Category: Exeter

Being a tourist in my own county, that’s Devon, the most perfect place!

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This weekend a lovely Australian friend came to stay and as it was her first time in Devon we tried to pick some nice spots to take her. First off we hit the city centre, planning to go to the cathedral, remember I posted about it a few weeks ago? A service was about to start so we thought we would come back later. Meanwhile the Cathedral school were holding their summer fete on the green and this is some of what we saw.

We headed through Ship Lane, passing Sir Francis Drakes favourite port of call.

to High street with its carefully restored Tudor buildings

We spent an hour in the welcome air conditioned museum, http://www.rammuseum.org.uk/ recently re-opened after a major refurbishment. At the moment there’s an exhibition of the late James Ravilious, one of my favourite photographers. Coming back to Gandy Street, we were so hot we just had to sit outside Coolings for a half pint of cider! 

there were a few cackling witches hanging around the back alley!

Some surviving parts of the castle

and city wall 

Back down the road we watched some street dance

The cathedral was closed when we got back, but we had a look around the nearby  ruins of  St Catherine’s Chapel, which date from the mid 15th century and were all but destroyed in the Blitz. 

Our day didn’t end there, we went on to the coast, walked on Cockle sands where the tide was out and had fish and chips on the seafront. Finally we pootled around Topsham for an hour, along Hannaford’s quay to the Goat walk. A super day, glorious sunshine and the lovely Australian had a fab time.

As I have included shots of Exeter’s ancient walls and St Catherine’s here is a few lines from the 8th century Exeter book, the poem ‘Ruin’.

Wrætlic is þes wealstan, wyrde gebræcon;
burgstede burston, brosnað enta geweorc.
Hrofas sind gehrorene, hreorge torras,
hrungeat berofen, hrim on lime,

scearde scurbeorge scorene, gedrorene,
ældo undereotone. Eorðgrap hafað
waldend wyrhtan forweorone, geleorene,
heardgripe hrusan, oþ hund cnea
werþeoda gewitan. Oft þæs wag gebad

ræghar ond readfah rice æfter oþrum,
ofstonden under stormum; steap geap gedreas.
Wonað giet se …num geheapen,
fel on
grimme gegrunden

or if modern English is more your style,

Wondrous is this wall-stead, wasted by fate.
Battlements broken, giant’s work shattered.
Roofs are in ruin, towers destroyed,
Broken the barred gate, rime on the plaster,

walls gape, torn up, destroyed,
consumed by age. Earth-grip holds
the proud builders, departed, long lost,
and the hard grasp of the grave, until a hundred generations
of people have passed. Often this wall outlasted,

hoary with lichen, red-stained, withstanding the storm,
one reign after another; the high arch has now fallen.

The wall-stone still stands, hacked by weapons,
by grim-ground files.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Unfocused

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I like this! The excuse to use some photos that don’t make the grade.

First of all the city centre by night

Some ghostly Dartmoor ponies

and I don’t know how I made this mess, I was on a footbridge with windows,  the red is reflected from behind and a bit of my reflection is in there too!

The building I was trying to photograph is the Royal Albert Memorial museum.

Exeter Cathedral

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The word cathedra means seat of a Bishop and the building of Exeter’s began in 1112 on ground that had been used by a religious community since the 7th century. These are the organ pipes, the biggest is 11 metres tall.

The Exeter Astronomical Clock dates from the 15th century and always fascinated me as a child. 

With its complicated workings. 

With angels watching over them, a monument to the 2nd Earl and Countess of Devon, from the 14th century.

A section of tapestry on a bench

and another tomb, this one 19th century, the Macdonalds from the isle of Skye.

An 18th century clergyman

Some little details that I like

This stone screen or pulpitum was built between 1317 and 1325

and the view through is of the Quire.

Above the Quire is the organ in a 17th century case

My favourite part of the cathedral has always been the lady Chapel but today I couldn’t take photos because of a service so this one is courtesy of   © Copyright Neil Kennedy and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

A view of the pulpit with the organ in the background

and the detail of the pulpit

Looking high

Some ceiling bosses

The West Front Window

and I saved the best until last, the vault was created as a vision of heaven in the Tierceron style. St Peters has the longest continuous medieval vault in the world, around 96 metres.

