2017 Revisited

Tags

crossbow, Doll's House Exhibition, Iceni artifacts, needlework, Norfolk, Norwich, Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery, stained glass, teapots

As I have mentioned before, we didn’t manage to do as much walking and we didn’t visit as many places as usual last year and, for the same reasons, I also didn’t write very many posts.  I have photos from the few excursions we did make and some pictures of interesting things I saw that I haven’t posted yet, so I thought I would put together some retrospective posts whenever I have spare time.

This is the first of a series of posts.

ooooOOoooo

Last spring, Elinor was asked to write about an exhibition she had visited.  Unfortunately, she hadn’t visited one for some time so we looked about us to see if there was anything on locally that appealed to her.  We were pleased to see that at the Castle Museum in Norwich there was an exhibition of doll’s houses – so that’s where we went.

The exhibits were difficult to photograph because of the lighting and the reflections from the glass cases.  Here is a slideshow of photos of some of the houses.

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Elinor stayed in the exhibition hall to sketch a few of the houses and make some notes while I wandered round the rest of the museum.  I spent some time in the art gallery where they have a fine collection of paintings and drawings by local artists: Gainsborough, Constable, Crome, Munnings, Seago and others.  I took no photographs there nor in the natural history section where there are a number of dioramas featuring lots of stuffed birds and animals mainly collected during the 19th century.  I don’t like stuffed birds and animals.

The museum has a collection of antique clothes and costumes which I enjoy seeing and also pieces of needlework and embroidery.

Here are some examples of Jacobean needlework and also a lovely lace collar.

I took a photograph of a splendid crossbow.

The museum has a large collection of teapots.  Here are some of them.

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I wandered through the Boudica and the Romans gallery and took some photos of a few of the artifacts that have been discovered.

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There are a few display cabinets in the large central area in the castle keep.

Castle keep

Castle keep

I like these examples of medieval stained glass.   Top left shows winter pruning, top right is a feast, bottom left shows a gardener hurrying indoors out of a spring rain or hail shower, bottom right shows a man harvesting bunches of grapes.

I had to go back to meet Elinor then before I’d finished the whole tour of the museum.  We returned a few weeks later with Richard so he could also see the exhibition and for Elinor to check on a few details.  We all enjoyed the exhibition very much.

Thanks for visiting!

 

King Street, Norwich

Tags

architecture, Dragon Hall, King Street, Lesser Black-backed Gull, medieval buildings, Norfolk, Norwich, redundant churches, River Wensum, St Etheldreda, St Peter Parmentergate, The Music House, Traveller's Joy, Wensum Lodge

It is some time since I wrote a post about Norwich and as my younger daughter Elinor has started attending some art courses in the city I thought I would share some  photographs I have taken recently.

Elinor is no longer at the City College so is attending art classes at Wensum Lodge which is owned by the City Council.

Main entrance to Wensum Lodge.

The City Council has converted old riverside buildings into classrooms and studios and this is where Elinor is learning Portraiture on Tuesday and Drawing and Painting on Saturday.  (She also goes to the Theatre Royal, Norwich every Thursday evening for drama classes.)

I love the soft red brick buildings and the cobbled yards.

More studios at Wensum Lodge.

Buildings at Wensum Lodge.

 The River Wensum flows through the centre of the city of Norwich.

The River Wensum seen from the rear of the art studio.

The River Wensum.

While Elinor studies, I take myself off and walk through the city.  Wensum Lodge is located in King Street which is full of ancient buildings and was inhabited by the richest merchants in medieval times.

Medieval buildings in King Street.

The entrance to Raven Yard

The lane going down towards the river is called Mountergate. There are new houses being built on the right.

Buildings of different heights and ages; shops, workshops and dwellings.

An attractive cottage in King Street with a courtyard beyond the gate.

Next to the cottage is the redundant church of St Peter Parmentergate now used as a martial arts academy.

‘Parmentergate’ means the street of the parmenters: parchment makers or leatherworkers.  As the word became obsolete the street name changed and became Mountergate but the church retained the original name.

I like the triangular gables on the roof of this building and the arched windows in the centre of the facade.

This is Stepping Lane off King Street

The Music House, the oldest private dwelling in Norwich. Sadly, it has been adorned with grafitti.

