Showing posts with label Skipton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Skipton. Show all posts

Tuesday 5 November 2019

Fireworks


I got up this morning for a quick walk round and get fresh air , and saw a fading rainbow over Giggleswick (you can see it here) which was wonderful but like many atmospheric events you have to photograph them now or else they are gone.

I then noticed the date and it's the fifth of November , Guy Fawkes Night

"Remember, Remember
The Fifth of November
Gunpowder, Treason and Plot"

We could do with Guy Fawkes today methinks ....

But that made me think of the song "Fireworks" by Blue Oyster Cult from their "Spectres" album which a lot of people put down for being too polished, but it is full of great songs and is worth having in your collection, I have all their albums and that is one of the stand outs.

Today will be a trip to Skipton to visit The Huntress of Skipton Castle Woods as I always do when I came here.

I know this is a short post but I need to be getting on my way to catch the train to Skipton.


Thursday 7 March 2019

Another Week In Settle


This week has been quiet and relaxing. I have managed to finish the excellent "Deadwood" , start "The Terror" ,binge watch two series of "Shakespeare and Hathaway", and that's part of the relaxation in the cottage. For some reason I have woken up early, before seven every morning after going to bed between eleven and midnight each night.

I have managed to walk up Castleberg Crag (Instagram video here and a climbing video here) and The Hoffman Kiln (Instagram video here) . There is a decent video of it here.

The amazing thing is the immense relaxation I have got from this holiday. Settle is full of great walks, pubs, eateries and the people are amazingly friendly. It is remarkably well served by public transport, though not a place to drive,many of the streets and roads only six feet wide.

I picked up some vinyl from Skipton Sound Bar and Skipton Market and visited The Huntress of Skipton Castle Woods (Instagram video here) , the train journey from Settle to Skipton  is maybe 30 minutes, so absolutely  local and easy to get to.

So I will share the Bronski Beat / Marc Almond take on Donna Summer's "I Feel Love" which is one of the 12" vinyl records I picked up from Skipton Market.

Monday 4 March 2019

Nine by Nine, and Three by Three


...We Shall Seek
The Skrayling Tree .....

No I don't know what this means or signifies but it's Michael Moorcock book that is my current read weaving his own universe with modernish times and touches of Jonathan Aycliffe / Daniel Easterman JG Ballard with the unease generated in the first twenty pages managing to drop inn North European and North American Indian mythology, it is a book I am looking forward to, the follow up to the excellent "The Dreamthief's Daughter".

I've just finished John Niven's "Kill 'Em All" his follow to "Kill Your Friends" bringing us into the Trump and Fake News era, though Stelfox is just an even more loathsome protagonist and the book does finish with a misogynist's nightmare sign off. Not to everyone's taste but I enjoyed it, and have loved all his proper novels.

Although you can Google Skrayling (or Skraeling) Tree , which I htink comes from some arcane poem or incantation, I will tell you when it reveals itself to me.

It is Monday morning but I don't have to go to work and am nipping to Skipton to possibly visit Skipton Sound Bar and The Huntress of Skipton Castle Woods. I am going by train so because of that I will share with you "The Last of The Steam Powered Trains" by The Kinks, Ray Davies take on Howlin' Wolf's "Smokestack Lightnin'".

Hope your Monday is good.

Wednesday 5 December 2018

Settle, Skipton, Sound Bar and Russia


I have to say Settle is a lovely place to say, although not a place to drive round. The people are friendly and everything is in walking distance. On Monday I met up with a hero of mine Mike Harding in The Golden Lion although missed him in The Royal Oak the same night, and absolutely lovely, funny and great man.

The cottage we're in is at the bottom of Castlebergh Crag and I went up there Monday afternoon and took this video. There's a few photographs and my fear of heights was tested. The Crag is used for rock climbing but that's not anything I will try out of choice.

Russia?
Incidentally the blog has had over a thousand hits from Russia for some reason, I don't see my posts as particularly Russo-centric, but I'm not complaining to much.

Yesterday I took a trip to Skipton to revisit The Huntress of Skipton Castle woods and see what the town had to offer as I'd only been briefly once before.

The train journey was incredibly cheap, half what The Trainline tried to charge me, which would have been cheap anyway.

My big discovery of the day was The Skipton Sound Bar and vinyl and music shop and bar and there's a short video I took here. The people are really friendly and I picked up a newspaper copy of "Thick as a Brick" by Jethro Tull, a Kool and the Gang 12"single and a Best of Duke Ellington 45rpm single. I'd recommend the place to anyone.

It is worth visiting for their posters and photographs, but they are very welcoming and were really helpful when I couldn't open my bottle of prosecco.

I also had coffee and cake at The Kibble Bakery a dog cafe which was again most excellent and much preferable to the adjacent Cafe Nero.


So I'll leave you with the lead track from the Best of Duke Ellington single which is actually rather good.


Thursday 18 October 2018

Unsummer


Woke up at  quarter to six, drinking coffee and the first song on the radio is "Hurt" by Johnny Cash. Last night I watched Pointless, Letterbox and two episodes of "Black Sails" and had a butter pie for tea. Nights and mornings are drawing in and there is more dark than light. Summer is definitely gone for this year.

Having said that yesterday was like a summer's day .... minus the heat.

We have now hit Thursday this week and as you can tell by what I am writing, not much is happening at the moment, although I noticed signs of screen burn on my Google Pixel, so I changed the picture to The Huntress of Skipton Castle Woods which looks almost ghostly and ethereal on the phone. My friend Helen noted that that it might be scary to come across in the dark, which reminds me of a ghost story told to me by my good friend Chris who we lost six years back.

One night he was walking back from helping out bailing on a farm. It was late but was walking back over fields and it took him through a smallish wood. A way ahead of him he saw some rectangular grey shapes floating about a foot off the ground. He had had a few pints but started to get more perturbed as he looked round not having a clue what these things were. In the end he broke into a run and then ran into one of the shapes.....

...as he was brought down , all was revealed, the creature was a sheep with a black head and black legs. Another logical explanation for a supernatural ghostly event.

I found "Mad Alice Lane(A Ghost Story)" by Pete Lawlor (ex of Stiltskin) to go with this. I don't know if this is readily available but was used in a Land Rover advert in 1996, still a very atmospheric song. I love it. It's on a "Spirit of New Age" compilation and this is what Pete says:

"Mad Alice Lane. I named this after a spooky alleyway I walked past before doing a gig in York. It was used in the Landrover commercial made by Nils and Roland (Harfensixpence is better than Harfenpenny is better than...) at Dorlands."

Enjoy your Thursday.

Monday 1 October 2018

61


That's me sixty one years on this planet, and I still find it amusing the number of people who deem themselves old or middle aged at thirty, forty or fifty. Really you can do nothing about time and a birthday should be an excuse have fun not be despondent. Though the fact is some people are only happy when they're miserable, the usually read the Mail and don't listen to music.

I have not done much today barring visiting Ambleside, eating at The Priest's Hole and researching whether to visit Skipton Castle and Woods, due to the amazing cane sculptures that I want to see.

I was in Kendal yesterday and was sad to see that the only record shop I know has gone, so it may be that I don't pick up any music this holiday, but I do have more than enough to listen to, and one of those is the new James album as well as the new Arctic Monkeys album. So I willleave you with "Better Than That" by James, which is just absolutely wonderful.

Going to catch upon "Better Call Saul" and "Constantine" tonight.