Shropshire

Summer is A Coming In*

At last we can go outside without our winter layers. Of course being Brits, we’re bound to complain that we’re now too hot. But then I don’t think this mini warmth-wave is set to last beyond a couple of days. Even so, it called a halt to digging up the lawn, which will doubtless resume later in the week when it’s reported to be several degrees cooler.

Instead, we meandered along Bishop’s Castle’s green lanes where all is a shadowland of dog roses and foxgloves among aged gnarly roots. The overarching boughs of sycamore, field maple,hawthorn, elder and ash create a sappy coolness.

Green lanes are a covert feature of the English countryside – unpaved, their one-time hedgerow borders grown up into tree arcades. Some of these byways may be old drovers’ roads. Others are far more ancient, once on trading routes used by Bronze Age and even earlier travellers.

This particular lane takes us up to a high meadow where the grass has been mown for hay. There is an antique barn, settled in scenic decay, and fine hill views all around. Bishops Castle town lies way below, quietly.

* “Summer is icumen in” a thirteenth century English round, hear it sung here in Middle English

All Burgeoning At The Hurst

Yesterday felt like summer. It was also ‘open garden’ day at The Hurst, near Clun, a place English-speaking writers, seasoned and aspiring, will know well since it is one of the four ‘homes’ of Arvon, the charity that fosters creative writing through its residential courses, festivals and retreats.

But before Arvon arrived at The Hurst, the other key writerly connection is that it was, until his death, the home of playwright John Osborne (1929-1994). He and his fourth wife, journalist, Helen Dawson, are both buried in the tranquil graveyard of Clun parish church. (See earlier post In the footsteps of the Green Man for photos).

Clun is only a short drive from Bishops Castle – an easy afternoon out then. Others thought so too, and it was pleasing to see how many had come along for homemade cakes and tea, garden rambles and to support the Shropshire Historic Churches Trust, a charity whose grants for repairs and preservation “help keep buildings open not only for worship and community use but also as quiet places for prayer and reflection.”

The Hurst sits on a hillside, forest all around, and with grounds that are more arboretum than formal garden. Long grassy avenues lead you on between azalea and rhododendron borders, while overtopping all, are magnificent, mature trees. Please feel free to wander and enjoy the sun-dappled paths.

All the lush greenery wafted over us like a tonic. And the mossy lovers above the bank of Dicentra ‘Love Hearts’ raised a smile.

#SquaresRenew Becky’s May challenge: a daily square format header photo featuring themes of renewal, moving forward, reconstruction and burgeoning.

Teeming Green Above Ludlow’s River Teme

The Green Cafe below Ludlow Castle

Ludlow is one of Shropshire’s loveliest old market towns, the earliest surviving remains (including parts of the castle) dating from the early Norman period in the 11th century. It’s also one of our favourite places, about 20 miles from Bishops Castle, but we had not visited for ages. And so a couple of weeks ago, when spring was teasing us with the notion that sunny days had returned, we thought it was about time for an outing. A significant lure included thoughts of lunch at The Green Cafe.

This award-winning little restaurant sits on the riverbank, between Dinham Weir and Dinham Bridge. Ever popular, it has an outdoor terrace, and an inside (compact) dining room. But wherever you choose to sit, you are guaranteed a warm welcome, including with added blankets if it’s cold outside and there are no seats free inside.

The menu is always inventive, dishes coming in large or small versions, and with emphasis on fresh, locally produced ingredients. The cakes and deserts are fabulous, although this time we had no room for them. We’d filled up on smoked salmon with pickles, labneh and mustard yoghurt, plus a dish of roasted tiny new potatoes with aioli sauce. All very delicious. After that, there was nothing left to do, but to wander over Dinham Bridge, look at the views, see spring happening and watch the river flow by.

Going with the flow

#SquaresRenew Every day in May Becky is hosting a square format header photo. The themes are move forward, reconstruct, renew, burgeoning.

Seeing Things In A New Light

Hurrah for May and Becky B’s month of squares. The themes are burgeoning, move forward, reconstruct, renew to interpret how we will. The only rule: the header photo must be SQUARE.

This photo is a view of very familiar terrain as seen from the upstairs windows of our cottage in Much Wenlock. It was a piece of landscape we looked at every day for sixteen years. What wasn’t familiar was this glorious copper light and that cloud come visiting from a Baroque masterwork.

