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Shanklin

It was on 3rd November last year that I featured two large format photographic prints of a holiday to Shanklin in September 1968. Today, in my trawl through my colour slides for posterity, I reached the batch from which these were extracted, and scanned a dozen.

Fun on the sun-kissed sand included me plying my camera; and Shirley substituting golden granules for flip-flops. I don’t remember whether anyone tickled her feet with the feather. Judging by the amount of sand scuffed up, it is of course possible. Incidentally, I just cannot get on with that style of sandal, expected to cling to one’s feet by means of a single post planted between the big toes and those next to them. I find them most uncomfortable. And I can’t keep them on.

The most delight of all was, of course, taken by Jackie and Michael, doing what has to be done with bucket and spade. The expression of my buried son doesn’t really indicate distress, given that the interment was at his request. He was hamming up a bit, because the following cheeky grin is far more reflective of his mood.

They also had a paddle in the sea, the other side of which possibly threw shingle up onto Hordle beach, which I have photographed on numerous occasions almost half a century on.

We visited other places on the island, such a Blackgang Chine, a scary tourist attraction featuring a ghost train running past enormous eyes that peered out of the darkness.

I’m not sure where was the model village that Michael explored.

Who would have dreamed, in those far off days that Jackie and I would one day be living just a mile away from a clear view of the Isle of Wight which we had once explored?

This evening we dined on Jackie’s luscious sausage casserole; crisp carrots, brussels, and cauliflower; and creamy mashed potato. Dessert was cherry crumble and custard. I drankChateau Clos Renon Bordeaux Superieur 2012, and Jackie didn’t.

Rosemary Verey

Yesterday Louisa posted on Facebook some delightful pictures of family fun in the snow. I imagine the magnificent one I have selected for its sense of movement was taken by Errol with his mobile phone. The nearest we got to the white precipitation was the gulls flying over the nature reserve on my way back from Milford on Sea, where Becky had driven me in order for me to catch the post. They didn’t settle.

Beneath them, a pink-velvet-breasted jay flitted from tree to tree, and another of the unidentified shrubs I had first photographed on 2nd was in full bloom on New Valley Road. No-one has yet named it. Becky likened the berries to Ninja Turtles. Perhaps that thought will jog someone’s memory.
Clifford Charles’s bench at the entrance to the Nature Reserve has received its own Christmas decoration; and halfway down the clifftop near Paddy’s Gap, named after the evergreen shrub Hedera colchica, or Paddy’s Pride, that once clung to the crumbling cliff; a bouquet has been laid in memory of Babs Geany.
A kaleidoscopic sunburst greeted me as I emerged onto the clifftop, which, together with the shingle beneath, was as populated as Paddington Station at rush hour.
Walkers with their eager, tongue-flapping dogs; and excited children grappling with windbreaks, on clifftop or shingle beneath, basked in splendid light.
The boys and girls seen with their red banner in the picture below trailed along the windswept shore until their leader, a little blonde child, like an injured royal standard bearer, fell over. Her companions turned tail and left her clutching the cloth in an effort to retain it. A passing woman helped her to her feet, and still clutching it, she signalled that battle could recommence.
I have mentioned before, the boxes of books on sale for Save the Children stacked outside Hillbrow. The weather is still clement enough for this noble effort to continue. I bought a fine copy of Rosemary Verey’s ‘The Scented Garden’. Twenty or thirty years ago I was privileged to visit this world famous gardener at her home, Barnsley House, near Cirencester in Gloucestershire. Her daughter Davina was a school friend of Jessica’s. This young woman, as she was then, owned an antique printing press with which she produced fascinating greetings cards reproducing illustrations from her mother’s historic herbals. I don’t believe she ever used a particular 16th century woodcut featured in her mother’s 1981 publication, which appears to reveal that ‘builder’s bum’ is not solely a modern phenomenon.
This evening we dined on tender roast lamb, crisp roast potatoes and parsnips, perfect pigs in blankets (sausages wrapped in bacon), green brussels sprouts, and orange carrots and swede mash, followed by Harrod’s Christmas pudding by courtesy of Norman. I finished the Parra Alta malbec, Flo drank J2O, and the others imbibed Provincia di Pavia pinot grigio blush 2013.

