldside

 

Ribblehead Viaduct

 

 

Après Storm!

 

 

Pen-y-ghent

 

The forecast for Thursday was dire and several folk opted out of walking but in reality, it was not too bad, I guess the valleys all experience different weather so forecasting must be tricky?

We were walking around Malham climbing initially to the Cove then passing the Water Sink where the overflow from Malham Tarn disappears underground. We picnicked by the Tarn then circled round to Gordale Scar and back through Janet’s Foss Wildlife reserve.

 

 

Stone walled fields above Malham

 

 

View of Malham

 

 

 

The Dry Valley

 

 

The Pavement above Malham Cove

 

 

Malham Cove cliff face

  

Gordale Scar

 

We left quite early on Friday and visited Saltaire village in Bradford. Saltaire is a Victorian model village situated between the river Aire, the railway, and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. Salt's Mill and the houses were built by Titus Salt between 1851 and 1871 to allow his workers to live in better conditions than the slums of Bradford. Some of the mill buildings now house shops, cafes and a permanent Hockney exhibition.

 

 

Mill chimney

 

 

Main Mill

 

 

Hockney Exhibit

 

On Saturday Kate began the day getting stung by a Queen wasp. I managed to harvest a few vegetables but more rain meant all local football matches were off again.

Our rainfall total for October was 141mm and the pond is still flooded.

 

Regards

Mike & Kate