Isn't Northumberland beautiful!

It's our second day in Northumberland today and we just had a short

We saw real curlews as well as mascot ones 

local walk from Low Hedgeley to Powburn to Branton and back around. Some of the walk was along the pretty River Breamish where there are bold yellow and purple flowers out in bloom. I braved crossing a seriously scary footbridge and we marvelled at the engineering involved in making a large salmon leap for what seems, at this time of year, to be a pretty small river. The footpaths are well signposted but have an odd habit of petering out mid-field and we found ourselves disagreeing with our Ordnance Survey map a few times! We have not yet set foot in the Powburn Emporium as we got back there just too late today. However, the Londis next door, which I expected to be just a petrol forecourt shop, actually has a good range of fresh food - meat, fruit and vegetables - as well as general groceries. Our local specialty of the week is the Border Tart - a mix of currants, sultanas, coconut and cherries in a pastry case and topped with white icing. The one we tried was baked by Trotters Family Bakers. In a change from many specialty dishes that aren't all that special, the Border Tart is really tasty and I think we might even splash out again!

Trotters' Border Tart

Yesterday was gorgeously sunny and we walked a good ten miles across

What a view! 

wonderfully varied landscapes in a big loop starting and ending in a nice free car park at the nearby village on Ingram. On the way there we saw a hare squeezing itself under a metal barred gate. Dave slowed the car right down as we passed and it stared back at us from only a few feet away! Huge eyes! Our later sightings of rabbits weren't nearly so exciting although they were remarkably chilled out about us getting close to them too. We also saw curlews, the emblem of the Northumberland National Park, skylarks and swallows, a couple of different species of bees and a few pretty butterflies. Most of the moorland here is bracken rather than the heather we saw in the North York Moors. Grouse are still raised here to be shot though and I startled one into making a loud and undignified escape!

Much of our route yesterday was over Open Access land, criss crossed

Dave's fort is a bit of a doer-upper 

with official footpaths and bridleways as well as random tracks in all directions. Fortunately Dave has got his phone GPS to work so our few wrong path choices were quickly rectified. Several settlements and a couple of forts were marked on the map and Dave is looking out for marauders from the ruined walls of one fort here. I am not exactly sure what all the stones are for in the picture below. The map indicated a settlement and perhaps the large stone in the centre was a doorstone or lintel. The ground looked to be hollow underneath it. Suggestions, if any, in the Comments please!

Not sure what this is or once was 

There are lots and lots of sheep here, mostly out on the open land

Another huge view -
my phone camera doesn't do this area justice 

together with herds of cows and their new calves. I found it much less nerve racking to pass the cows when they are not fenced in. Wide berths are easier! The Northumberland National Park is very green and lush which I wasn't expecting. I suppose I had imagined an even more rugged version of the Peak District and the North York Moors, however now we are here, I am reminded of our Scottish walks from Oban. The hills are rounded and there are boggy parts with coarse grasses. Dave kept his nice new boots dry, but I managed to sink almost over the tops of mine once. Fortunately the water wasn't muddy - just wet! We also passed small areas of managed woodland and a few incredibly isolated stone farmhouses. I love the building stone and the architecture used around here. The buildings look solid and eternal, but also elegant. There's a pretty cottage only a few minutes from this campsite which is only £115,000 ... !

We have two weeks here before we move on again and we are hoping to

see much more of the local countryside. Tomorrow I think we will have an easy day and just visit Wooler for a spot of shopping. Then off moorwards again on Tuesday with a picnic lunch. Weatherwise it is supposed to be a good week so I might even add to yesterday's sunburn! The guy on the next pitch lent us a book of short (5 mile) Northumbrian walks so Dave has noted down the ones nearest this campsite. Roseberry Topping was in there so we could already put a tick by that one in our minds. Happy Valley looks a pretty place to visit and we are also considering whether to to go to Lindisfarne and walk across the causeway. Having recently heard about the long-ago Viking attacks there, it would be interesting to actually see the site. There are so many places and so little time though. We are discovering the great paradox of travelling is that the more places we visit, the more we learn exist so, instead of slowly working through all the sites we want to visit and eventually finishing, we just keep adding more and more to the list!

The River Breamish 

-->

We cross the Tees and the Tyne

In our continuing journey northwards through England we crossed two

Pitched up at Low Hedgeley 

iconic rivers yesterday - the Tees and the Tyne. We also caught a glimpse of the Angel Of The North from the roadworks on the A1. I hope Dave managed to snap a clear enough photo from the passenger seat as we drove past, but the sculpture is quite obscured by trees so he only had a few seconds in which to do so. We drove for a couple of hours and are now on a Caravan Club CL at Low Hedgeley, just outside Powburn. The site is very neat with a water tap and electricity on each pitch, and the usual waste facilities and recycling bins. It is a pound more expensive than at Great Busby (£13 a night here), but we do have the additional extra of a toilet room, should we want to use it! The field is a bit slopy in all directions so getting ourselves level took a while. However, once the rain cleared, we got our new awning put up in a fraction of the time of our first attempt - only forty minutes from opening the car boot to hammering the final peg this time. Can you see Dave's celebratory mug wave in the photo above? We chose to put the awning further back on Bailey this time so the front window is clear and we also have full access to the under-bed locker. The awning seems squarer in itself too and the caravan door doesn't block the super-wide awning door so we still have easy access.