So what do you think of Exeter’s glorious cathedral?

I’m adding this photo for http://beeblu.wordpress.com/category/home/ sorry its not very good but you can read a little more about the clock!

Exeter Cathedral 1

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Just a quickie taken with my mobile tonight. The cathedral has had scaffolding up for  a very long time while they were doing restorative work. For several months the Occupy people were there and they left a mess. It was so nice to see it in all its glory. The stone masons have done such a good job on this thousand year old building, so I wanted to share it.

St Peters Cathedral Exeter

The Sunday Post : Culture

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Jake’s Sunday post this week is culture – not as easy as you would think, but here is my offering! Pop on over and join in or see how other people have interpreted it.

http://jakesprinters.wordpress.com/2012/04/07/sunday-post-culture/

My Chambers Dictionary defines culture as :

The result of cultivation; the state of being cultivated; refinement in manners, thought, taste, etc; loosely, the arts; a type of civilisation; the attitudes and values which inform a society; a crop of micro-organisms, eg bacteria, grown in a solid or liquid medium in a laboratory.

I’ll skip the science and instead show you just a little culture from my city.

A touch of Rock to celebrate World Peace Day

Some Cafe culture, at least three choices in Princesshay Square

Some Cultural heritage provided by history re-inactment

Busking Hip-hop

Last but not least one of the High Street sculptures, 6 metres high, stainless steel and I love it but as always with these installations it has been controversial. Engraved on it are some of the Exeter Riddles, from one of the oldest books of Old English poetry, dating back to the tenth century. To add to the mystery the riddles are engraved backwards to be read in the reflections.

Here are two of the riddles.

Some acres of this Middle Earth are handsomely attired with the hardest, sharpest, most bitter of man’s fine belongings:

It is cut, threshed, couched, kilned, mashed, strained, sparged, yeasted, covered, wracked, and carried far to the doors of men.

A quickening delight lies in this treasure, lingers and lasts for men who, from experience, indulge their inclinations and don’t rail against them; and then after death it begins to gab, to gossip, wrecklessly.

Shrewd men must think carefully must think carefully what this creature is.

Any ideas?

I am a strange creature with various voices.

I can bark like a dog, bleat like a goat, honk like a goose, shreek like a hawk, and at time I imitate the ashen eagle, the battle bird’s cry;

the vulture’s croak trips off my tongue and them mew of the seagull as I sit here saucily.

The capital G suggests my name and AE, R, and O assist it so do H and I. I am called what these six characters clearly spell out.

I’ll come back in a couple of days and add the answers!

One Hour in Exeter Summer 2011

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I’m a travelaholic and I’m always posting photos and anecdotes from places around the world but for once I’m going to sing the praises about my own city. Beautiful Exeter in the south west of England is 2000 years old and has something for everyone. Here are just a few pics I took last summer when I spent just an hour in town.                                                                      A fund raising event

A shiny band

A veterans parade (and above)

Restored Tudor buildings

A recent mural

The 900 year old St Peter’s cathedral

Some of the flock!

Mols coffee house

A ruined church

A friendly labradoodle

Silver man

A catwalk show in Princesshay shopping centre

The blue boy relocated from the old Princesshay

I hope you like this quick insight into a summer day in Exeter.There is always something to see and do, we get lots of tourists and the coast is just ten miles away.

A Postcard from Torquay

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I spent an hour in Torquay today. It’s never been a favourite place but I try sometimes to like it, after all thousands of tourists arrive each year so it must be okay mustn’t it? The pedestrianised town has some of the usual chains and an awful lot of hideous souvenir shops, selling the same tat they sold when I was a child. Do people really want to buy plastic dinosaur ornaments with Torquay emblazoned? Along the sea front sits a theatre where the annual pantomime  is performed by F listed soap stars and in the next few months, The Dreamboys full frontal tour – spare me, and the Grimethorpe Colliery band – probably the most talented of the bunch! The beach itself is narrow, but nice for winter sunsets when you can’t see the kiss me quickers.