The Monk

One of the benefits of our mild Autumn has been that non-hardy plants, like this fuchsia Quasar, are still out in the garden. Normally a delicate pink and lilac on a white ground, this picture was my selection for the third day of my Black and White Flower photograph submissions.
Edward Sherred, landscaper, called this morning with his wife. Every couple of years he had pruned the tops of the variegated hollies in the front garden. Our predecessors had the benefit of free tree surgery and his wife used the branches to make Christmas wreaths. Having enjoyed a similar arrangement at Lindum House I was happy for us to continue the process. He did a good job.
It was a dank day for my Hordle Cliff top walk this morning. Stinging nettles and sticky willies were sprouting again in the hedgerows. Blackberries had been conned into producing more blossom, and a brave little dandelion had forced its way up through a driveway’s gravel.
Birds were silently snuggled up in their nests, and The Needles were shrouded in mist. I met no other creature in an hour’s walk.
‘The Castle of Otranto’ is hailed as the first gothic novel, and Matthew Lewis’s ‘The Monk’ as the ultimate one. This work, which I finished reading today, has all the ingredients. Set in Madrid at the time of the Inquisition, we have a dubious monastery and a doomed convent; we have wild weather and benighted forests; we have superstition and sorcery; we have blind belief and blasphemy; we have saintly heroes and sinful religious; we have cunning and deception; we have a sadistic prioress and a seduced and seducing prior; we have terror and torture; we have ghosts, ghastly dungeons, and damp sepulchral crypts strewn with unburied bodies; and we have rape and murder most foul.
Hammer (‘The House of Horror’) Films would have relished it, but it was a French-Spanish production directed by Dominic Moll that presented the adaptation released in 2011.
It hard to believe that Lewis was barely twenty when he completed this fast-moving and insightful novel that has intrigued readers ever since 1796. My Folio Society edition benefits from an introduction by Devendra P. Varma and is embellished by the wood engravings of George Tute, who must have thought it was Christmas when asked to illustrate a book packed with such dramatic incident. He is certainly up to the task.
This evening we dined on Jackie’s delightful chicken jalfrezi (recipe) and savoury rice (recipe). I finished the chianti.

Strictly Come Dancing

This morning Jackie made a shopping trip for more supplies for the day, then drove Louisa to Milford for her to buy a birthday present. Later, I walked down to the Spar shop with my daughter. We then awaited the arrival of Errol, Jessica, and Imogen coming by car from Mapperley.
The girls had to be persuaded to eat, because they were desperate to get out into the garden. When they were eventually released, they set about hiding the pumpkins, two of which they had brought with them, and the other three having been prepared by Jackie.
Again, they had to be prised from the garden for a trip to the beach. They were, of course, very happy to get there, and enjoyed scaring themselves by confronting the buffeting waves which had the propensity to cover their feet and soak their leggings.
On the cliff top, a painter was intent on capturing the seascape.
Although the day was warm, the wind was strong, and the water cold, so Jessica and Imogen eventually felt chilled enough to return to the house in order to prepare for the bonfire. With a little help from the adults they dressed Guy Fawkes.
Between three and four o’clock Danni and Andy, Jacqueline and Elizabeth, and Mat, Becky, and Flo all joined in the party. Flo set the bonfire, Imogen and I carried out the effigy and sat him on the pyre, and we all waited for nightfall. When that came, candles inside the pumpkins were lit, and the fire was set alight. At the last minute I hammed up trying to retrieve my infamous pink jogging bottoms. I was, of course, too late.
The splendid display of fireworks was managed by Matthew, and Flo and Errol assisted in keeping the fire going.
Jackie had catered brilliantly. Everyone was able to choose from chilli con carne, lamb jalfrezi, chicken and vegetable soup, hot dogs, scones, blackberry and apple crumble, and Becky’s flapjacks. Wine, beers, water, and fruit juices were on tap.
The children waived viewing the last three fireworks, because they wanted to watch ‘Strictly Come Dancing’, especially as it was a Halloween special.