Love the big windows 

I love the visibility from this awning. The view a way ahead is of this little

View from our pitch 

hill which we may or may not get to climb. Today we drove to Alnwick for a look around and to get some shopping. There were two nice butchers shops in town, plus a good cake shop! Parking looked like it would be impossible until we managed to stop and study a map outside Sainsburys and learned where the car park was hidden (hard left directly after the very narrow stone gateway as you head out of town. It's free parking). The local accents have changed again and now local people sound like my Grandma putting a long 'oo' sound into 'cook' and 'book'.

There is a teashop and general grocery emporium in Powburn and we

View the other way across our campsite 

should be able to take a walk there. Plus a footpath starts right from the gate of the farm here so we have no excuse for not getting 'out there'. A disused railway runs very close by as well but we can't see that it has been turned into a walking/cycle route (yet!). Wooler is supposed to be a nice little town for shopping and possibly cycle-able. It's a sunny evening here after a rainy start and a mostly grey day, so we are sitting on our loungers in the awning enjoying the warmth and thinking about all we might do and see over the next couple of weeks before we move on again. Bliss!

A quick end note: I have won another book! (As if I don't already have enough to be going on with!) This is Into The Fire by Manda Scott which is a historical novel about Joan Of Arc, and a signed copy too. Thanks to @followthehens on Twitter for picking my name out of her hat!

Our final North York Moors walk - Square Corner to Kepwick

We hope not our final walk here ever as the North York Moors are

The poshest 'shut the gate' sign we've seen so far 

gorgeous and we have hardly scratched the surface of walking opportunities in the area, but today was our last walk of our current three week stay. We don't know when we might be coming this way again. Dave found us an eight mile loop without too much in the way of really strenuous ups and downs which started not far outside the wonderfully named village of Osmotherley. There is a car park at Square Corner and, had we continued along its road for another mile or so, we would have joined our 15-mile-epic-walk route. Instead, today, we began our walk by setting out towards the hill called Black Hambleton.

Dave was sporting his new Meindl walking boots and Berghaus

Happy hiker! 

waterproof jacket, both of which we realised needed to be replaced after our rainy outing the other day! I love this photo of him looking so happy! As it turned out, he was equally happy by the time we got back because, despite my insisting that he carry his trainers all the way (just in case) his boots were comfortable with no rubs or blisters at all. Our walk was almost entirely on tracks - stony, chalky or gravelly. I was surprised at one point to see chalk grassland that looked incredibly similar to the South Downs. This was above the Forestry Commission site of Silton Wood which we skirted to begin with and walked back through the centre at the end. There wasn't much in the way of far-reaching views early on, although the neat stone wall in the way was quite an impressive sight in its own right.

Our lunch stop was in the village of Kepwick, just in front of the ever-so

Rhododendrons on the moors above Kepwick 

grand gates of Kepwick Hall. We had begun to see extensive areas of flowering rhododendrons on the hills above so I had thought there must have been a country mansion somewhere, but it was tricky to see clearly as it was set so far back from the path. We also saw a large area of disturbed ground just as we began to descend towards Kepwick. It reminded us of the abandoned flint mines at Grime's Graves and we wondered if these lumps and bumps were evidence of similar activity here.

Abandoned mine workings? 

Heading towards Silton from Kepwick, our route shrank to a narrow footpath across farmers fields. We were suspiciously observed by a half dozen cows with two young calves who didn't appreciate us crossing their field. Then we also found ourselves having to cross a field with a single bull in it. I am always a little nervy of cows and, especially, bulls, but this one looked quite young and disinterested in us!

Back on stony track again and ascending through Silton Forest we saw

Marking National Cycle Network
Route 65 

an amazing machine which was felling, stripping and sectioning pine trees - all in one operation and only needing one person at the controls. It was fascinating to watch. I also spotted a sculpted waymarker which was the spitting image of one on the Cuckoo Trail in Sussex. I had only really noticed its outline before and not read it closely. I learned that 1000 of these were put up all across the country on the then new National Cycle Network. That would explain the similarity! The markers were funded by the RBS and, much like the bank itself, are now looking a bit the worse for wear. Now, you have all signed the RBS petition I posted, haven't you?! It was remarkably muggy in the forest as we didn't get any of the breeze that we have been used to up on the moors. It was lovely to see sunshine through the branches though.