Tourist ‘attractions’ include a model village (very clever and a bit twee) and Kents cavern (beautiful prehistoric caves) which is listed as a wedding venue, presumably for those of us who would like to re-enact the Flintstones. Between lovely parkland and the esplanade there is a large balloon thingy that allows you to rise directly above the bay, for the views, while remaining tethered to the ground. The hotel used for filming Fawlty towers is somewhere in Torquay, can’t think of anywhere more appropriate.

Torquay has a darker side and I don’t just mean the troublesome night clubs. It’s the drug capital of the South West, filled with dealers who moved down from places like Nottingham and Liverpool, having spent their childhood holidays in the caravan parks. Until they become OAP’s (if they’re spared) and sit in deck chairs on the seafront, with their heads under tabloid newspapers, they will happily prey on the users they have hooked. These dealers have a hierarchy; very, very evident today were the scruffy, jeans sliding down, yobs in small huddles just off the main streets. More worrying are the big boys in their own sleazy underworld. Torquay has a very busy drug and alcohol service and there are hostels in what were once tourist hotels and are now crumbling dives. I found it interesting today to see one of the town councils attempts to deal with the problems, public toilets where 20 pence is charged to help them keep them clean and safe for ‘us’, no doubt it also helps to pay for the sharps disposal container provided inside.

My visit was brief this time. I didn’t stroll beside the marina with its berths full of very expensive yachts, or drive along the exclusive Ilsham Marine Drive, dreaming of a lottery win. Instead I came back, thankful that Exeter (though not perfect) with its clean streets, history and culture is home. It seems that a journalist in the Independent thinks so too http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/sick-of-the-south-east-then-emigrate-to-exeter-6282484.html?fb_action_ids=10150443679332742&fb_action_types=news.reads&fb_source=other_multiline but I really wish he didn’t, maybe he could big up Torquay instead.

Occupy St Peters

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The 900 year old Cathedral of St Peter in Exeter was subject to a clean up after it became a ‘hang out’ for street homeless, drug and alcohol users. They had begun to turn the grounds of this place of worship, tourist attraction and place where locals relaxed, into a mess. It now has strict rules of behaviour in its beautiful green environs. That is, until last month when ‘Occupy’ arrived.

Now there are up to thirty people camping out on the once pristine lawns, complete with dogs, small children and banners. There are around fifteen tents which include a kitchen,

library and even one they call the university. They plan to continue their protest indefinitely and have even had a sculpture created by a sympathetic, anonymous artist.

The last few days has seen the first drop in temperature in what has been a very mild autumn, so we will see.

I wandered around the green with my camera snapping away until a man approached me saying ‘We don’t mind photos as long as you ask before taking pictures of people.’ I said that I hadn’t taken any of people perhaps a bit defensively because I really wanted to; he allowed me to snap him and liked the result. There were lots to see besides people though.

At the far edge towards the cobbled path I stood to watch an ex military type tent being put up, I’ve never seen a tent of its size go up so quickly. No sooner had they rammed in the last peg than the very irritated Dean arrived to remonstrate with them, it was a canvas too far for him, but he has been very tolerant of their presence to date.

I asked a couple of guys what they would be doing if they weren’t there – I really wanted to know what they lived on – and they said they would be somewhere else protesting about something else. Protesting is a profession then? Perhaps to be studied at their ‘University’.

One young man, a lot smarter, told me that he wasn’t camping because he had to go to college and work. He arrived every morning at 6.30 to ‘help’ for a couple of hours, went to lectures and work and then returned every evening. ‘Help’ was clearing up rubbish, very noble but why couldn’t they all clear up their own? There wasn’t any rubbish around but the tents that were open looked pretty untidy as tents do. This tender sixteen year old also cooks and does whatever is asked of him, apparently he is very dedicated. I confess to being a political ignoramus so his awareness of the cause and willingness to put his normal life on hold is impressive, he will go far when he finds his path.

