South West England has two main draw-backs: it is popular and, as it’s on the west, it can suffer from wetness – particularly at its extremities. Other than that, it has pretty much everything, including mystery, prehistory, history, cuteness, grand…
It’s become something of a cliché, to describe a place as ‘being frozen in time’, or similar. But in the case of Culross, a small village on the north bank of Firth of Forth in Fife (try saying that after…
Last Updated on 23rd February 2020To visit Lindisfarne, a tidal island at the tip of north-east England, is to enter a different world. It is a world of saltwater, seabirds and saints, a world of mudflats, mead and mystery that…
The great tempest broke rapidly and without warning in the darkness. The sea around Whitby convulsed, waves rising in growing fury, over-topping one another, beating white-topped on the sands, rushing up the cliffs and breaking with great spumes over the…
Last Updated on 1st March 2018The first thing that struck me about Furness Abbey was how red it is. The second thing was the girl in the visitor centre and the third was drainage; but we’ll come onto all that…
It beggars modern belief just how much London – well, pretty much everywhere in Europe, I guess – was once dominated by the Church. Did you know there were more than one hundred parish churches within or just outside the…
Christmas in the year 877 did not turn out as Alfred planned. One minute he was celebrating, the next his hall was overrun by screaming, violent, bloody-weaponed, pagan warriors. He escaped with his life and a small band of followers,…
This is the story of England’s first known poet. Once upon a time, many many years ago, there was a good herdsman who lived on a cliff top called Streaneshalch. The herdsman’s name was Caedmon; he was no spring chicken…
Last Updated on 8th May 2019The Yorkshire coastal town of Whitby is celebrated for its fish and chips, the semi-precious gemstone, jet, its associations with the explorer Captain Cook, Dracula – and its abbey. It is less well-known as the…
Last Updated on 6th December 2016There was trouble at St Mary’s Abbey in York. Some of the monks felt that monastic practices had strayed too far from the original values set out by the blessed St Benedict. In 1132, influenced…
Last Updated on 6th December 2017There’s something calm and peaceful about the ruins of Egglestone Abbey. They huddle on top of a small hill above the River Tees, just outside the old market town of Barnard Castle, in County Durham. …
Last Updated on 3rd May 2017These are the remains of Sweetheart Abbey, founded by Dervogilla Balliol. Here’s devotion for you. When her husband, John Balliol, died in 1268, Lady Dervorgilla had his heart removed, embalmed and placed in an ivory…