Our whole walk was about four and a half hours, including a reasonably leisurely lunch stop. We saw a few bees, a couple of butterflies including a beautiful blue one, a stoat or a weasel, a curlew (probably) and several swooping swallows. There were also more other walkers about on this route than we have seen since Roseberry Topping. Wednesday must be Walking Day around here! I will be sorry to leave the North York Moors. Brian at South View Farm campsite has been a good host and we wish him and his son all the best. Tomorrow (or today by the time I stop waffling and publish this) we are moving further north again. My next post will be from near to Alnwick! Perhaps Dave will stop serenading every walk with this song by then? Perhaps not. There are more moors in Northumberland!

The Polish Officer by Alan Furst / A Girl Is A Half-Formed Thing by Eimear McBride / Fade To Black by Tim McBain and L T Vargus

The Polish Officer by Alan Furst
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Buy the ebook from Amazon.co.uk
Buy the paperback from The Book Depository
Buy the paperback from Waterstones

The Polish Officer by Alan Furst was recommended and a copy given to us by our friend Dave Dyke. Set across Second World War Europe, the novel follows the activities of a Polish former-cartographer, Alexander de Milja, who has been recruited into their intelligence services.

I appreciated Furst's detailed descriptions of the towns and cities to which de Milja is sent. The atmosphere often almost crackled with tension and I was interested to read of the beginnings of the war from a non-British viewpoint. I have always been encouraged to believe that Britain leapt into the fray as soon as Poland fell, and it was only the Americans who dithered. It would seem that we weren't exactly quick off the mark ourselves. Furst cleverly includes fascinating minutiae without slowing the pace of his tale - how to locate a wireless operator, why peasant women might be paid to collect rags - which adds to the convincing authenticity and from a historical point of view, I very much enjoyed this book.

My problem with it was our protagonist, de Milja. Most of the other characters are static, while de Milja travels constantly, so we only meet them briefly and I found it difficult to gain much sense of them as real people. De Milja often doesn't know much of their backstory so neither do we. Unfortunately, de Milja doesn't give away much about himself either. In order to succeed in his new career and identities, he needs to be aloof which makes him difficult to empathise with. And the deeper he gets, the more detached he becomes. By the time we get to Russia, I wasn't actually bothered about him at all and had no emotional involvement remaining in the story. As it turned out, this was a good thing because the story just stops, presumably to be continued in a sequel, which is one of my real pet hates! Authors: please write proper endings!

A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing by Eimear McBride
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Buy the audiobook download from Audible via Amazon.co.uk
Buy the paperback from The Book Depository
Buy the audiobook from Waterstones.

The Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction 2015 has recently been announced which seemed like the perfect time for me to get around to the 2014 winner, A Girl Is A Half-Formed Thing by Eimear McBride. I have read that it took ages and plenty of refused submissions before McBride found herself a publisher and I can understand that in a way. This is not an easy novel, not in its language or in its subject matter. I think that it is brilliant though!

I downloaded A Girl Is A Half-Formed Thing from Audible as an audiobook and believe that this is the perfect way to experience this book. As I already mentioned, the language is not easy. It is written from the point of view of an unnamed young woman who speaks directly to the reader as though she was actually speaking - confessing or recounting - so there are stops and starts, part sentences, abrupt exclamations - at times it could even be poetry. This all makes perfect sense when actually narrated, especially as my audiobook was narrated by McBride herself, but I think it could be extremely hard work to follow as prose. If my review tempts you to try this book yourself, get spoken word!

McBride sweeps many themes into her work. This is an angry scream of a novel encompassing child abuse, rape, the insanity and hypocrisy of religious fanaticism and the intense pain of losing the person we love most. The central family is fractured and violently dysfunctional, yet keep returning to each other despite the pain and guilt this incurs. McBride has written perhaps the most realistic literary portrayal of a rape I have ever encountered and completely understands the self-destruction of her protagonist. Practically every character is shocking, believably real, and I am sure that A Girl will be a novel I will think back to repeatedly over the coming weeks. It requires effort and emotional strength from its readers (and listeners), but is well worth the time put in. An outrageously powerful book.


Fade to Black by Tim McBain and L T Vargus
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Buy the ebook from Amazon.co.uk
Buy the paperback from The Book Depository

I have already read one McBain and Vargus novel, Casting Shadows Everywhere, and thought it good enough that, when I saw a box set of their new Awake In The Dark trilogy on sale at 99p as a newsletter promotion, I would give it a try. The first in the trilogy is Fade To Black.

I enjoyed the beginning with its graphic and detailed description of what might be real or might be a bizarre dream as our hero, the implausibly named Jeff Grobnagger, finds himself hanging by his ankle and needing to escape from a hooded murderer. Again. Unfortunately, this is as good as it gets and I struggled to get more from the book. Jeff's backstory is tragic, but only stated and not really explored in his character. He repeatedly tells us he is a loner, yet clings to a new-found friend, Glenn, who doesn't really have a character but seems to exist to explain philosophical ideas to the reader. He makes lots of long speeches!

