Beverley Festival Of Christmas 2018

A lovely sunny day visiting one of my favourite towns. A large impressive parish church, a minster, many dozens of market stalls, live street music everywhere, the smell of food everywhere as well...but too many people - I found it quite claustrophobic and threatening at times.

Our visit got off to a good start with free parking for the day.

After having a quick look at some of the stalls which were already trading we went into Wetherspoon's pub for breakfast - it was already quite busy.

St. Mary's Church was holding a craft fair; it was busy inside which restricted my angles and positions but I still got a few decent photographs of the interior.

There were a lot of people wearing steampunk costumes in Beverley today...and a St. Bernard's dog group was collecting money for charity.

It cost £3 to go inside the minster to look at the Christmas Tree Festival, and there was a long queue to get in...so we didn't bother.

The crowds were too much for us by one o'clock and so we headed back to the car park; I'd already spent quite a bit of money though on a mixed game pie from the market, a couple of nice jumpers and an almost new pair of hiking boots from the charity shops...and a large fat rascal from a bakery.

We called back at the farm shop cafe at Drewton at the foot of The Wolds for tea and cake - I managed to grab a photograph of the farm cat as it ran away from me.

Lincoln Christmas Market 2018

Another day out with Siobhan, my support worker. The day started off very murky but ended up with brilliant sunshine after we'd only been a few minutes in Lincoln. Lincoln is always a delight, and I love the city...but the Christmas Market this year was a little disappointing; I couldn't buy a game pie or a rabbit pie and Siobhan couldn't find any lemon and gin cheese which she was sure she bought at the market last year.

Parking was easy - we used the 'park and ride' at the County Showground at Scampton to the north of the city; very convenient for us driving in from Doncaster.

From The Archives: Clumber Park

I've not done one of these posts recently where I do a review of  places I've visited; checking my files it seems that it's the turn of Clumber Park today: unfortunately I've only got a small version of the photo stored on my computer.

The image is of the chapel at Clumber Park. I've taken photographs from the outside on two or three occasions but have never been inside.

Clumber Park is a few miles south of Worksop in Nottinghamshire and I can reach it fairly easily from Doncaster. I've visited with the autism group and with my support worker in the car and have passed through on the return leg on walks back to Worksop.

There's a pleasant walk of about two miles round the lake passing through several different types of landscape, there's also a nice cafe and an information centre, and some interesting parkland curiosities....strangely though, mobile phones don't seem to work there.

Hope, Pindale, Bradwell, Shatton, Offerton, and Hathersage Booths

I caught the first available bus going from Sheffield into the Peak District this morning and arrived at Hope at about 09:50. I took a few photographs before I left the village and headed south going up the road to Pindale, and then walked along the footpath which goes through the cement works down to Bradwell.

There were excellent views featuring the cement works over to my left as I then took a footpath heading northeast.

When I reached Townfield Lane, a wide track, I was heading due east towards Shatton, and then southeast to Offerton.

Just before arriving at the hamlet of Offerton I held a gate open for a group of two dozen women and girls on horseback - it was safer than proceeding down the narrow restricted bridleway they were using: I did receive a smile and a 'Thank You' from most of the riders.

A bit further along, by now I was walking on a metalled road, I noticed a flattened badger at the side of the road - they really are quite large.

I took the path that leads down to Leadmill Bridge and then climbed up the hill to Hathersage Booths and [eventually] caught the bus back to Sheffield outside The Millstone pub. The bus didn't show up and the next one was over half an hour late. Fortunately a group of about eight members of a walking club were also waiting for the same bus and someone was able to phone up and find out what was happening - a broken down bus and a diversion in Sheffield. So, even after waiting for over thirty minutes we still had time to go for a warm in the pub; I bought a pot of tea. When a bus did eventually arrive it was still twenty minutes later than the time we had been told.

When something like this happens it always spoils my day...a bus over ninety minutes late really ruins a good day's walking, and today's experience has been my worst experience on public transport in the Peak District ever...the bus services are quite frequent and usually very very reliable.