The Music House was built in the 12th century and in 1225, Isaac Jurnet, a member of one of the wealthiest Jewish families in England at the time, bought it from a man called John Curry.  During the reign of Elizabeth I the house became the headquarters of the Norwich waits and minstrels and thereafter became known as the Music House. The front you see in this photo is 17th century but behind the left hand gable are the remains of the 12th century building constructed at right-angles to the street.  This original 12th century building was extended later in that century, in 1175, with a north-south range where the current 17th century front stands, making an L-shaped building.  The new part consisted of a single-aisled hall with an undercroft (cellar, basement, storeroom) which was at ground level when built, but is lower now.  The aisle of the hall was removed in 1480 and another undercroft built.  Most of the hall was removed when the 17th century front was constructed.  The building is owned by the City Council and is part of the Wensum Lodge range and can be accessed from the inner yard.  Concerts are performed in the building.

More old buildings.

Entrance to a former inn.

Princes In(n).

Another redundant church, St Etheldreda’s which as you can see, is artist studios

St Etheldreda was a daughter of King Anna of East Anglia.  Anna had four daughters, all of whom were made saints.  Etheldreda founded a monastery on the Isle of Ely (in Cambridgeshire) and died there in 679.

I am surprised to find I didn’t photograph Dragon Hall this time, but below are some photos I took of the hall a couple of years ago.  

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The Dragon Hall dating from 1420, is a merchant’s hall which belonged to Robert Toppes who was made mayor of the city four times.  It is virtually unique in Western Europe in being a medieval trading hall built by an individual rather than a guild.  One of the spandrels in the roof of the grand hall upstairs is carved with the figure of a dragon.

I just can’t resist photographing plants! This is Traveller’s Joy or, as it’s also called, Old Man’s Beard (Clematis vitalba )

I also liked this gull on the roof of Wensum Lodge, though my camera insisted on focusing on the roof.

I believe the gull is a Lesser Black-backed Gull ( Larus fuscus) in its winter plumage.

 

Thanks for visiting!

I have used the following sites and books :

http://www.tournorfolk.co.uk/norwich.html

The Medieval Churches of the City of Norwich by Nicholas Groves

The Little Book of Norwich by Neil R Storey

Norwich by Stephen Browning

Harrap’s Wild Flowers by Simon Harrap

RSPB Complete Birds of Britain and Europe by Rob Hume

 

Highlights Part 3 Strumpshaw Fen

Tags

common meadow-rue, common twayblade, common valerian, Dame's-violet, dogwood, great crested grebe, green alkanet, grey heron, guelder rose, hemlock, hop, marsh thistle, milk-parsley, Mute Swan, Norfolk, Ragged Robin, River Yare, RSPB reserve, southern marsh-orchid, Strumpshaw Fen, the Broads, wild flowers, yellow water-lily, Yorkshire Fog

It was our 22nd wedding anniversary in June and instead of buying each other gifts we usually plan a day out that we will both enjoy.  We chose to visit Strumpshaw Fen  which is situated in the Broads.

Pond at Strumpshaw Fen

We had hoped to see all sorts of birds here and I had set my heart on finding a Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio machaon), as the Broads is the only place in the British Isles where they can be found.

Fenland

As was the case with many of our ventures last year, we didn’t have as successful a visit as we had hoped because the weather was miserable.  It was cold, wet and windy – not a day for viewing rare butterflies or the Norfolk Hawker dragonfly or any of the birds we had hoped to see.   However, we persevered with our walk round the reserve and saw a few things of interest.

A broad

Small fry – baby fish in the broad

Dogwood (Cornus sanguinea) in flower

A waterway in the fen

Yellow Water-lily (Nuphar lutea)

The flowers are much smaller than White Waterlily flowers being only 6 cm/2.5 ins across and are alcohol-scented apparently!

Mute Swan (Cygnus olor) with cygnets

Common Valerian (Valeriana officinalis) You can just see the pink flower-heads!

The River Yare

This might be Milk-parsley (Peucedanum palustre) the food plant of the Swallowtail caterpillar.

It might also be Hemlock! (Conium maculatum) They are both described as hairless biennials with purple-blotched stems.  Hemlock’s stems are hollow and purple-blotched and Milk-parsley has ridged stems that are often blotched purple!

Ridged purple-blotched stems?  I can’t decide!

More purple-blotched stems.

Hop (Humulus lupulus)

Dame’s-violet (Hesperis matronalis)

Guelder-rose (Viburnum opulus)

Common Meadow-rue (Thalictrum flavum)

Southern Marsh-orchid (Dactylorhiza praetermissa)

Ragged-robin (Lychnis flos-cuculi)

Marsh Thistle (Cirsium palustre)

A meadow full of Yorkshire Fog (Holcus lanatus)

The flower-heads of this grass are red-tipped and gave the meadow a pink glow!