Villages Of Oxford And Cambridge Shires

I walked my normal route to Milford on Sea and back this morning. Waves buffeting the beach were choppy and the wind blustery, but that did not deter families settling on the shingle, along which couples perambulated.
Part of the footpath that I had, only two days ago, described as safe, has tumbled down the cliff and been bordered by a protective fence.
On the cliff top I met a man walking his dog, who was amused at himself for having forgotten to put his clocks back last night, the end of British Summer Time. He was impressed by how many jobs he had managed to do after having risen so early, but he thought the day ahead would be a long one.
In the Nature Reserve an elderly gentleman tipped his hat to me as we exchanged greetings.
Watching fallen leaves sailing sedately on the surface of the stream, I was reminded of Flora Thompson’s book. My copy of this classic portrait of a nineteenth century Oxfordshire village is illustrated by Lynton Lamb.
At intervals along the trail, birdseed had been heaped upon tree fungus. Perhaps Hansel had been returning the favour of the white feathers.
To a certain amount of trepidation by his mother, a small boy was having great fun on the swing I had noticed previously. She had not, fortunately, seen the first episode of ‘Grantchester’, in which a snapped rope bearing a similar swing gives James Norton, playing a charismatic Cambridgeshire village clergyman, an opportunity to emulate Colin Firth’s wet shirt scene in ‘Pride and Prejudice’. Based on the detective novels of James Runcie, ‘Grantchester’ is now a major ITV television series. Norton’s Sidney Chambers develops an unofficial partnership with Robson Green’s Geordie police sergeant.
Flora Thompson’s story was published in 1948, and the detective series is set in the 1950s, so they are contemporaneous in period, if not in authorship.
Later, we watched the second episode of Grantchester. Well, we had to, didn’t we?
Although we ate it in the evening, Jackie produced a superb traditional Sunday lunch. Slow roasted beef was accompanied by roast potatoes, parsnips, and Yorkshire pudding; thick gravy jam-packed with juices from the meat; brussels sprouts, carrots, cauliflower, and broccoli. After this we could just manage a custard tart. Jackie drank Hoegaarden, and I drank Castillo San Lorenzo reserva 2008 rioja. As is often the case when enjoying such a meal, we spoke of our mothers’ roast dinners of our childhoods in the ’40s and ’50s, which we converted to cottage pies on Mondays with the aid of a National or a Spong hand-operated mincer that was clipped to a tabletop. You put the pieces of left-over joint into the bowl at the top, turned the handle, and the minced meat was forced through a circular grill, and dropped out of the spout into a waiting container. Jackie, herself, used one when we were first married in 1968.