For a short novella length book, a fair bit of the prose is repetitive, but it's nicely written for an easy read with no indie-curse typos (although chapter 17 is repeated). However, I didn't like the frequent plot holes and several scenes stop rather than end - at one point gunshots are fired through Jeff's windows. Then he arrives at Glenn's house. How did Jeff escape? Weren't the villains waiting for him to exit? Was it just a random drive-by? More attention I think needs to be paid to flow as the pace varies from chapter to chapter and the story often jumps forward with minimal, if any, explanation. Then the whole thing stops, abruptly, and that's the end of Fade To Black.

I am sure that pertinent details are set to be revealed in the rest of the trilogy and beyond into at least a fourth book so far. This is probably why Fade To Black is effectively just a prologue and not a story in its own right. However, I am irritated enough by the assumption that, having started a series, readers will obediently shell out for several books in order to get one complete story, that I probably won't bother reading even the rest of what I already have. Disappointing.


View all my reviews on Stephanie Jane or on Goodreads

We go walking In The Rain! Clay Bank to Bloworth Crossing

Those of you who know us well will already know that we simply don't

Do weather, but after three days stuck indoors avoiding showers and chilly winds even Dave was ready to brave the elements. Dressed in all the waterproof gear we own, we drove to the Forestry Commission car park at Clay Bank, overshot it, and parked in the next large layby just before the spot where the Cleveland Way crosses the B1257. We swapped cheery hellos with a family picnicking in the layby - in the rain - and took the Cleveland Way uphill towards Bloworth Crossing. Our plan was a ten mile loop although, at this point, I wouldn't have been surprised if Dave had already starting suggesting going home. It's no fun when your glasses are permanently blurred with water.

Instead we followed the practically-cobbled Cleveland Way up into the

Not a great day for views 

clouds. Actually into clouds! The wind did get stronger as we ascended but it was still warm and we were both wishing we weren't quite so well dressed by the time we got to the top. Dave had also begun to suspect that his waterproof coat was no longer as waterproof as it had once been. The track was very clear which was fortunate as visibility was down to probably about 100m along the top and I was fascinated by the swirling cloud that I could feel on my face as we walked through it. Wildlife wasn't as obvious as usual. We did see skylarks, what we are calling a curlew, a couple of rabbits, and several grim-looking sheep. This was my first time out with my new walking poles and I am very pleased with them. Not having had shock absorbers on my last pair, that give took a bit of getting used to, but once I got the hang of it they were great.

Our route called us to take a right turn but we couldn't find it anywhere,

I'm sure that cloud is chasing us! 

so we continued on the Cleveland Way to Bloworth Crossing. This used to be where a railway - from ironstone mines on the moors to Battersby - crossed an ancient drove road. Vintage photographs online show a dozen or so railway workers cottages in a small settlement. However now there is only a small information placard there. Another way to our missing path should have materialised just after Bloworth Crossing, but we chose not to go that way because it was just a faint sheep trail setting out across the moors. We were concerned that if we lost sight of Bloworth Crossing and the Cleveland Way, and then the tiny path petered out, we could get ourselves very lost indeed. We do walk with phone GPS and an Ordnance Survey map, plus we had our lunch and a flask of coffee, so it was tempting to stride out regardless. Commonsense won the day though so we paused to eat our sandwiches before turning back the way we had come. We would still have a respectable seven mile walk and were pretty proud of ourselves for being there at all!

We saw our first Other Walkers on the return leg - a group of nine who

Not so happy here 

loomed up out of the mist like something out of a zombie movie. Their expressions ranged from cheerful to wry to miserable. I loved this stone marker, engraved at some point in the past with the North York Moors equivalent of a smiley face, and the centre of a bridleway sign informed us that we were temporarily on the Wainwright Coast To Coast walk. Did Julia Bradbury ever do that one for TV?

The rain had let up by this time leaving us just with the swirling clouds to contend with. Our path did suddenly become more popular though and we were overtaken by two more walkers, a fell runner and a mountain biker on the steep downhill back to our car. Going downhill also allowed us a sudden improvement in visibility as we came out below the cloud level again. Dave says the mist's effect was more intense but similar to his experience of a cataract. Scary stuff.

Wainwright's Coast to Coast Walk 

Our walk was just under four hours all told and we were pleased with that. I liked having seen the moors 'under their duvet' this one time, but the lack of distant views did make for a very different walk and we both agreed we prefer being able to see for miles. We didn't get too cold and I stayed nice and dry. Poor Dave ended up soggy through both his coat and his boots though so we are now considering whether to make a return visit to Go Outdoors for replacements (there's a sale on!) or whether just to never walk in the rain again!