Part of our walk was along Tinker’s Lane

Tinker’s Lane – looking back the way we’d come

Tinker’s Lane – looking ahead. Elinor is the figure in the far distance

Green Alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens)

Not a good photo of Common Twayblade (Neottia ovata) Though ‘common’ I had never seen this orchid before and was very pleased.

Common Twayblade

a Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea) that refused to look my way!

Great Crested Grebe (Podiceps cristatus)

We enjoyed our walk round the fen and were pleased with the amount of interesting plants we had seen.  I would like to return there this summer if possible to see the butterflies, dragonflies and birds we had intended seeing last year!

Thanks for visiting!

 

December 2016

Tags

Advent, Advent Crown, Cromer, Cromer Lifeboat, Cromer pier, fog, frost, mist, Norfolk, Norwich, Norwich Market, Rumburgh Church, Suffolk, sunset, Turnstone, walking, Westleton Heath

Before Christmastide draws to a close I thought I’d better write something about what we managed to do over the past few weeks.

This is the Advent Crown that Elinor and I made this Christmas. The first candle was lit on the first Sunday in Advent.

Norwich Market

Norwich Market

The 1st of December began with a frost (we had many frosty and foggy days in December) but by the time I had driven Elinor into Norwich for her afternoon classes at college it had clouded over and had become a little milder.  The light wasn’t really good enough for photographs but the city had recently put it’s decorations up and was looking festive, though these photos make it look rather gloomy!

During the whole month, unless I got to the city before 9.00 am, I was unable to find a parking space in any of the car-parks.  Norwich Council would like their visitors to arrive by train, bus, bike or on foot and don’t make it at all easy for car drivers.  There is very little public transport from where I live so we have to drive into town.  There are ‘park and ride’ places on the outskirts of the city but an acquaintance of mine queued for ages to get into the car-park and then waited an age with crowds of other shoppers for a bus  which was full before he got to it!  He returned home without doing his shopping.  I have discovered a roadside parking area near to the college where I get two hours free parking and which is only a fifteen minute walk away from the city centre!  This is where I had parked that day.  I had coffee and a sandwich in a café and did some Christmas shopping and then made my way back to my car.

The Coachmaker’s Arms

This former coaching inn is on St Stephen’s Road and was built in the 17th century on the site of an asylum.  The pub is said to be haunted.

An attractive frieze outside the pub showing what the inn might have looked like when first built.  It was near one of the many city gates

For most of the month, Richard was still unable to drive any distance and was very bored being at home all the time.  On the 2nd of December he joined Elinor and me in the car and after I had dropped Elinor off at college just before 9.00 am we drove to the north Norfolk coast and spent the morning in Cromer.

Cromer Pier

The tide was in.  Looking westward.

Looking towards the east.

This is a photo of a very tame Turnstone (Arenaria interpres) who had decided that a good living can be made by following visitors about and eating food crumbs. It behaved just like a feral pigeon!

We were so surprised to see this bird at such close quarters!  Normally they keep their distance from humans and find worms and molluscs etc. on the shore.

Cromer Pier

There was a large amount of spray coming off the sea

The sand and stones on the promenade show how high a recent tide had been

Boats out at sea

An off-shore wind-farm

A rainbow

Richard walking towards the beach changing rooms

Cromer cliffs

After walking along the front we then visited the pier.

View from the pier

Looking back towards the town

Cromer

We visited the Lifeboat station at the end of the pier

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Part of one of the boards listing all their call-outs. I chose this because I was born in 1958

This is one of the war-time boards

Richard in one of the shelters on the pier

‘The Wellington’ – one of the pubs in the town

Returning home from shopping the following week, Elinor and I marvelled at the beauty of this misty sunset

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Christmas flower arrangement around the font at our church at Rumburgh

Richard and I had a lot to do at church this Christmas.  At the beginning of the month we had an Advent Carol Service with all our favourite Advent hymns and Advent readings.  Usually we have a Carols and Capers service with the local Morris group and their friends at the beginning of the season but sadly they were unable to organise it this time.  We had a Christmas Carol service on the 21st of December and then our church hosted the Midnight Mass service on Christmas Eve too.