It was early spring, the sun already up at 5 a.m. a time I rarely saw. And now here was the field, usually so plain in the flatness of main-day light, quite transformed. It felt like a parallel universe. So, I thought, this is what Townsend Meadow gets up to when we’re not looking, showing itself off in this magically theatrical glow. What have we been missing?

I never saw anything like it there again, although there were many other light and cloud shows over the years, usually at sunset. But it made me think. Sometimes it pays to break a habit. And if that unexpected view changed the way I saw the meadow, what other bigger shifts may be possible?

#SquaresRenew burgeoning, move forward, reconstruct, renew

Welcome To My World ~ A Late-Day Walk Above Bishop’s Castle

On Sunday I did a lot of complaining about the cold and lack of sunshine. Perhaps the weather gods took pity. At five o’ clock the clouds lifted and the sun came out, and although it was still chilly, we thought a walk was called for. There was a path I had my eye on back in the winter when it was too muddy underfoot to attempt it. But after a couple of downpour-free days and lots of drying wind, I thought it should be passable.

First, though, a spot of orientation by way of some archive photos. Above is Bishop’s Castle High Street as viewed from the Town Hall window. Our street runs parallel to it, behind the ancient timber-framed house in the right hand foreground (the Porch House).

Next is an autumnal view of said street, named Union Street after the Clun Union Workhouse that once occupied the site next door to us, now a care home with a community hospital behind.

Our walk took us uphill, and left between cottages into Laburnum Alley, a shadowy path that runs between old stone walls and gardens. I imagine much of the stonework along this ginnel came from the demolished castle.

The path exits onto Welsh Street near the top of the town. There’s a handy kiosk here selling eggs and garden plants and sundry items that need a good home. I noted the tray of chunky broad bean seedlings, and pots of strawberry plants. There was also a notice advertising baby rabbits for sale.

Just beyond the kiosk are a couple of striking looking barns – a case of scenic dilapidation…

And across the road is The Wintles, an upmarket community of eco-homes, built in the days before eco-homes were quite invented:

We’re on the edge of town now, and this is the green lane path that had caught my eye. It borders The Wintles’ communal ground of allotment and vineyard.

The verges were bright with stitchwort, wild garlic flowers, cuckoo pint, violets, cranesbill, unfurling ferns and cow parsley just opening, Jack by the Hedge aka Garlic Mustard. The lane was sheltered, but even so, I wished I’d put a hat on. It was easy, then, to promise Graham that this was not a major expedition; simply a brief foray to see where the path led.

It led us to a gate and wobbly stile into a sheep field. We struggled over. Ahead the pasture rose steeply, and I could tell G’s enthusiasm was waning. Just as far as the horizon, I said, in winning tones.

But once we were in the field, we found ourselves looking at marvellous hill country. On our right stretched the Long Mynd, its westerly flanks bathed in sunshine…

The sight of the hills all around had us striding on and up, now and then stopping to look back on the town. You can see the parish church of St. John the Baptist, dating from the late 1200s, in the second photo. It stands at the foot of the town.

We were watched of course…

At the top of the sheep pasture there was another stile and beyond it an increasingly uncommon sight – a ploughed field (no-till farming becoming the norm these days).

But beyond the plough, what a fabulous scene, the hills of the Shropshire-Wales borderland. A hint of The Lost Continent somehow miraculously manifested on our almost doorstep? It was too exciting. And anyway it was at this point we lost sight of where the path actually went. The way marker arrow suggested straight ahead, but tramping on wind-dried plough is v. bad for the ankles.

A retreat was declared. But we’ll be back to discover more.

Heading for home down Union Street.

Jo’s Monday Walk Go here for some stunning Portuguese walking.

Apple Blossom, Wintery Weather And A Puzzling Plant Pest

The wind is roaring round the house as I write this. The good news is the house roof is back on and fully restored. Ace builder Alan finished it off today, up there on the scaffold top, in the teeth of gale and squall, painting the gable tops, realigning a dodgy gutter. He said it was freezing up there. What a hero.

The re-laid slates are looking pretty smart, but the grand reveal will have to wait till the scaffolding comes down at the end of the week. In the meantime, it’s good to know that the weather will now stay outside the house and the fragile gables stop crumbling into the bedrooms.

In the garden, spring is happening despite the perishing wind. Our gnarled little apple tree by the compost bin has dared to open three buds, but you can tell they’re shivering. I think it’s a Crispin. We had a few good apples from it last year. The other two apple trees that came with the garden, had to be hard pruned, as in eight feet of top growth removed, so we’re not expecting much from them for a while.