Her Very Own Seaside

Molly’s Den is the name of a company that runs vast Vintage Antiques emporia in Hampshire and Dorset. We chose to visit the one in New Milton this morning. It offers several hours entertainment and the opportunity to pick up interesting bargains. There is a tea room, a very large play area, including an old bus, for children to amuse themselves for hours. The refreshments and the children’s facility provide welcome respite from wandering up and down the aisles examining the fascinating wares on display in units varying in size from a cabinet to a twelve foot square room-sized cubicle.
Elizabeth pointed out a ‘monstrosity‘, the family term for which is explained in my post of that title. In fact the Molly’s Den one is far more tasteful than the telephone table described in that story.
An unexpected embellishment to a desk caused me to look up to the ceiling in search of an open skylight. There wasn’t one.
As always, exploring outlets for items which for some are history and for me reminiscent of my own lifetime, I was taken back to childhood by some exhibits. The several copies of the Dandy and Beano on offer dated mostly from the 1990s. We enjoyed them at home in the 1940s and ’50s, but we had to wait for Mum to read them first. In my photograph can be seen two painter’s footprints and Elizabeth and my sandalled toes. That seemed quite a happy coincidence.
I have already featured the practical use Mum made of dressmaking patterns. Today I noticed a rack of possible covers which were guaranteed to be contemporary with the tissue paper we sat and contemplated in our early years.
There was plenty of opportunity for Elizabeth and me to appear in a reflective mood. I even managed a selfie.
I bought an apparently unused 6 foot by 4 foot pure wool rug with hand-knotted fringes for the incredible price of £18. Jackie capped it with nine Victorian etched glasses for half that price.
For some reason Jackie and Elizabeth were amused at my efforts at photographing the glasses. I was oblivious of this as I concentrated on the subjects and got my lady to hold up a towel in an effort to reduce glare from the window. That particular device was soon abandoned because it produced a coloration that suggested that the receptacles already contained wine.
Reminiscing about our respective childhoods over lunch led to discussion of those rare trips to the seaside. Jackie’s grandfather, a motor factor, always had a car; but when Elizabeth was very small our Dad didn’t, and we relied on those of uncles. I have entirely forgotten one of our outings, but my younger sister has not. She was too young to remember the venue, but the story, from about 1959, has stood the test of time. Apparently Dad, Chris and I had sneaked a small suitcase onto the beach, unbeknown to our little sister. When we got home she was presented with the container. When she opened it, there before her very eyes was a heap of sand and shells enclosed in a secure space. She had her very own ‘seaside’ with which to play in her London garden.
This afternoon Jackie drove us to Woodgreen near Fordingbridge where nineteen artists feature in Hampshire Open Studios. First stop for us was to Pete and Nicky Gilbert’s idyllically sited beautifully restored home where Pete showed his paintings along with work by Hugh Lohan, Frances Barker, and Yukari. All the paintings, pastel portraits, photographs, jewellery, and woodwork were impressive. Pete’s landscapes and his life’s journey were truly inspirational. Further information can be found on his website at www.pgilbert.me.uk
Elizabeth bought a print of one of Pete’s pieces, more of which are seen behind him in my photograph. She then dashed back for a chopping board.
We proceeded to Coach House Studio to see the work of Andrea Finn, Dawn Gear, Sarah Orchard, Sarah Waters and Wendy de Salis. These included jewellery, ceramics, sculpture, textiles, and paintings.I had a long conversation with Sarah Waters who is developing the creation of fabrics using the combination of yeast and bacteria in a glucose solution. This produces a mat of cellulose fibres which form a vegetable ‘leather’. One table displayed Kombucha, the process; and another the product, more of which was suspended against the light. Sarah’s website is www.sarahwaterstextiles.com
We bought three of Wendy de Salis’s ceramic birds to hang in our trees. The sun, playing in the smokebush tree in Wendy’s garden, seemed to know it was part of the group of artists.
Hordle Chinese Take Away provided their usual splendid meal for our dinner. Elizabeth and I drank more of the Cuvee St Jaine. Drank open, and enjoyed, the dry white version.

Satiation

Today we took a break from packing. Off we went for lunch at The Needles Eye Cafe in Milford on Sea. This took us past our prospective new home outside which stood a furniture van into which items were being decanted from the house. This made us feel optimistic that we may be able to collect the keys fairly early on 31st.
Obtaining cash in the small town was an interesting experience. There was no bank. We thought there might be an ATM in the Co-op. There was. But it wasn’t working. The shop assistant directed me to a beauty parlour, on the outside wall of which I would find a cash machine. You see, the building used to be a bank. Quite handy if you needed cash for a make-over.