I had made an Advent Crown for church too

We went for a walk on Westleton Heath on Boxing Day

The gorse (Ulex europaeus) was in flower

In the autumn this area of heather is a rich purple colour

Alice, Elinor and Phil, Alice’s boyfriend who stayed with us this Christmas

Phil up a tree

Richard, walking without a stick now!

Trees on the heathland as dusk fell

Sunset

Melting frost on the outside of my bedroom window

These following photos were taken by Richard in our garden that same morning.

Hoar frost on a Hogweed seedhead

Hoar frost on rose leaves

Our big pond

Frost and fog

Frost and fog

Richard and I went out for a walk across the fields on New Year’s Eve.  The weather was very gloomy and I didn’t find much to photograph.

View across the fields

View across the fields

Yet another view!  Note the large toadstool – bottom right of the photo.

The large fungus!

And that was my December which also included Christmas celebrations with much cooking and baking, a lot of driving about, lots of shopping and an amazing amount of housework!

Thanks for visiting!

Norwich – Sir Thomas Browne

Tags

Anne and Patrick Poirer, art, Norfolk, Norwich, polymath, sculpture, Sir Thomas Browne, street furniture

As the weather hasn’t been conducive to photography recently, I decided to find and use some more of the pictures I have taken over the past year on my walks through Norwich.

Next to the Guildhall (mentioned in my recent Norwich post) is Norwich Market and on the further side of the Market Place is Hay Hill.

Statue of Sir Thomas Browne

Sir Thomas Browne, born 19th October 1605 in London, lived and worked in Norwich from 1636 until his death on 19th October 1682.  He was a polymath; a physician, a botanist and a writer.  He was well-educated, well-travelled, religious and very well-liked and respected in his time.  He wrote several important books and in doing so, coined many new words in the English language.

ambidextrous, antediluvian, analogous, approximate, ascetic, anomalous, carnivorous, coexistence, coma, compensate, computer, cryptography, cylindrical, disruption, ergotism, electricity, exhaustion, ferocious, follicle, generator, gymnastic, hallucination, herbaceous, holocaust, insecurity, indigenous, jocularity, literary, locomotion, medical, migrant, mucous, prairie, prostate, polarity, precocious, pubescent, therapeutic, suicide, ulterior, ultimate, veterinarian.

Sir Thomas Browne lived in the Hay Hill area nearly 400 years ago.  His house (which no longer stands) was in Orford Yard and he is buried in St Peter Mancroft church.  Both these places are next to Hay Hill.  He lived and worked slightly earlier in the same century as Samuel Pepys, who lived in London.

In 1671 King Charles II came to Norwich and viewed the city regiments from the balcony of the Guildhall.  Whilst he was in the city he knighted Thomas Browne and then dined with him on the first dolphin to be caught off the Norfolk coast.  This dolphin had been sent to Sir Thomas for his interest and dissection.

The statue of Sir Thomas Browne (see photo above) is by Henry Albert Pegram and it was commissioned to celebrate the 300th birthday of Sir Thomas.  The statue was unveiled on 19th October 1905 and huge crowds turned out to witness the ceremony. Pegram was also commissioned to make the memorial to Edith Cavell which stands outside the gate of Norwich Cathedral.

Edith Cavell Memorial

In the early years of this century the Hay Hill area of the city was looking a little run-down and untidy.  The authorities had wanted Anne and Patrick Poirer, a French husband and wife team of artists, to create a sculpture for the Marketplace when it was renovated but this hadn’t worked out.  They were therefore then asked to consider a commission for a sculpture on Hay Hill.  The couple researched the area and decided on a homage to Sir Thomas Browne.  This was a major public art commission, paid for by The Arts Council England East and Norwich City Council with a contribution from Norfolk County Council.  It was commissioned in 2005 and installed and opened officially in 2007.  The work was intended to be a set of street furniture; a living room for the city.

Homage to Sir Thomas Browne – street furniture

The sculpture was made in Pietrasanta in the foothills of the Carrara mountains in Tuscany, Italy.  This area is famous for it’s beautiful white marble; the granite used in this sculpture came from Zimbabwe.  (We visited Pietrasanta a couple of years ago while on holiday and enjoyed the best pizza and bruschetta we have ever tasted in a little café in the market place.)

There are twenty pieces of sculpture and twenty-two lights and all the pieces relate in some way to Sir Thomas.  Some of the pieces are made of marble and some of granite.  Some are polished and shiny and some are rough and matt.  All are intended to be sat upon.

