Now for my second group of images of the Peak District, which lies north of Derby and between Manchester to the west and Sheffield to the east. In other words, the district is the lungs of the industrial north, but as you will see there's not a hint of urbanisation. It is just picturesque and often grand countryside. As before, I'll deal with separate clusters of landscapes, and start with the Arbor Low stone circle and adjacent Gib Hill Barrow. These could be as old as 6000 years BP and the stones forming the circle are mostly lying flat -surrounded by a trench.
And the Barrow:
Now to the Longnor district where we were staying, starting with a view from the back of our rented house. I took many walks in the lanes around the little town, often early in the morning when the light was crystal clear, and I nearly always had my camera handy to produce the next nine pictures. I often saw mist in the valleys in the early morning, chatted with cattle peering over the walls, and saw interesting shadows thrown across the landscape by hills and even the pervasive stone walls..
Much of the Peak District's landscape is formed from limestone and this has led to the formation of many underground caverns. We explored the Blue John Cavern - as members of a conducted tour - and were treated to a wonderful experience as we descended many steps into the depths of cave, stopping to admire interesting rock formations and mineralisations. The third and fourth of these five images show veins of Blue John, which is a form of feldspar. Max doesn't know it yet but he's just about to get a large lump of blue feldspar. The last image was taken above ground, and gives little hint of the dramas below.
At one stage we drove to the Derwent Valley reservoirs, which store water for the industrial cities surrounding the Peak District. Before we got there we crossed some of the higher, heather covered, and open moorland. We stopped our car a little way up the valley to take a walk through the forests surrounding the impounded bodies of water and found an amazing site. A group of youngsters was being filmed playing jazz numbers in the middle of the forest and alongside a little stream!
And we found that one of the impounded lakes and its associated dams was used by the RAF during the second world war to practice destroying dams using bounding bombs! They subsequently successfully destroyed several major German dams in that country's industrial heartland, an exploit that was the subject of an interesting film ... the Dam Busters ... that my grandmother took me to see in Brighton when I was about eight or ten years old! These are the focus of the next three images.
Here's an interesting lake-side memorial to a dog!
One of the more spectacular piles of surface rocks we came across was called the Roaches. As a French speaker, I soon realised that name has nothing to do with insects (cockroaches), but is derived from roches (or rocks). The third of the following images reveals a well--known person.
And finally we come to the Windgather Rocks near Kettleshume. These rocks were a practice ground for rock-climbers the day we were there. Yes, that's me below.
I think you'll agree that this is a rather lovely district.
As
Now to the Longnor district where we were staying, starting with a view from the back of our rented house. I took many walks in the lanes around the little town, often early in the morning when the light was crystal clear, and I nearly always had my camera handy to produce the next nine pictures. I often saw mist in the valleys in the early morning, chatted with cattle peering over the walls, and saw interesting shadows thrown across the landscape by hills and even the pervasive stone walls..
Much of the Peak District's landscape is formed from limestone and this has led to the formation of many underground caverns. We explored the Blue John Cavern - as members of a conducted tour - and were treated to a wonderful experience as we descended many steps into the depths of cave, stopping to admire interesting rock formations and mineralisations. The third and fourth of these five images show veins of Blue John, which is a form of feldspar. Max doesn't know it yet but he's just about to get a large lump of blue feldspar. The last image was taken above ground, and gives little hint of the dramas below.
At one stage we drove to the Derwent Valley reservoirs, which store water for the industrial cities surrounding the Peak District. Before we got there we crossed some of the higher, heather covered, and open moorland. We stopped our car a little way up the valley to take a walk through the forests surrounding the impounded bodies of water and found an amazing site. A group of youngsters was being filmed playing jazz numbers in the middle of the forest and alongside a little stream!
And we found that one of the impounded lakes and its associated dams was used by the RAF during the second world war to practice destroying dams using bounding bombs! They subsequently successfully destroyed several major German dams in that country's industrial heartland, an exploit that was the subject of an interesting film ... the Dam Busters ... that my grandmother took me to see in Brighton when I was about eight or ten years old! These are the focus of the next three images.
Here's an interesting lake-side memorial to a dog!
One of the more spectacular piles of surface rocks we came across was called the Roaches. As a French speaker, I soon realised that name has nothing to do with insects (cockroaches), but is derived from roches (or rocks). The third of the following images reveals a well--known person.
And finally we come to the Windgather Rocks near Kettleshume. These rocks were a practice ground for rock-climbers the day we were there. Yes, that's me below.
I think you'll agree that this is a rather lovely district.
As
No comments:
Post a Comment