At the cafe, as I was feeling rather peckish, I treated myself to a perfectly cooked light snack while Jackie enjoyed a baked potato filled with cheese and beans. My fry-up should have been followed by toast and marmalade. By the time I realised this had been forgotten, I informed the staff that I would be quite satisfied without it. With it I would have been sated.
Jackie then admired the view whilst I wandered along the beach. A boat was visible against the pale sea and skies merging in the weak sunlight.
This was the first time the tide had been low enough here for me to walk along the strand. It wasn’t long before I realised that I could neither continue hopping over breakwaters nor reach the footpath above. My way to the bank was blocked by hundreds of yards of metal barriers erected on either side of what had once been long terracing of beach huts. A dog owner, whose pet was anxiously wandering along the barriers with that tell-tale tail wagging, told me she was ‘keen to get down to her favourite beach’.

Shingle still covered the concrete steps.

These holiday venues were much more substantial than the wooden ones we had seen at Hordle Cliff Beach. They were built of breeze block with roofs of some kind of aggregate. The storms had destroyed some, rendered others unusable, and the whole area unsafe to enter. Entire buildings were now just gaps in the rows; others had lost walls, roofs, doors, or windows. A notice announced that ‘the work’ would be finished by April 11th. Men in hard hats wandered along the devastated stretches.
Through one space where a hut should have been, I had a clear view of the now calm sea with The Needles in the background. The fortuitous notice warning of ‘the gap’ was nothing to do with that created by the so recently raging ocean. It was akin to those similar signs painted on tube station platforms where the bend in the rail cannot be fully adjusted for by the train carriages, thus leaving a wide gap to be leaped over on entering the transport. Here there is a gap between the edge of the made-up footpath and the backs of the huts. I imagine it is possible, if you are really determined, to lose your leg down it.

The early morning rain had set in again by the time I, later, walked down to the postbox and back, passing Castle Malwood Park Farm.
Having seen what I had for lunch, Jackie really should have had mercy on me this evening. But, no, she presented me with an irresistible plate of her delicious chilli con carne (recipe) and wild rice and peas. I didn’t quite manage to eat it all.

Birthday Greetings

This morning I worked some more on the old negatives. There were another dozen of Sam, and three of my friend Giles. These latter would have been taken when I was living with him in Claverton Street, Pimlico, in 1973. We were playing chess on his glass board set into a coffee table. The shot was taken from the viewpoint of me, his opponent. Just for the record, he usually won. Maybe that’s why I wanted to stand him on his head. If it makes you feel disoriented to look at it, it may be helpful to stand your computer on its head in order to admire my friend’s face.
Whilst searching my old albums for help to date the Giles pictures, I found a newspaper cutting of a photograph of contestants in the Soho Festival cigar smoking competition and inserted it into the post featuring that event. For anyone wishing to see it, I’m the one with the dirty feet and clean armpits.

The weather today was splendid. Although the temperature reflected the fact that there was no cloud cover, the sun shone from a clear blue sky throughout the day. It brought all human life to the beach at Bournemouth where Jackie drove me this afternoon. She remained on the top of East Cliff whilst I walked along the top for a while, descended to the beach, and walked to the pier and along the length of it and back.
On the way to Bournemouth, I received a photograph on my Blackberry, of a birth that took place early this morning. It is only a few days ago that I wrote about running a race in aid of my nephew Adam Keenan’s day nursery. Now, he and his wife, Thea, have made me a great uncle for the sixth time; and, more importantly, my sister Elizabeth and his father Rob grandparents for the first time. Since it is the prerogative of his proud parents to display their infant to the world themselves, I will publish neither further details nor the delightfully peaceful picture.
In the top left hand corner of the beach scene above, stands the Red Arrows memorial sculpture. When I first photographed it last year the accompanying plaque was not in situ.

Eschewing the East Cliff Lift, which I would probably find more frightening than the steps down, although even they didn’t look too appetising, I took the spiral footpath down to the beach. Slaloming among the other pedestrians, a jogger made a number of runs up and down the steep inclines.

Before descending, I noticed that another birthday was being celebrated in greetings in the sand.

A gentleman paddled a surfboard up and down. Up and down in more ways than one, since he occasionally disappeared beneath the gentle waves that ended their journey sliding up and down the sand in the ebbing tide, only to reform and reform and, like the surfer, repeat the process interminably.
Small families, groups of young people, lovers, dog walkers, and elderly gents occupied themselves in various ways along the sands.

