More walking yesterday afternoon. How many miles have I left to tread? If I were a car I think I would need a new engine by now. "But you're not a car!" snapped Clint as I left him to snooze by the bus shelter in Litton.
Through the cattle pastures and along the path that clings to the rim of Cressbrookdale. To my left, the slope was precipitous - rolling down through the trees to the valley bottom far below.
Just before I reached Cressbrook I spotted an American woman having a pee with her ten or eleven year old daughter keeping guard.. As I approached the Yank yanked up her khaki shorts. A bit further along, I met her baseball-capped husband and another blue-eyed daughter They were heading for Monsal Dale and they all had walking poles.
But I was heading for Ravensdale Cottages in the green heart of the valley. It had been seven years since I last passed by them. They were built in 1823 and housed lead miners and their families. It would have been a very peaceful place to live but the steep valley sides mean that the spot where they were built enjoys only limited direct sunlight each day.
The lead mines are all gone like the lead miners. Today half of Ravensdale Cottages are holiday rentals. I could hear some holidaymakers making conversation as I stopped to take pictures. Their front door was open for this was a time of day when the cottages were not in shadow. I didn't listen to what they were saying. It was just like bees humming.
When I got back to Litton I treated myself to a pint of bitter shandy in "The Red Lion" and it was as welcome as the potato crisps (American: potato chips) that I ordered with my drink. Twenty five minutes later I was back home. Another five miles plodded en route to oblivion.
Those cottages look like an interesting place to visit -- but I'm not sure I'd want to live in such a steep-sided, shadowy valley.
ReplyDeleteNo. Nor me Steve. By the way, the cottages are Grade II listed.
DeleteAlmost a Wainwrightesque account of your walk (I doubt he'd use the word "pee").
ReplyDeleteSh was an American lady. Perhaps I should have written "taking a squirt" or maybe a "leak" or even a "tasker"!
DeleteMy dad's usual term was "going for a Jimmy Riddle".
DeleteDid the Riddle family live nearby? Perhaps Mr Riddle would say, "I'm going for a Tasker Dunham".
DeleteThe shadow in a valley seems so bleak compared to a shaded area not in a valley
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like a sentence you have lifted from a dictionary of quotations. A metaphor for human life.
DeleteEvery time I duck off into the woods to pee now on my walks I will think, "I am having a pee."
ReplyDeleteWhat do you suppose the life expectancy was for a lead miner? For his family, for that matter. Kylie is certainly right- there is no hope of relief from the shadow in a valley until the next day's sliver of light.
Beautiful pictures.
If a lead miner reached the age of fifty he would have been both lucky and unusual.
DeleteI imagine it would have been quite gloomy living in those cottages, beautiful as they are.
ReplyDelete(Now I understand your comment on my post - you have obviously been thinking about peas/pees).
Ha-ha! Yes. How clever of you to make the connection!
DeleteThe village in the shadows must have been a dismal place to live.
ReplyDeleteIn winter especially it would have been damp in that valley but at least the cottages are sheltered from the wind.
DeleteThe cottages look pretty and picturesque with the kind of weather you had that day, but I imagine it a rather forbidding and bleak place to live in winter or even just on a grey, wet day. A quiet place for a holiday, but rather limiting for permanent living quarters.
ReplyDeleteAs they are listed, I suppose they cost quite a lot to rent. In fact, I think I shall look them up on the "Gorgeous Cottages" website I often browse just for fun.
"Gorgeous Cottages"? Don't you mean "Gorgeous Male Hunks"?
DeleteInteresting pictures. It almost looks like a scene out of a book or a movie. Photos like this could inspire tales of the past.
ReplyDeleteOnce upon a time and long ago, in Number 3 Ravensdale Cottages, there lived a sweet little girl called Bonnie Brown. She was sweet but she had a terrible secret to hide...
DeleteYou really have such beautiful scenery where you live.
ReplyDeleteBriony
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And I didn't see any other walkers apart from the little American family with the weeing mama. I wonder if Americans spray the ground with wee-wee wherever they travel.
Delete"On the way to oblivion" struck a rather dismal note at the end! I picture you walking each day, growing smaller and smaller on the horizon, until you just disappear :)
ReplyDeleteLike everyone else has commented, it must be somewhat hard to live with so little direct sunlight, especially on a cold day.
You have a vivid imagination Jenny... seeing me turning into a Lilliputian.
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