366 Photos - 226/366 - Saturday Wanderings

[byslantedlight]

Lovely relaxed morning on Saturday, finishing The Petticoat Men, and then I needed some exercise, so I went to visit this chap. Found him in need of a good trim and shave!

Wandered into Cerne Abbas itself, through lovely cool green. There used to be watervoles along here, a lady stopped to tell me, but they're gone since it was cleaned up and given hard edges...

Popped into the church. Full of old memorial tablets and medieval paintings.

The other windows had rosettes, and this is apparently not a man sticking his tongue out......but a lion - "with its origins in the patriotism that surrounded the 100 Years War" and probably dating from the 14th or 15th century. Huh!

Outside the church, meanwhile... ...and then further along the road - the village pond, complete with a house for the ducks (and I immediately thought of Doyle's pond in Larton, and Bodie getting his students to build one for him!

Cerne Abbey. Mostly destroyed by Henry VIII in the Dissolution, of course.

St Augustine's Well... ...and some of its legends, for anyone interested! I liked that they told us. *g*

Ironically......or perhaps not irony at all, just modern bloody life.

Had a wander around the cemetery. Love the old skull-and-crossbone gravestones. They did rather hammer the death of it all home. Then it was all about god and heaven, and now it's all about people missing each other. Well, it seems to me, as a casual watcher of gravestones. *g*

And then I went home, where the sun was also out.

Very annoyingly, I ended up with a headache (I swear I'd touched nothing dairy!) and went to bed early - then couldn't sleep. Woke up all tropical about 2.30am and when opening a window wasn't enough, popped outside for a moment - to find the skies clear and star-spattered, the Milky Way stretching itself across, and four faint Perseids shooting for me. *g* Still tossed and turned when I went back to bed, but I saw four Perseids. *vbg*

Comments

[gilda-elise.livejournal.com]

You live in the most interesting area, and never seem to run out of places to go. I especially loved the church and abbey. You're making it very hard for me to be patient. 17 days to go! *g*

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

The UK's a bit like that - small enough and dense with history enough that you practically trip over it where ever you are. *g* And ooh - just 17 days - yeay! How's your itinerary?

[gilda-elise.livejournal.com]

Yes, I've noticed that! While going to one site, we'll discover two or three along the way.

I've been meaning to email you. I'll send you the updated itinerary at the same time.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Cool! *g*

[snailbones.livejournal.com]

Oh brilliant! You managed to see some more shooting starts *\o/*

Isn't Cerne pretty? I once had tea in the abbey, seated on old Persian rugs draped over bails of hay, with a rain storm thundering down outside and an open fire inside... it's that sort of place where odd magical things happen. I love the gravestones - aren't they fabulous?

I hope your head has sorted itself out again - random headaches are awful.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

I did! Not as many as the other night, but still some. *g*

Cerne is very nice! Lovely and old too. Too late I saw they had some village trail leaflets in the local shop - and I'd seen a couple of people looking at some kind of map and then peering at odd corners, so I wished I'd gone in first!

I'm impressed with your tea in the abbey - but whichever part do they open for it? I thought everything except the guest house (well, maybe that, it looked empty and almost derelict inside when I was peering around - though a tantalising glimpse of some old metal equipment of some kind!) and the gatehouse were private residences?

[just-ann-now.livejournal.com]

Those Cerne pictures are absolutely gorgeous, and put me in mind of a book, A Green and Ancient Light, which I very highly recommend!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

That does sound good - I've added it to my Want to Read list - thanks! Cerne definitely seems to be a place where magic of some kind happened.

[loxleyprince.livejournal.com]

Iz sad for the watervoles (although their river does look wonderfully green and shady) but Yay!!! for the four Perseids (the tropical sleeplessness not so much.)

The stocks are all very medieval. Were there any dragons masquerading as swans in the pond? :-)

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

I didn't see any dragons this time - but maybe they were all very little and hiding in the duck house. Or maybe it's not a duck house, maybe it's a dragon hat, and there was one watching me all the time... *g*

[loxleyprince.livejournal.com]

Doyle's dragon, Puddle, is only little. He'd fit in the duck house :-)

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Doyle has a dragon called Puddle? *g*

(Wait, Medieval-Doyle, or CI5-Doyle? Cos the latter would be especially cool. *g*)

[loxleyprince.livejournal.com]

Lol! Medieval Doyle *g*

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

I remember him! *g*

[loxleyprince.livejournal.com]

Yes, and as you can see, he's definitely duck-hut-sized. Well, for now, at any rate... *g*