Only a short local walk today; I had planned to go for a full day's walk in the Peak District but I received a phone call yesterday - I needed to meet with someone at short notice this morning. It was good news though, an opportunity to start doing a bit of 'Permitted Work' which people such as myself who are receiving Employment Support Allowance are allowed, or even encouraged, to do.
It's been a lovely day today and I didn't want to miss out on a walk. I know the person I was meeting and so it would be okay for me to go dressed ready to go walking...and then just catch a bus as soon as we'd finished.
The meeting, in one of the tea shops in town, went very well; the next bus due was going to Worksop and so I got on and travelled to Bawtry. After taking a few photographs I found a seat in a sunny spot next to some pansies, where a could eat my sandwiches.
I walked down the road to Scrooby, the first village in Nottinghamshire, first taking the Great North Road, then a country lane. The county boundary is only a few yards beyond the last buildings in Bawtry.
I've only ever passed through Scrooby on the bus, and on one occasion rushed across the fields to catch the bus back to Doncaster, so I haven't really seen much of the place. It's quite pretty though. Apart from taking photographs of the usual things, a rather unusual 'traffic' sign caught my eye. On first seeing it I thought it was the regular sign for 'Mud on Road', but it wasn't - the wording at the bottom reads, 'BETTERAVES' the French word for 'beetroot.' A bit strange; when I got home I did some research online and it seems that the road sign is actually an image that appears on an album cover by a French punk rock band from a couple of decades ago called 'Betteraves.' Maybe someone in the village is a fan, or maybe the locals who need to drive along the narrow winding country lane that I walked along just thought it was an appropriate sign to encourage other drivers to slow down because of the mud on the road. I don't know - there wasn't anyone around to ask.
I spent a few minutes exploring Scrooby before continuing south along the main road for a few hundred yards until I reached a bridleway which led across fields to Serlby. I only passed by the edge of the village though, next to the golf course.
For the final few minutes before I reached Blyth I had to walk along a stretch of quite busy road; never a preferred option for me. Blyth is quite a large village with a few shops, several pubs, and a large impressive church which seems to have a bit of a strange architectural style combining elements of a church, a castle, a town hall, and a cinema in the design of the building...it is quite attractive to look at though.
In places it was quite muddy as I walked across the fields to Hodstock using the footpaths. The main thing to see at Hodsock is the priory; the sun was at the wrong angle in the sky when I arrived there though and the best shot I got was from the back of the building.
When I got to Carlton in Lindrick it was still quite early and I considered walking to the church; it's about half a mile from where the footpath brought me out. I'd had enough though, I'd got a bit of earache because of the cold weather and so I just waited for the bus which was due in ten minutes...and arrived on time.
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