Dorset, Part One
I've changed my header to one which is a bit blurry but it was taken out of a plane window. It makes me think of the feeling of excitement as you are descending at night to some unfamiliar place - in this case, I took the picture over Africa, and you can see how few settlements there are, just one not-very-big town. I look at it and I wonder what it is like to be down there in the dark African countryside with the plane droning far above?
I haven't gone far recently, and have so much to do here I'm glad of that - daresay I'll change my mind when winter gets under way though! We had a great trip to Dorset during the recent sunny spell. It was to attend a golden wedding celebration in the extended family, and then the weather was so nice that we decided to just stay on in Dorset.
These beautiful blue butterflies could be one of several varieties, and I'm not smart enough to tell them apart. But I'd like to think at least one of them is a Silver Studded Blue, a rare one local to Portland, where we took the picture. Portland is an island reached by an isthmus and overlooking a long, wild and empty beach, Chesil Beach. It's of great geological and wildlife interest, and has good fishing, but I'll be honest with you that its eighteen miles of unadorned shingle wouldn't make it my choice of beach on which to spend the day.
Portland has been quite industrial in its time, and is indeed the main source of Portland Stone, a prized white limestone that has been used both for Buckingham Palace and St. Paul's Cathedral. The island is bleak, stony, quite densely populated and not too affluent but it's interesting. The butterflies live in one of a number of disused quarries which have become nature reserves. Each has their own personality.
The one below, Tout Quarry, is notable for its sculptural decorations carved into the rock, which you come across unexpectedly. I loved this Victorian fireplace, complete with clock in the centre and what might be geological specimens on either side.
And here is a life-sized falling man, below. The sculptures are not named or indicated in any way so it's startling to come across these curious things unexpectedly as you explore.
The beaches down this coast are mostly rocky, although in different ways, so very different from each other. The coast is actually a World Heritage Site on account of its geological interest. From a photographic point of view, I found the different sorts of beach rocks very interesting. This is one of my favourite pictures of the trip, taken on the beach near Osmington Mills, east of Weymouth. Do you think the irregular shape on the central rock looks like part of an ancient map? Of course it is a type of seaweed, which close up looks like curly hair.
Many of the stones on this beach are huge, brown, smooth and sculptural, in fact the sculptor Henry Moore is said to have gained inspiration from them - there's an interesting little item here showing some of the other things that gave Moore sculptural ideas.
There's also a very jolly pub in the hollow near the beach, called the Smugglers' Inn. It is not just a fanciful name - the area used to be a haunt of smugglers and in fact there is an amusing tale which I found written in the church of the nearby village of Langton Matravers ....
So, here is a picture of the west wall of Langton Matravers church, below. If you look carefully you'll notice that the wall looks old and if you look very closely you will see two different roof lines, both of which show a pointy roof. That shows the church has been rebuilt, and these are the ghostly remains of earlier churches.
To be honest with you, they haven't been so very lucky with their churches in Langton Matravers, and maybe it's not surprising. The church before this one was built with a large space above its concave ceiling, some way below the roof timbers. It seems this large space struck the churchwarden, Charles Hayward....
...who also happened to be a smuggler, as an ideal place to hide a large number of barrels of brandy, which he just happened to have in his possession. He stationed his grandson at the church gate as lookout, and he and his mates carried the huge barrels up and hid them above the curved ceiling.
Since the floor was obviously not at all flat in their hiding place, (in fact, it was very curved, almost in an arch) the barrels all rolled down to the sides, and such was the weight of them that they pushed the walls of the church outwards, and eventually, the whole place collapsed.
We only know this because Charles' grandson, the lookout, wrote about the whole exciting incident in his diary. I don't think the diary surfaced in time to convict Charles, in fact, he seems to have got away with it, perhaps because smuggling was one of the local businesses and not exactly a crime, or something. It certainly looks from the plaque above that Charles Hayward died a respected member of local society.
One of the best known villages on the coast is Kimmeridge. It might be well known but it is very small. It's about a mile from the sea, which is reached by a narrow toll road. It's a lovely place, with the gardens of its thatched cottages absolutely alive with butterflies.
Someone drove a vintage car up the road as I was there. You can see it going past the old thatched pub, Clavells, which does very nice food.
Kimmeridge has several claims to fame. There is a circular folly called Clavell Tower, built in the Tuscan style in 1830 by the wealthy local vicar, Rev. John Richards Clavell. It's now owned by the Landmark Trust, which lets out fantastic unusual quirky old buildings to holidaymakers. They actually rescued it from falling into the sea by moving it physically back from the cliff edge where it once stood.
There is also a modern and spacious museum, beautifully designed and built of the local stone. This is the Etches Collection, the lifetime's collection of local plumber Steve Etches who got into collecting local fossils in a big way when he was young and ended up getting a PhD. He has donated his stunning specimens to the nation in a museum built with National Lottery funds. (click the link above to find out more about it). The museum's displays give a real feeling for what these bizarre and often unnervingly huge marine animals were like, how they looked and moved and lived, and the many little films of Steve at work convey not only his great enthusiasm for them but are also really informative. I can only feel grateful that they died out many millions of years before I came along because I would definitely not have liked to encounter them when swimming in the sea.
The layered rocks on Kimmeridge beach are very striking and interesting. T and I thought the broken off bits looked a bit like sandwiches with thick fillings.... but I guess that just shows we don't know much about geology.
On the way to Kimmeridge, down extremely narrow and steep little roads, we stopped off at the village of Steeple. By coincidence, there's also a village of Steeple in Essex (that's the area I visited in the last post). The name in Steeple, Essex refers to an ancient lookout point, and its church doesn't have a steeple. Nor does the church in Steeple, Dorset.
What Steeple Church in Dorset does have is a barrel organ. These were used in small remote places where there wasn't anyone to play a real organ. If you've ever tried to play a barrel organ you'll know it's fiendishly difficult, specially if you have to pump it with your feet at the same time. You need to turn the handle very smoothly at exactly the right speed otherwise the notes come out as a jumble.
What Steeple Church in Dorset does have is a barrel organ. These were used in small remote places where there wasn't anyone to play a real organ. If you've ever tried to play a barrel organ you'll know it's fiendishly difficult, specially if you have to pump it with your feet at the same time. You need to turn the handle very smoothly at exactly the right speed otherwise the notes come out as a jumble.
Here's the organ. It should have a case but that's being used in the vestry for something else.
It does play, though.
... and here is a very similar barrel organ, playing the hymn tune "Cranbrook,"
The church considers this to be the old tune of "While Shepherds Watched their Flocks By Night."
You, though, may recognise that the tune often has very different words sung to it. "On Ilkley Moor" is almost the National Anthem of Yorkshire, although I wasn't able to find any decent videos of people singing it - not unless you like listening to people singing in the pub on Saturday night anyhow.
Oh, forgot to say. We saw this caterpillar in the quarry in Portland. T. reckons it is a moth of some sort, but we couldn't identify it.
It curled up when picked up, and I took it off the main path which it was slowly crawling across and put it into the long grass. If anyone can suggest what sort it was, I'd love to know.
This post is getting a bit long so I'll end it here, but we did lots of other things in Dorset, and I'll write some more about it in my next post. I know I often say I will and then don't, but this time, I really will!
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