Rule Britannia

Monday

#mondaymemories

With indoor bowling over it is a chance to get back to Sketching Club. Today’s meeting place is St Thomas Church in Stockton Heath and a warm welcome is provided by the church volunteers with coffee and bonhomie. My attention is drawn to this figure dangling high.

I ask but no one connected with the church is able to provide a background story. One volunteer hadn’t even noticed it before. Who climbed up there to hang it is one of a number of questions I could ask but I am here to sketch. I decide to take a photo of the exterior, to be drawn inside in comfort and warmth on a cushioned pew. Not sure that is technically acceptable but it works for me. Completed in 1868 in the Gothic Revival style, the church makes an attractive and enjoyable subject. I complete my sketch at 1215 in a pencil style.

Tuesday

A chance to indulge myself. Just after lunch I head out in search of an iconic steam train from my childhood. The Britannia locomotive, number 70000, is heading back to Crewe from Bury East Lancs Railway and here is a chance to get another sighting of one of the star attractions of the Settle-Carlisle Railway, a loco that pulled the funeral train of King George VI in 1952. After negotiating three sets of roadworks and running along a muddy rail side path I position myself by a long straight near Glazebury and don’t have long to wait before the smoke appears in the distance and the familiar shape comes ever closer. The thrill remains sixty years on.

Then it is straight back home for the u3a Poetry Group and with Rick, the Urban Poet, incapacitated I am in charge. We spend the first half of the session sharing our own limericks before looking at Spring poems from famous poets. The limericks contain a worrying number of references to alcohol while the Spring poems, almost without exception, leave us feeling depressed.

Just time to read an email from Los Angeles inviting me for a TV interview with an Emmy Award-winning broadcaster about one of my books which they didn’t even name. I kid you not.

Wednesday

We join the latest u3a walk, setting out from Dunham Massey. It gets cold and wet in the middle and the mud is almost impenetrable along the Bridgewater Canal but the company is engaging and we emerge to end in sunshine and are rewarded with this cornucopia of colour.

Thursday 

It’s proving to be a busy week. Today, Matthew, I am Grandad Bunny presenting an Easter quiz to fifty-six senior citizens. Mrs M, meanwhile, is playing her ukulele whilst wearing bunny ears.

Just another u3a day. We are in the village hall helping to present an Easter social event. You might detect a tiredness in the eyes after a hectic schedule. A snooze is required afterwards before we head off to Yorkshire for a few days walking over the Easter weekend.

Good Friday

It’s time to restart the Ridings Route after a seven month gap. Devotees of the Ramblings will be aware that Mrs M and I are linking all the significant places in our lives by foot. So far we have completed the Ruby, Red Rose and Ribble Routes, having started on Valentine’s Day in 2018. The aim on this walk is to cross the Ridings from Hull to Skipton. We last left it in Harrogate.
With sister Janet and Peter we operate a two car set up. Mrs M has modified today’s route to bring in Almscliffe Crag, a feature which has long intrigued Peter, visible from miles around. Apparently it featured in the opening sequences for Emmerdale between 1998 and 2005 but that’s not his motivation. For Good Friday read Mud Friday. Despite the copious amounts of the stuff we follow a beautiful route from Mrs M’s childhood stomping ground in Harrogate through Wharfedale and the views from the top of the crag at the end are worth the climb. We recognise features over 25 miles away.

Easter Saturday

Another leg of the Ridings Route is completed, six and a half miles finishing at the top of the Chevin overlooking Otley and looking across Wharfedale to where today’s walk started. Yorkshire looks fab in the Easter sunshine.

Climbing the Chevin opens up the likely final stage of our walks, a seven mile hike back to college in Leeds, where we first met. Not many more days left before we get to that celebration!