I'll finish up by saying Congratulations to everyone who has been doing the Refugee Tales Walk this past week - 'a Walk in solidarity with Refugees and Detainees'. Our friend Andy had signed up to walk the 80 miles from Dover to Crawley and I think the group should be arriving at their destination tomorrow.

Still smiling at Bloworth Crossing 

North York Moors walk to Commondale

I'm backtracking a couple of days now in order to tell you about a walk

Our moor path 

we did on Monday. It was about eight miles in all and, at its farthest point, took in the very pretty village of Commondale. We started by parking in a big layby off the A171. (Just past Charltons heading towards Whitby the road splits to climb a hill. At the top, as the road merges again is the layby. Parking is free plus there's lots of room and a tea van!) We crossed over the A171 and started along the clearly signposted footpath. Grass and earth at first, once the ground becomes boggy someone has kindly laid lots and lots of slabs to walk upon so we had both a dry path and a clear view of it heading away over the horizon. I do love a path that looks to continue forever! The volume of water was a surprise to us as our previous walks around this area have been on noticeably dry terrain. This moor had little becks and pools, one of which had a miniature waterfall trickling into it and this stunning orange plant growing under the water. We commented that most of the water had a brownish tinge to it and this reminded us of our first holiday in Scotland. We stayed in a rural log cabin near Oban.

Anyone know what this stunning
orange plant is? 

Our lunch stop was a little early, but in the shelter of the valley. We

Stained glass windows at Commondale church 

descended a road through Sandhill Bank which looks like an abandoned quarry, and sat on a bench in the middle of Commondale. Commondale used to be a brickmaking village which is why their church is so different from any others around here. The red bricks glow in the sun and I love their trio of stained glass windows. Sheep and chickens wander at will through the village and I saw one plaintive 'please shut the gate' sign because 'sheep eat my garden'. A couple of little cottages there are for sale and we were particularly taken with one that has access to the beck!

Back uphill after lunch and 'Meml' on our Ordnance Survey map turned

War memorial near Commongate 

out to be this elegant memorial for two First World War soldiers, presumably local men. The stone is well away from the village and completely surrounded by moorland, but had a relatively recent wreath at its base so is obviously still a place of remembrance. We disturbed several grouse which flapped off squawking indignantly and got us pondering a question: do people 'grouse' because it sounds like the bird, or are the birds so named because of their disgruntled cries? The Online Etymological Dictionary notes a possible Old French root for the human action, but not for the bird name. On a roll, we also considered whether 'pharmacy' and 'farm' have the same origins. 'Pharma' is definitely from Greek and 'farm' must come from the French 'ferme', but does 'ferme' come from an original Greek meaning for the domestic growing of plants for medicinal purposes? Or do they just sound the same in modern English? It turns out that I need a different dictionary to answer that one, but 'farm' in an agricultural sense is pretty recent so it's probably just coincidental! I love language!

Although this walk was only just over half of our previous fifteen mile epic, we both found it more tiring which baffled us. Perhaps a greater proportion being uphill was the reason, perhaps the stronger wind at times, or perhaps just one of those random walking occurrences! Not including our lunch stop, we were on the move for just under four hours. Our car was patiently waiting in the layby, but the tea van had already shut up shop. I really need to remember our thermos before we set out, not at the point where I want a hot drink.

Beautiful moors and a tiny Dave 

We buy an inflatable awning! Outdoor-Revolution Compact AirLite 340

We've spent rather a lot of money today - mostly at Teesside Caravans

Our new awning looking rather smart 

with a little at Go Outdoors too! No doubt you've all been on tenterhooks since the demise of our Towsure porch awning, eager to know with what we might replace it. No? Oh well, I'm going to write about it anyway!

Dave did all the research this time around. We considered another basic porch awning, a full-size awning, and a new-fangled inflatable awning. Our choice is limited by the odd door placement on the Bailey Orion which means that the back poles generally need to go right across the windows - which bow outwards - so the awning doesn't sit flush to the caravan side. A full awning would solve this, but they are generally heavy and look a faff to put up so Dave decided to focus on the new style inflatables. They don't have back poles - although we learned today that poles are an optional extra - and are supposed to be so quick to erect and dismantle that it would be easy for us to do this when strong winds are again forecast. Several companies now do versions but it is difficult to decide between them based on small photographs. Luckily, we are near a huge caravan shop and showroom, Teesside Caravans, which has awnings actually put up for customers to see. Dave measured outside Bailey and calculated that we could fit the mid-size 340cm Outdoor-Revolution models, gaining ourselves nearly a metre more space.

Standing inside our chosen Outdoor-Revolution Compact AirLite 340

And from the other side! 

allowed us to appreciate just how big it is! The fabric is much sturdier and I love the huge window panels. The doors are very wide with the option to have them all open or just half way.There are triangular 'sunroof' panels too so it feels light, and adaptable ventilation at the corners helps with airiness. The Awning Guy at Teesside was very helpful and happy to spend time explaining the features and also demonstrating how the air-filled pillars work. We got lucky as well because the shop has some factory seconds at £649 instead of the rrp of £749. The only fault is a little discolouration in places on the pale panels and all guarantees etc still stand. We talked about whether the marks would be irritating long term and decided, for the sake of £100, we could ignore them!