People lined the railings on the end of the pier enjoying watching the sun subside beneath the waves.

During the waning afternoon the vibrant yellow horizon metamorphosed into a pretty pastel pink.
Once we had returned home, Jackie set about preparing a superb chicken and egg curry with savoury rice and parotas for us and Elizabeth, Danni and Andy, with which the rest of us drank Les Courlandes Chateauneuf-du-Pape 2012. Elizabeth said this meal would beat Eastern Nights, which is praise indeed. And true.

D-Day

The weather today could not have been more different from yesterday. As it was ten degrees warmer and sunny, Jackie was prompted to pore over maps to find a spot from which I could walk and she could potter. She came up with Lepe beach, on the other side of the Beaulieu estuary from Bucklers Hard (see post of 12th January), and drove us there. Leaving her in the carpark I walked along the beach in one direction, and back along a road above it. A kind gentleman thrust a parking ticket, valid for the rest of the day, into my hand as I got out of the car. He’d only used it for ten minutes. This quite often happens in The New Forest area. We had marvelled in the car that we now live in the midst of so many places that tourists drive long journeys to enjoy. The tide was out as I walked along the strand watching a solitary yacht wending its way through the river mouth. Scavenging birds were gathering rich pickings. They ignored a headless fish. There was a very strong smell of seaweed. With the water on my left, much of the land on my right was in private hands and fenced off with instructions for the public to keep out under threat of marauding dogs. The guidebook Jackie had produced described the road above the beach as the route to be used at very high tides. There was also a board in the car park explaining that, because of the melting polar icecap, the sea level was rising. With the tide coming in and my time running out I decided to climb a wooded bank up to the recommended road. By the time I returned to the carpark much of the sand and pebbles I had walked along at the beginning was under fast-moving water that splashed up over a concrete wall. Before meeting Jackie, I popped into the cafe and bought a leaflet on D-Day at Lepe. As I enter the car, there, on the passenger seat, lay another copy. Jackie had thought it might interest me. We learned that Lepe was a major departure point for troops, vehicles, and supplies in the Normandy landings; like Bucklers Hard it was a construction site for part of the prefabricated floating Mulberry Harbour; and a mainline base for the P.L.U.T.O pipeline. After this we dropped in at The Firs. Elizabeth was out, but a roofer was working on a dilapidated chimney stack which had suffered greatly during the last twelve months of rain. He went into great detail about the problems, but he rather lost me. All I can report is that it was wet, crumbling, had vents in the wrong place, and grew ferns. Jackie watered greenhouse and garage plants and drove us home. I then walked to Seamans Corner postbox and back to post Jessica’s birthday card enclosing a bit of dosh. The most apologetic contractor who had forgotten our correct replacement toilet seat came to fit a new one. It still doesn’t fit properly, but it is a match for the split one. When this building was converted, no expense was spared in fitting out the flats to a high specification. This included, in our flat at least, a kind of baroque shape to the bathroom equipment. Given that the landlord’s agent was only prepared to authorise a ‘like for like’ replacement for what had been in place when we arrived, we had scoured the internet searching for the correct original. It would have cost £300. That seemed like the cost of a golden throne. We didn’t bother. We had not been to the Imperial China restaurant in Lyndhurst before, but booked a table for their Valentine’s Night set meal. As we scanned the menu’s eleven items a waitress told us we didn’t have to choose because we were getting it all. There followed an excellent meal. Jackie’s was accompanied by T’sintao beer and mine with white then red du Beouf wine. Behind me, but in full view of Jackie, was a platignum blonde in her forties wearing outrageously fun platform shoes. Jackie was so fascinated by these that I got up, went over, and informed their owner. It went down quite well. Afterwards I chatted with the proprietor about living in Soho’s Chinatown. My readers will know that I had lived there during the 1970s. Our host, Gary Kwok, had been a boy there then.