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These pieces are arranged in a pattern known as a quinconce or quincunx, a five-pointed diamond shape which Sir Thomas believed existed throughout nature.  The pieces are also arranged in line with his home in Orford Yard and the place of his burial in St Peter Mancroft church.  Many of these pieces are inscribed with quotes from Sir Thomas using the original spelling.  At night the sculptures are lit with coloured lights set in the ground and which are part of the art-work.

The largest pieces are a marble brain and an eye carved in the classical style and refer to Sir Thomas as a thinker and to his approach to philosophy, religion and science.  There are five granite chairs,  two benches, three tables, six conical seats and two smaller pod seats which represent Sir Thomas’ interest in Botany.  The gold design on the back of some of the seats is the artists’ interpretation of the rooms of the brain – memory, creativity and intellect and the way they are linked together.

This area is well-used and in the summer many people sit here and eat their lunch or rest after doing their shopping.  Sadly, not many people understand its relevance or know who Sir Thomas Browne was!

Thanks for visiting!

 

Wells-Next-the-Sea

Tags

beach, Norfolk, pine woods, Rain, sand, sea, Wells-Next-the-Sea

Wells-Next-the-Sea

 

Last summer we visited the seaside town of Wells-Next-the-Sea in north Norfolk.  It is a very attractive little town with plenty of narrow, winding lanes, pretty cottages, interesting shops and a lovely wide green surrounded by elegant Georgian houses.  The place is very dear to me as I spent many holidays here as a girl.  It gets very crowded nowadays during the high-season and there is nowhere to park if you arrive after mid-morning.

Unfortunately, we set off rather late and stopped in Fakenham on the way to have lunch.

Fakenham is a pleasant market town in Norfolk

The place where we had our lunch.

 

 

Wells has a harbour but the beach is a mile away from the town and is reached by a narrow road and paths. There is a high bank next to the road which was built about 150 years ago to consolidate the channel that connects the sea to the harbour and also, I presume, to act as a sea defence.  The paths are on the sea-wall.  During the summer months there is also a narrow-gauge railway that shuttles holiday-makers to and from the beach.

View from the top of the bank, across the tidal waterway (called ‘The Run’ I believe) that connects the harbour with the open sea, to the mudflats and saltmarsh beyond.

 

We decided to forego the delights of the town and so drove along the road to the beach car-park at Pinewoods.  We found nowhere to park (of course!) so left Alice and Elinor there with our belongings and drove back to the town where there was an overflow car-park next to the playing field.  We thought we might return to the beach on the little train but we had just missed one and there was a long wait for the next.  We walked along the sea wall in the strong sunshine.  It was very warm work.

Looking towards the sea in the distance

A poor photograph of Viper’s-bugloss (Echium vulgare) that was growing at the side of the path

 

 

 

We found the girls and shared out the bags and chairs and started to walk through the pine woods to the beach.  I remember playing in these woods with my brother and sister over forty years ago when it was wilder and there were fewer designated paths through the dunes.  Red squirrels were still to be found there in the early 70’s but they were under great threat and had died out by the mid 1970’s I believe.  Sadly, I never saw a live red squirrel only a dead one.  At intervals along the path there are steep slopes and steps up to the top of the dunes from where you suddenly see miles of sandy beach and the sea in the distance.

A lovely sandy beach where one can find pretty shells and where jelly-fish swim in the shallow warm-water inlets

I love to see the pine trees so close to the sea.

 

 

We walked some way across the sand in the direction of the sea.  The tide goes out for miles here but when it turns, it rolls in very quickly and many people get stranded on sandbanks every year by not heeding the tide and not listening out for the warning siren.

The beach huts here are on stilts

More beach huts

 

 

As seems to be what happens to us whenever we visit this beach, no sooner had we settled ourselves on the sand when the wind picked up and large clouds appeared.  I was glad of my hat and coat.

What is known as ‘an interesting sky’.

A bit of cloudy sky didn’t put people off their relentless march towards the distant sea.

It’s okay! That raincloud isn’t coming this way!

It looks quite nice over there.

People began to make their way back towards the woods.

This is me! I was glad of the hat and coat.

A yacht going out to sea. Notice the off-shore windmills in the distance. These days it is rare to find a place where you can look out to sea and not see windmills.

The sea was getting rougher

There are always fishermen on the beach

The visibility was getting worse.

A buoy

Wet sand

When we saw this we reluctantly started back towards the pinewoods.

It began raining just as we reached the woods and rained very heavily while we walked under the trees.  It stopped eventually and we walked back along the sea wall to the car.