Having got our new awning home we discovered that the speedy putting

It came out, but will it ever go back in? 

up only actually applies to the main shell - which did go up within just a couple of minutes. What took absolutely ages, although should be a breeze once we get the hang of it, is pegging down the back pads so that they don't gape away from the caravan sides. It took us several attempts to work out exactly which strap is the best in which direction. Also, we hadn't fully considered that putting the awning over far enough to allow Bailey's door to rest in its catch means the awning end is just into the awning rail's downward curve. So one of our inflatable poles is at a screwy angle, making the gaping side even trickier to overcome. I think next time we put it up, we will move a foot or so further towards the back. The door won't then open all the way, but that's not really a problem and the awning pole should then be straight. The two inflatable bracing poles are far easier to use than their metal counterparts and only need one person to install them. Unfortunately one of ours keeps going flat so we think it must have a puncture or a dodgy seam. Dave is going to try and find the fault later, but we might need to take it back to swap for a good one. On the whole though, we are happy with our new awning and know from experience that we will learn its tricks and short cuts! And I am sure we entertained the other campers here for a while!

Teesside Caravans is only about five miles from a branch of my new

Super comfy trews 

favourite shop, Go Outdoors. It was such hassle to find a pair of convertable trousers that I liked that, now adoring my super-comfortable HiGear Nebraska ones, I thought I should buy and stash a second pair for when the first ones wear out. I also wanted new walking poles as the joints are shot in mine and they keep telescoping at inopportune moments! A timely email from the Camping and Caravanning Club had announced a new discount of 10% for members at Go Outdoors too. It only applies to the Discount Card price so you have to already have a Go Outdoors Discount Card, and isn't added on sale items. I got an extra £1.59 off my trousers bringing them down to £14.40, but the HiGear Walker poles I chose were already on special at a pair for a tenner. They are a little heavier than my knackered pair - which should mean extra anti-bingo-wing exercise! - and have antishock which the TrekRites didn't. I'm looking forward to trying them out on our next walk sometime soon.

My longest walk ever: 15 miles across the North York Moors

It seems that Dave tempted fate recently. In a conversation with our

Cairn at the top of the hill above Chop Gate 

friends Chris and Marta he mentioned our then recent 10 mile walk and said that we'd never equal their recent 15 miles. About a week later, and with a combination of gorgeous sunshine and stunning scenery, we did! The North York Moors are a fabulous place to walk. Clicking this link will take you to a Google map of the route we actually walked - as opposed to the one we planned. Several of the paths wind more than the straight lines imply so we are confident of more than 15 miles 'on the ground'. We took a picnic lunch, should also have taken an afternoon snack, and the walk was just over seven hours plus twenty-five minutes for lunch.

Dave had planned us an eightish-mile route starting in the village of

View back downhill to Chop Gate 

Chop Gate. Their village hall car park is accessible to walkers and I loved their Pay And Display system: take a numbered ticket as if for a supermarket deli counter and drop a pound coin into the box. Just a pound! Brilliant! Our route started uphill straight from the car park and we jockeyed for position several times on the climb with another couple who had parked at the same time and were following a five-mile route cut from the Northern Echo newspaper. All our best walks seem to start with a knackering incline. This one was half an hour and very steep in places, but with a cushioned grassy surface. The cairn in the first photo was a welcome sight marking the top of the hill, yet, strangely, looked somehow different at the day's end so we weren't sure of our descent!

We walked on mostly sandy paths and saw dozens of hides for grouse

Babbling brook 

shooting parties as well as what looked like cat litter trays everywhere which we assumed were also grouse-related. We did also see several of the birds themselves - they seem just as daft as pheasants. Babbling brooks were remarkable by their absence - we only spotted a couple including this one and another by Rye Farm where we perched on a convenient pile of cut logs to eat our lunch. Other bird sightings included lapwings, curlews (probably) and another peregrine falcon. This one flew low over us so we got a very good look. There were skylarks everywhere and I enjoyed listening to their songs tumbling from the wide blue sky. It was very hot at times so our carefully packed fleece jackets weren't needed at all and I actually ended up with a little sunburn! Sunburn in June? Who'd have thought it! An unexpected 'No Entry' sign started us on a detour which we then compounded by adding a good burst of enthusiasm. During the day we managed to walk 'off map' from two sides which made navigation interesting and which wasn't helped by an almost complete lack of phone signal. Were we downhearted though? Surprisingly not (much)! A tall mast provided a visible anchor and we just kept striding out enjoying the fabulous views and colours around us.

