DAY 22
Monday June
13th 2016
Annan to Grange
Over Sands, Cumbria Miles 173
Today I contemplated on the building of walls, rode on a train
and found an island ruled by a King.
The day started grey and overcast, later turning to heavy rain, but
ending the day with a dry and pleasant evening.
I set off from Annan and quickly entered Gretna Green, the
border town with England. When I was
growing up this was the Scottish town that young couples in England (under age
18) who wanted to defy their parents and get married without parental
permission, would elope to. Over time
the law changed in England so Gretna lost its “strategic purpose” and it fell
back into being just another border town. It is not an unpleasant little town,
but it seems to have no special appeal, other than the Outlet Mall built on the
English side of the town. This has a
collection of well known branded shops selling last year’s designs or
remaindered products, at prices which you assume must be a bargain as you are
buying them at an Outlet Mall.
I now took to the lanes so as to get to the Solway Firth coast. The road runs parallel for a little way with
the M6 motorway and thus a good plae for a haulier to have a depot. I was very interested to see a sign saying
“Stobart Café” and wondered whether this is a one off at a depot, or open to
all truckers. Eddie Stobart, as many of
you may know, has one of the largest haulage businesses in the UK, with
distinctive red and green trucks, drivers in uniform and the reputation of
being the “politest lorry drivers on the road”.
You can even buy models of his trucks in toyshops.
When I got to Bowness on Solway I was surprised to see signs
saying “When the water reaches this point the depth is one foot”. I stopped to take a photograph of the sign
(some even said two feet), which clearly showed that this road would flood on
certain tides. However, what is not
clear is where is the “point” on the sign that indicates the height of the
water. The sign in the photograph
actually stands four feet above the ground, so where then is the motorist
expected to read the water depth from?
Anyway the tide was well out when I was there and it had also not
started raining so I felt it was OK to proceed.
The whole of this area felt very bleak under the grey skies and
the flat open expense across the Firth, which was mainly muddy flats as the
tide was out. I personally could not
live in a place such as this, but obviously it appeals to others. There were
single properties looking out onto the estuary and also small farms and groups
of homes. In the little village of
Bowness about a dozen hikers were waiting at a bus stop to catch a bus to
somewhere. They had presumably stayed
overnight in a local B&B.
This area is actually the western end of the Hadrian’s Wall
trail. I was hoping to see some of the
wall, but none of it is obvious (or possibly even existing at this point). The Roman Emperor Hadrian had organized the
building of a wall right across England, from East to West to keep the Scots
from invading. This was the most
northerly part of the Roman Empire in Britain.
Quite a bit of the wall remains to the east of Carlisle, but I could not
see any where I was. The wall was built
around AD50, but today, 2000 years later and despite “civilization”, people are
still building walls, or fences, between countries and communities. The Berlin wall has now gone, but Israel is
building a wall between itself and Palestine.
There is a high fence between Mexico and the US, but if Donald Trump
gets elected he promises to turn this into a wall. We even have Brits (on the Internet)
promising to pay to build a wall between Canada and the US just to keep out all
the Americans who want to come to Canada if Trump is elected!
At Cardurnock there are a large number of very tall aerials that
I assume must be of military communication significance. In this day of cable TV they certainly can’t
be for television and based on the bad reception I was receiving they can’t be
for radio 4 either. It was just about this
point that I saw the unusual sight of about 50 or so sheep all walking in
single file. Possibly they were marching
along the top of Hadrian’s Wall and it was there after all, but I just couldn’t
see it.
I continued on until I reached Siloth. This is quite a large town and was obviously
adjacent to a wartime airfield that is now an industrial park. Surprisingly Samantha had no record of Siloth
on the GPS, but it was there right enough.
Indeed it was a real surprise.
The streets were cobbled and there was a fine park/green fronting onto
the waterside. The properties were large
and of a style that suggested merchants’ houses at one time. The other streets all appeared to be tree
lined. I saw a coach from Edinburgh that
no doubt had brought a party across to the town, presumably via the outlet mall
at Gretna.
I continued to follow the coast road reaching Maryport. Here there was road sign pointing the way to
“Tourist Attractions and Industrial Estate”.
Somehow they don’t seem to fit together.
At Flimby and then on to Workington things became very
industrial. There were long rows of wind
turbines on one side of the road and factories and tall chimneys on the
other. There was also land advertised as
available for building more, so clearly they’re not finished yet. By the time I got to Whitehaven the rain was
pouring down. This has a small harbor
and a Tesco overlooking it. I used the
facilities in the store and purchased some more fuel for the car. I am currently achieving 56 miles per gallon,
which I think is excellent seeing as how I am on minor roads most of the time
and rarely able to use the top two gears (this vehicle has 6).
From this industrial area I took the coastal road to the village
of St Bees. St Bees head is the most
north westerly point of England and has a lighthouse, but it was too murky to
see it clearly. This village is the only
piece of designated Heritage Coast between Wales and Scotland and is a Site of
Special Scientific Interest because of its large seabird colony. Although small, St Bees produced two
Archbishops during the Reign of Elizabeth I: one of Canterbury, Edmund Grindal
and one of York, Edwin Sandys. In 1981,
an archeological dig at the old priory revealed a vault containing a lead
coffin inside which was a very well preserved body of a knight, Sir Anthony de
Lucy who died in 1368 on a crusade in Lithuania. The skin, nails and stomach contents were
found to be in almost perfect condition.