In between rainstorms, and wrapped up in sweaters, padded parka, fleecy pants and woolly hat, I’ve been a) digging up the lawn to create more vegetable growing space; b) attempting to dig out and unpick ground elder, Spanish bluebell and Mexican cigar plant colonies*; and c) continuing to disengage the hedge from chicken wire and the ivy overburden. This last activity is proving slow going. My presence causes the sparrows to dive from the hedge-side feeding post and into the hedge, where they shout loudly until I go away.

*Now for the plant pest and a note of caution, as in beware of letting Mexican cigar plant (Cuphea) loose on your property. In our garden, it’s like ground elder on steroids. Even the tiniest root fragment will turn into a shrub; the new roots spreading several feet in fleshy festoons, thick as macaroni – under paths, into lawns. When in flower, it has a trillion tube-like blooms that also make seeds. Only if you have the chance of entertaining humming birds should you have it in the garden, and only then in a container.

Needless to say, we do not have humming birds in Bishops Castle. It’s also astonishing that a tropical plant should make itself so at home in this rather draughty, frost-prone corner of Shropshire, although I gather there is at least one variety of the the 250 that is winter hardy.

When we moved into the house last August, this promiscuous entity was sprawling out of our garden, admittedly from a very sheltered, sunny bed, and up over next door’s garage roof, i.e. two metres taller than it’s supposed to grow. Though it did occur to me that perhaps it had found some ancient long-drop W.C. to root itself in. It was also giving itself a leg up along the length of a pine tree that was growing horizontally across the back of the flower bed. But I keep wondering if I’ve misidentified it; maligning an otherwise innocent shrub.

Any thoughts, gardeners? The serrated leaves are puzzling me, but when in flower, it looks like THIS. And descriptions of the swift growing/spreading roots/long flowering season fits.

There Goes Our Roof…

Yesterday, the specialist asbestos tile removing guys exposed the bones of our hundred year old roof. Today, all the wooden battens came down. We now have huge piles fore and aft, and Graham is painstakingly de-nailing and cutting them into kindling. (Some of you won’t be surprised.)

We were lucky with the weather, at least until late afternoon. And then the builders had to step on it. They only just managed to secure a tarpaulin sheet before the downpour happened. Today, they have worked doggedly through rain and perishing wind. (N.B. Global warming in NOT happening in Bishops Castle. Nor are we having any lamb weather to see out the March roaring lion).

But we do have new battens for old. They’re holding down the roofing felt (there was none in the original roof). And of course plenty of insulation has gone in too. The only downside is all the hammering is not suiting the fragile plasterwork in bathroom and bedroom ceilings. Much mortary fall out and a few cracks in some quarters (Another job then).

And here we have sight of the next big job. Once the roof is done and the scaffolding down, it’s demolition conservatory time; this to be replaced by a properly insulated kitchen, built on the same footprint (single storey), but extending further along the back wall. Half of the rear house wall (furthest away from the present door) will be taken down, a supporting beam installed, so the new kitchen opens into our existing sitting room with its L-shaped galley kitchen. The latter will then become a utility room, and open into an existing cloakroom (window just visible behind the blue fence, which also needs to go).

Meanwhile, our excellent builders have cleaned up all the surviving Welsh slate tiles from the front roof, and begun to rehang them. The gables, which were very fragile and uninsulated, have been reconstituted and will have leaded side panels. (Pity about the plastic windows. They’re early UPVC, and beginning to fail, so their days are also numbered).

So there you have it: the Farrell plans for domestic chaos for months to come, and I haven’t even mentioned the work needed in the rest of the place. Because, after all, it is a modest little house, and until we have the new kitchen, we are in log-jam mode with the rest of it. A tad frustrating, but at least we have the trusty log burner to huddle round on these cold spring evenings, and by day, all the front windows face the morning sun, should it care to shine. And so, muddle and all, it feels like a happy house. Upwards and onwards…

Bishops Castle Days

At last. Three days of fine weather, days that feel like spring. Days for sowing seeds – Tuscan kale, Swiss chard, spinach, carrots, cauliflowers, leeks…

…for digging up the lawn and mowing what’s left of it…

…for tackling the ‘hedge of iniquity’ that runs the length of the back garden, extracting the tangle of ivy, holly, privet, hawthorn, sycamore and ash from the chicken wire that some erstwhile inhabitant has laid along the entire inner perimeter so creating an interweaving thicket of manic vegetable intensity that is impossible to cut properly. Meanwhile, inside the hedge the ivy has grown stems as thick as mooring ropes, looping and leaning, causing the holly to loop and lean too and think it is a creeper…

But I’m dealing with it calmly – one snip at a time. The only problem is my presence hedge-side keeps the sparrows away from their feeding station, and at the moment they are ravenous. I’m giving them a break while I write this post.