We were both tired by the time we did get back to Chop Gate and,

I loved the colours in the heathers and lichens 

fortunately, the descent was a firm grassed surface which I could walk practically normally - instead of my usual Bambi-on-ice tiptoeing when faced with scree. We were confident of having got into double figures of miles, but didn't know for sure how far we had gone until Dave gmapped the route today. This was the longest walk I have ever done and is also the longest we have undertaken together. Dave did complete 15 miles previously - from Falmer to Alfriston - but said he felt much better physically this time. I think we both could have done more had we needed to, but it was a relief to see a waiting car!

I'll finish up talking about our walk with this great image of the moors

Oh look, more moor!

rolling off into the distance and please keep scrolling for an important petition underneath ...

I received the following email from SumOfUs this morning and it has made me pretty angry with not only the Conservatives but also everybody who voted them in! Scarcely back a minute and they are already starting to sell off taxpayers' assets at knock-down prices. Please sign the SumOfUs petition, then tweet or email your MP to protest this waste of Our Money, share and reshare on social media, and generally throw a right hissy fit! The extra £13bn we won't be getting could make a huge difference right across Britain and we need to act fast to have any chance of keeping it.

SumOfUs said

"By George, he's gone and done it. It's official:

George Osborne has just announced Britain's biggest ever privatisation. He's going ahead and selling off RBS at a loss of £13bn -- a huge loss to the taxpayer. It's part of the rush to privatise Britain -- an ideological move to hand over power and profit to corporations.

But, we own 79% of RBS.

Rather than selling off our stake at a loss to the bankers who got us into this mess in the first place, the government should be finding ways to make the bank work for the good of the nation and using this as an opportunity to fix our broken banking system.

Just as he's pushing through £12bn of welfare cuts that will hit the poorest and most vulnerable in society, Osborne is prepared to sell RBS off at a £13bn loss. £13bn is enough to plug the gap, protecting our public services and preventing austerity."

Please sign and share now.

A Brief History Of The Vikings by Jonathan Clements / The Visible World by Mark Slouka / Epitaph For A Working Man by Erhard Von Buren

A Brief History of the Vikings: The Last Pagans or the First Modern Europeans? by Jonathan Clements
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

We chose not to visit the Jorvik Viking Centre when we were in York so I took the opportunity to plaster over a few of the gaps in my Viking history knowledge by downloading A Brief History Of The Vikings via Audible UK. I got lucky as this book was included in one of their 2 for 1 credit sales for members so it only actually cost just under £3! The information would easily be worth a full credit though.

A Brief History Of The Vikings is cram packed with names, dates and familial relationships. I would say that it is a male book because it concentrates on battles and power rather than giving much on how the various Viking societies lived their day to day lives. However, there is an interesting chapter about religious belief and later chapters touch on the violent forced conversions to Christianity from Paganism.

I was amazed by how far Viking influence spread during the three centuries of their 'heyday'. I already knew about the Danelaw that covered much of northern and eastern Britain for a long period, resulting in many modern-day people of that area tracing Scandinavian ancestry. It was interesting to learn more about this time and how the Viking Danelaw existed alongside the remaining Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. Viking traders and settlers were also recorded by the Spanish Moors, the Byzantine empire, as the Russ in Russia, and even building camps in the north Americas centuries before Columbus arrived.

A Brief History this book might be but, at a nine-hour listen and with so much information, I think it is one that could be returned to several times and might even take those several listens to determine exactly who is descended from whom!

Buy the paperback from Waterstones.


The Visible World by Mark Slouka
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Visible World by Mark Slouka is another paperback that my sister passed on to me. Set mostly in Prague, it is a fictional work that reads convincingly like a memoir so I wasn't ever completely sure how much might have been Slouka's real family and how much was imagined. The writing is beautiful and very atmospheric and I liked the dark undercurrent which kept me reading, dreading what was going to happen yet wanting to know all the same. The end of the wartime tale is even more emotional than I had imagined.

Slouka copes well with his dual time periods and both always feel real. I found the narrator's character the most difficult to pin down, while his father is certainly the most poignant I have read in quite a while. The Visible World is an interesting title as much of what happens is hidden, whether by passing years from our narrator, or by the need for secrecy even from close family during the war. The gradual uncovering of bravery, violence and passion keeps this novel interesting and it often seems to pose a question of its reader too: what would you have done?

Buy the paperback from Waterstones.


Epitaph for a Working Man by Erhard von Büren
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I received a copy of Epitaph For A Working Man from its publishers, Troubadour, via NetGalley, in exchange for my honest review. The novel, in this English translation, is due to be published on the 28th of June.

I was initially drawn to Epitaph For A Working Man by its striking cover art as well as its intriguing title. The book is quite short, more novella length than full novel, and this brevity suits its style. In the book we meet a Swiss family: our protagonist who is an unemployed son living with his wife who has a good enough job to support them both; and his elderly father who is partly disabled and living in an old people's home on the outskirts of town.