If it seems that I am negative about Occupy it’s not intended, it really is that I am uninformed, she says shamefaced. In the days when Swampy tree-housed on the A30, see      https://lucidgypsy.wordpress.com/2011/10/27/hitching-a-ride/  I could keep up with him, but this bigger stuff has left me behind. I’m actually touched by these people, most of all by their wish list pinned to a post.

A Summer of Boats, England and Turkey

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For someone who doesn’t do boats and knows nothing about them, this has been a boaty summer. It began on a glorious April day with a short trip across the Tamar River in Plymouth, Devon on the Cremyll ferry with my lovely daughter in law and granddaughter.

One of the best things that Plymouth has ever done was to buy the Cremyll along with Cornwall Council, for fifteen minutes you have the most wonderful view of the Sound, Royal William yard and the spectacular coastline.

The boat was full of day trippers who like us were heading for Mount Edgecumbe Country Park, on the Rame peninsula that’s actually in that foreign land of Kernow.

Plymouth is a bustling city with little charm having been badly hit in the blitz, but stepping onto the ferry really is another world.

Everyone is excited to be going on a mini holiday to the countryside, the ferry ride is less than five pounds for a family of four and the destination has acres of grounds and gardens to walk, picnic and relax for free!

My next boat experience was crossing the Dardanelle straits, which both connect the Aegean to the Sea of Marmara and also separate Asian turkey from European Turkey. The Dardanelles have been an important stretch of water throughout history and strategically relevant in the Crimean and First World War After an emotionally moving time in Gallipoli I crossed to Canakkale on a large boat where I’d foolishly chosen to sit upstairs for the best view and nearly froze in the draft for an hour. Soon after landing my travelling friends and I reached the site of the ancient city of Troy but that’s for another blog.

Ten days and around eighteen hundred miles and I’m back at another ferry port, this one takes me back to the European side of Istanbul. It’s a large ferry this time with lots of strange chunks of metal, cables, ropes and good strong coffee. The view in all directions is amazing and it’s a real thrill to arrive in a cosmopolitan city I have waited so long to visit.

Later in the day it’s time for a cruise on the Bosphorus, we are just a few on Edim, a posh boat that had the capacity for fifty people with a bar and café. We cruised along one bank beside painted wooden houses, stylish restaurants and clubs frequented by Istanbul’s’ glitterati.

Pootling along for what seemed like hours, the waterway was busy but with space enough for everyone it was quiet and relaxing. The size of the city became apparent from the perspective that the water gave, I lost count of the number of domed mosques and minarets.

Some of the grandest buildings were foreign embassies, palaces and military colleges. The Bosphorus was a lovely place for a relaxing cruise, next time I’ll go by night.

In August I had a brilliant day out with friends in Gloucestershire, a couple of hours on the train. Gloucester Dock, a very ‘Gentrified’ area has the prettiest of canal barges,  well   maintained with shiny bright paint jobs. I’m very curious about who lives here and just what they are like inside. I imagine it’s like being in a wobbly caravan,lovely in summer but a bit bleak in winter especially if the canal froze.

A complete contrast for my last boats of the summer, on Exeter quay where there is a working boatyard. It’s one of those places that look out of bounds and until last year I had only stood at the gate to peep, until one day a man said that it’s public and okay to go in. It looks like a very male environment until you see pots of geraniums flowering their little heads off. A very sensory place with smells of engine oil mixed with oily fry-up, sounds of oars, hammers, rap and classics and boats of all shapes and sizes. I’ve watched this one

develop and now it’s nearly completed it may be gone next time I go down. I’d love to see it hit the water.

This one saddens me, the council have deemed it rubbish and an eyesore.

An official letter is pinned to it stating that they will dispose of it unless the owner removes it by a date that has now passed, and they will charge for doing so. Someone has been working on its restoration, just not as quickly as the council would like, it’s a massive money pit of a project. I talked to one of the boat owners and he said that the mooring fees had been paid and apparently it’s a trawler, obviously very old. Who knows what its history is?I believe it would be beautiful once done, surely the purpose of a boat yard is to mend and build boats? Bureaucracy drives me mad.