St Bees is named after an Irish woman, Bega, who fled Ireland
rather than marry the son of the King of Norway to whom she had been
unwillingly betrothed. She felt that she
should save her body only for God. She
lived as a hermit on the beach at St Bees before traveling to Northumbria where
she entered into vows, and then later (possibly) returned and founded a convent
at St. Bees.
From St. Bees I continued on south to Seascale, which is the
sight of a nuclear decommissioning center and is currently decommissioning the
nuclear reactors from nearby Sellafield
and Windscale. Just below here at
Millom I was stopped at my first ever, manned level crossing. A man in a high visibility jacket stopped the
traffic and closed the gates. Then a goods
train came through at some speed. I
presumed that it was going to Seascale and was involved with the
decommissioning of the nuclear materials.
No doubt this is a manned crossing to ensure that there are no accidents
involving nuclear materials, which would not look good on the national news.
I had long heard about the Ravenglass and Eskdale narrow gauge
railway and felt that I should go and see this as I was in the area. When I got to Ravenglass it stooped raining
and a train was due to depart (on its 7 mile journey) within 2 minutes. I
wasn’t sure that I wanted to go but with only two minutes to make up my mind
and an hour before the next I quickly thought I would go for it. I sat in a covered but otherwise open
carriage. There were also open carriages
(all empty) and some fully enclosed ones.
I sat right at the very back of the train so could not see the engine. As we pulled out of the little station, the
skies opened up and the rain was torrential all the up the track to
Eskdale. Even the sheep that were
everywhere were trying to get out of the rain.
I was glad when we got to the end of the line and I just had time for a
cup of tea to warm me up before I caught the next rain back. I sat this time in a closed carriage, along
with the guard, who was very interesting to talk to and learn about the
railway. It was originally built to
carry stone from the Eskdale quarries down to Ravenglass where it was loaded
onto the main line trains to Barrow etc.
The line went into disuse in the late 1800s but was purchased in 1903
and the new owner changed the track from 30 to 15 inch gauge in 1906. In 1988 a preservation society purchased it
and they own and operate it to this day.
Along the railway line - a valley of rhododendrons
From Ravenglass I continued to follow the coast road through the
small town of Millom and on into Barrow-In-Furness. Barrow once boasted some of the biggest shipbuilding
yards in the country and built many of the Royal Navy’s ships. When the yards closed the town went into a
steep decline. Today however it is the
home of BAE Systems, whose business is armaments, aerospace and ships and from
the size of the ginormous windowless towers that dominate the town and the dock
area, it manufactures a lot of highly secret things here in Barrow.
BAE dominating the town bridge
Barrow faces onto and is joined to a large spit of land known as
the Isle of Walney. This island is about
6 miles long. Approximately 2 miles
offshore and running virtually the whole length of the island is another wind
turbine farm. There were more than I could
count. (It would no doubt drive a
Norfolk man to despair). This is the
largest wind farm that I have seen so far on my trip.
Between the isle of Walney and the southern end of Barrow is
Piel Island. This is one of those
idiosyncrasies of British life. The
island is owned by Barrow town and the council appoint a “King of Piel” who
takes over the administrative duties of the island (population 4) as well as
running the pub. The coronation of the
latest “King” was televised on the BBC, not quite to the same extent as for a
ruling British monarch, but it was featured on a TV series “Islands of Britain”
hosted by Martin Clunes (Doc Martin).
As I left Barrow I saw the only “Vote Remain” poster that I have
seen on all of my trip so far. The
referendum for Britain to vote to remain or to leave the EU will take place 10
days from now. I can understand at an
emotional level the desire to have Britain fully under its own sovereignty and
free of Brussels. But if Britain does
vote to leave the EU, I fear that the outcome will be a significant economic
downturn for Britain. The country has
been in the EU far too long to be able to extricate itself and be immediately
better off. The EU took a hard stance
against David Cameron’s threats to leave the EU unless Britain was given
significant concessions and not much seems to have been achieved by his
brinkmanship. However Cameron promised Britain a referendum and the EU having
given nothing of significance, the danger is that this will mean that the vote
to leave wins the day. Everyone,
including the EU, will likely be the worse for it. It may even result in the break up of the
United Kingdom as Scotland have said they want to remain in the EU and will
seek separation from England if the vote is to leave. Interesting times.
The journey from Barrow to my destination for today,
Grange-Over-Sands was a very pretty one.
It had by now stopped raining and it was a pleasant early evening. As I came into Ulverston I notice a very tall
lighthouse on a hill. Presumably it is
visible far out to sea and this hill was the highest piece of land on which to
site it, despite it being well inland.
Ulverstone with lighthouse on hill above
Ulverstone Lighthouse
Grange is a nice little town. It has only 4000 residents but with shops
providing everything someone would need.
There is a grocer, a baker, doctor, dentist, pharmacy. A pub, a church, an electrical shop, a
furniture shop and those little crafty and knick-knack shops so loved by
tourists. The high street only has three
or four visually “loud” signs, all food shops, apart from one, which is an
estate agent. There are also two bank
branches and a large Post Office here, which is unusual in that throughout
England, many banks and post offices have closed down their smaller branches.
My B&B tonight is one of the best I have stayed in so far
and is run by the Deputy Lord Mayor of the town, who tells me that their annual
budget for local services is 130,000 pounds, which is soon to be reduced, and
that 18,000 pounds of this goes on maintaining the toilets, hence they are now
charging for people to use them (like everywhere else). I suggested that they allow a Tesco to be
built on the edge of town and they could then close the toilets!
Tomorrow I head down the Lancashire coast and expect to spend
the night in North Wales.
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