Von Buren's writing is economical and matter of fact which tempers his potentially overwhelming story. Essentially these are ordinary people to whom nothing outrageous happens, yet Von Buren has them deal with terminal illness, marital infidelity and the self-identity of the breadwinner. I liked the questions asked of society at large: the father is the one dying yet his doctor will only speak over his head to the son; the son cannot find work anywhere yet the father is casually employed on pocket money wages and has more work than he can manage: the wife's job pays well yet for her to be financially supporting a house-husband makes everyone, except her, uncomfortable.

I'm glad to have stumbled across Epitaph For A Working Man as it is a well-written, thought-provoking story. It is different and original and, although action story fans probably would not enjoy its slow, small pace, I would like to recommend it to those who like to try a more unusual read.

Pre-order the paperback from Waterstones.


View all my reviews on Goodreads

Micheline Robinson exhibition and a Wednesday in Whitby

For my readers in New Zealand, and I know from my stats that there are

a few from time to time, I would like to invite you to visit the Arts In Oxford gallery on South Island this month. I discovered artist Micheline Robinson via a randomly-spotted tweet, loved what I saw, and supported her Kickstarter campaign to get her work framed and transported ready for her first solo exhibition, Essence Of A Landscape, which is being held there. In return I received these four gorgeous cards. (Thanks to Gemma for posting them on.) The green works represent what Micheline is currently creating and I have put the one top-left, entitled Italian Garden, up on Bailey's wall. Unfortunately, for obvious reasons, we are unable to visit Essence Of A Landscape ourselves, but if you are more local, please drop in and pass on my regards! The exhibition started today, June the 10th, with its Gala opening this Saturday coming, and continues until July the 1st 2015.

We unexpectedly revisited the New Zealand theme in Whitby today, at the

20th century printed Tapa fabric from Fiji 

Captain Cook Memorial Museum which is a restored town house on the town's harbour. The young James Cook stayed here while he was apprenticed to the house's owner, Captain John Walker and the building is now an excellent small museum and reasonably priced at £4.80 for me. We were warmly greeted by an enthusiastic guide and enjoyed exploring the house. The museum contains lots of letters to and from Cook as well as fascinating early maps of the Pacific and Americas from when much of the coastlines was unknown. Two rooms are furnished in 18th century Quaker style. Best of all for me is the 2015 special exhibition in the attic of Polynesian and New Zealand traditional fabrics which included this finely woven cloak made of tree bark! The Polynesian Tapa fabric is also made of plant fibre, beaten to tissue paper thinness by hand and coloured by a process similar to delicate bronze rubbing. Amazing in a culture that had no metal tools, simply wood, bone, stone and plant fibres and good to learn that the skills are being rediscovered by artists such as Jo Torr.

Hand woven bark cloak 

Before the Cook Museum, we marched up the famous 199 steps and

Whitby Abbey 

through the grounds of St Mary's Church to reach the iconic ruins of Whitby Abbey. Another for our collection of places-destroyed-by-Henry-VIII, Whitby Abbey has a wonderful presence. Its skeletal remains tower far above visitors and I loved the way the sandstone pillars and blocks have eroded. The site is maintained by English Heritage and paying to get in is compulsory as the high stone wall all around obscures any good view otherwise! I didn't mind the £6.80 though as this is one place I very much wanted to see. The audio guide is informative, if a little twee, and I now want to learn more about the one-time Abbess, Aelfflaed and her mother, also a Whitby Abbess, Hilda. A few finds are on show in the Visitor Centre and we could walk freely around the Abbey where only the towers were blocked off. I can easily see how Bram Stoker could have been inspired here and plentiful copies of Dracula were on sale in the English Heritage shop!

Whitby Abbey 

I was disappointed not to see a single goth in Whitby, but it was a

Eroded pillar at Whitby Abbey 

gorgeously sunny day today so perhaps wouldn't have suited them! We took advantage of the new Park and Ride which has only been open since last year. The fare was £4.60 for us both - there is a bus pass concession if you know to take your card - and this was equivalent to four hours' parking in the town centre, but without the hassles of clogged streets and actually finding a space. Whitby is somewhere we decided we definitely don't want to live! It was very busy and I can only imagine the chaos on a sunny weekend or during high season. Our plan originally was to sample the Whitby fish and chips for lunch. There are many chippies to choose from, but most involved queuing or were large establishments that I wasn't sure could be as good as they claimed. We ended up in a pretty cafe called Crumbs and Cobbles where I had the rare treat of a veggie All Day Breakfast. It was delicious and so massive that I am still no hungry now and it's gone 9pm!

In 'other news', an email from Go Outdoors could well be of interest to other Camping And Caravanning Club members. If you have a Go Outdoors discount card and are a CCC member, you can now get an extra 10% off the discounted price and that's online as well as in store. Get shopping!

Poppies and cow parsley by Donkey Road, Whitby