For the last few weeks, through chilling winds, frost, rain and rare bursts of sunshine, we’ve been blessed with cherry blossom. Not our tree, but one growing just over the hedge near the back door. Now, the flowers are fading and falling and when we go outside, we’re sifted with tiny petals. The terrace flagstones too. It looks like confetti.

But our own small cherry tree has begun to flower. It’s a Japanese variety, Kojo-no-mai, more of a shrub than a tree, and in time growing to around seven feet high and wide. It will be fine in a pot until the garden is finally ready for it. (Which won’t be soon). And while it’s so small, it can best show itself off on the terrace wall, where the honey bees have already found it. In fact as I was busy transplanting a Dame’s Violet (brought from the Wenlock garden) in the bed behind it, I suddenly realised my head was filled with bee-hum. Happy bees.

As I work in the garden I lose track of time. This is a special Bishops Castle feature, the locals tell us. I hear the Town Hall clock strike the quarters between the hours: one chime for a quarter past, two for half past, three for quarter to. You can see the dilemma.

Sometimes a red kite drifts up and up over the garden. I feel myself lift and drift a little too.

We’ve become avid sparrow watchers since we set up the bird feeding station. This was created from an existing tall post (of no obvious purpose) that rises from the hedge of iniquity, and seems to belong to the era of the dreaded chicken wire application. Anyway, it’s good for suspending feeders, and we can covertly watch the birds from the kitchen window. I like the way they pop in and out of the hedge.

Mostly, they’re good at taking turns.

Lately, with the drier weather, dust bathing is the thing. The sunny front garden is a favourite spot. We’ve lifted all the ugly paving slabs that covered the two borders, leaving a skim of loose mortar on the soil. Ideal for synchronous avine plunging and dousing. On Monday, over lunch, we watched four go at once: essence of sparrow-joy as they worked the dirt through all their feathers. Later, as I go out to the shop, I spot the four neat little hollows left behind. There’s an inclination to cup my hands and gather one up. Yes. Sparrow-joy. There’s much to be said for it.

Happy Spring , North-dwellers

P.S. As I write this, scaffolding is going up around the house, a two-day job apparently. Next week the roof is coming off. Heavens!

Here In The Marches, March Comes In Like A Lion

And we can only hope that old country lore comes up to snuff when it says that March coming in like a lion, goes out like a lamb. It can’t be too soon for some lamb-weather either. At least yesterday, after I’d taken this first photo of Ragleth Hill, the sun came out and melted the snow. But it was a one day wonder. Today, after more overnight frost, the wind is roaring round the house and down the chimneys and it’s wet, wet, wet. Downcast daffodils all round.

So, Weather Gods, more skies like this, please. (You can hold on the snow).

Ragleth Hill, Church Stretton

The Weather In The Garden

So far this week at The Gables we’ve had frost, biting wind, and yesterday an all-day deluge with wall to wall gloom. But today, St. Valentine’s, the rain has held off. In fact it’s been almost warm, with a glimmering of sunshine, and up in the top garden this clump of seedling crocus was in full fanfare.

And not only that, Mr. Whippy, the ice-cream man, was back in town. Jangling rendition of O Sole Mio up and down streets. And then while I was snapping the crocus, along buzzed a honey bee, the first I’ve seen and heard this year.

Anyone would think it was spring.

But then February can be a tricksy month in England, ambushing us with a day of sudden warmth, only to whip up more icy blasts just when we’ve been daft enough to cast off our thickest winter woolly.

So: best not to count one’s spring chickens too soon.

This bee, though, is definitely seizing the moment, making the most of fine weather, and a rich pollen harvest. (Note the gathering sac on the rear leg; full pollen facial thrown in). What’s not to love.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Lens-Artists: Weather This week Anne at Slow Shutter Speed has us weather watching. Plenty to inspire us in her lively photo essay.

Tish Farrell

Writer on the Edge