My trip from Suffolk to Lincoln last week went well. I dropped Jess off at her new Uni digs in the south of the City and left her to unpack. I then took the road to the coast via Horncastle; the home of 19th century Executioner, William Marwood. Interestingly, apart from undertaking his duties in Lincoln Castle Prison and elsewhere in the country, he devised the revolutionary 'long drop' whereby the man at the wrong end of the rope would fall to his (almost) instant death rather than the previous approach of slow strangulation at the end of a short rope. Anyway, more about the prison later.
The east coast is dotted with tourist hotspots like Skegness, Mablethorpe, Hornsea and Bridlingon. None of them is anything to shout home about but they do attract many thousands of people. The natural bits of coastline are mainly sandy beaches and muddy cliffs. These cliffs are crumbling at an alarming rate of about 2m a year; not good if your house or business is standing on top of it!
I was not sure when I crossed into Yorkshire but Filey is well into the East Riding (or is it the North Riding?). It has a number of traditional holiday attractions set within a steep-sided bay and is well worth a fleeting visit. Quite a bit of the sea front is accessibleby bike so don't forget to cram the bike(s) into or onto the car.
Guess where this is...
The further north you go the more beautiful the coast becomes. A few more pics..
This is Flamborough Head.
Spot the seal a long way down...
Mankind has of course stamped his mark with this bit of stunning functional architecture...
In my opinion you should turn right after you have passed Grimsby (I was advised not to actually go into Grimsby - the clue is in the name). The drive over the massive Humber Bridge is well worth the £1.50 toll. I spent a very quiet night parked up in the little village of Patrington and woke up in time to see the sun rise over Spurn Head. At 6.00am, I was the only person on the point and spent a few minutes exploring this long narrow spit of sand and gravel. Of course I took a few snaps of the sun rise. You know how I like a good sunrise especially when I'm the only person seeing it - selfish or what?!?
Apart from the rough track, some old railway lines and a few buildings occupied by the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, the only significant man-made features are the the black and white light house, something that looks like a water tower and a permanent RNLI station with a few houses for the live-in men and their families. Everything else is natural and a litle surreal. Again, it's well worth a visit even if you aren't into wildlife, light houses or sun rises.
I got as far as Scarborough and found a busy town with nowhere to park so I decided to travel inland to Pickering, thre home of the Yorkshire Steam Railway. It was very busy too, probably because it was rush hour and I didn't want to compete with all those busy worker bees buzzing back to their hives. So, I turned south and headed for Norton and Beverley. I bedded down in a tiny village called Hibaldstow just off the A15. After a quiet night I headed back to Lincoln via an inland route through the attractive gently rolling wolds. Market Rasen is a real gem; quietly getting on with its life tucked away in the heart of Lincolnshire without the need to shout about all the all the good things it does (what a fantasic railway station!). Another visit to Horncastle gave me more time to explore all the antique and junk shops. One day, I would like to explore the WW2 airfields in the county where thousands of bombers and their supporting fighters were based. If you know where I can get information about these, please let me know.
I got into Lincoln quite late and found a nice place to spent the night with sight of the cathedral.
The next day, I explored Lincoln on foot. This is a gem of a city. It ooses history, with the Romans and Normans stamping their various marks on the place followed by wealthy English Merchants, Politicians and Religeous bods. It seems only 20th century developers and the planning system failed to appreciate the inrinsic value of the town.
The cathedral is said to be the most beautiful in western Europe and I have no reason to doubt it. The castle has the only prison chapel open to the public and Steep Hill has been making visitors catch their breath for centuries.
The historic core of the city really is a beautiful place especially before the hoards of tourists take over!
At the top of Steep Hill, is the Cathedral, which can be seen from most parts of the city.
On the opposite side of the hill top, in the year 1068 William the Conquerer stopped off at Lincoln returning to LOndon from up north and decided to build a Mott and Bailey castle to fend off the angry locals and make it clear to all concerned who was now boss. As time went by it was converted from a wooden defensive structure on a high man-made hillock to a vast stone castle dominating the city. It still dominates but not for the same reasons. It's now owned by the County Council and is used as a County Court and tourist attration. A recent grant from the National Lottery is helping to fund an ambitious £25m capital project aimed partly at interpreting the Magna Carta, one of the four original copies of which is currently on view in a dimly lit room. If you go into the museum to see this, take your glasses - they wrote with a very small quill and the ink has faded a bit in the last 800 years.
The old prison is well worth a visit and it's also worth tagging onto one of the free guided walks to get the inside information on what went on in there. Remember Mr Marwood? You can see where he spent the night before undertaking a job, the prison accommodation, the surgeons room, the matrons bedroom, the condemmed person's cell and the spot where the poor unfortunates met their end.
Before public hangings were banned (apparently the powers that be were worried that hangings had become a bit of a roudy spectator sport), some fellons were even dispatched on scaffolds erected on the roof of one of the towers so more people could see them meet their maker. And often, to make best use of the scaffold (and presumably give the spectators their monies worth) more than one person was hanged at a time - a great day out for the whole family!
The yard between the two buildings (above) was where the later scaffold was erected. Many people who were not executed may have found their way to one of our colonies with a one way ticket. Most of them never returned. Stealing food, animals, and small amounts of money and valuables often resulted in death by hanging or deportation. Debtors were imprisoned until they could pay of their debts and the Turn Keys often benefitted financially from bribes and payments for simple luxuries.
Inside, the inmates of the Victorian prison had single cells with as hammock, table, chair and a small sink and cold water tap. They stayed in their cells for 23 hours a day, working, sleeping and contemplating their evil ways - not speaking to anyone. This was meant to help with their rehabilitation! I guess the blue polypropolene rope is a later prison reform.
The Chapel is unique and gives a further insight into the guiding principles of silence, solitude and religeous education. Inmates were led into the chapel wearing brown leather hoods over their heads with eye holes to avoid communication and recognition. They were then helped into a single stall and locked in. Their seats were leaning forward so it was impossible to sit back and day dream. From that position, the only person they could see and hear was the Parson standing in the elevated pulpit.
Prison was not a nice place but it does make for an intertesting heritage destination!
Now, take a final look at the execution yard, which is undergoing an archiological dig as part of the Heritage Lottery project hence it's poor state. It will be brought back to its original condition when the site is opened to the public in 2013.
It's a sobering thought that this was the last place many people saw before being hanged. For me, the last place I saw was the Prison cafe and a very good cup of coffee.
I highly recommend a visit.
BFN
