lincolnshire – Fooyah

February 23 2019February 23 2019

Lincs. Views

Having spent a few days in Lincolnshire I can confirm it is gorgeous and horrifying at the same time. The roads are too straight, there aren’t any hills, and the doesn’t seem to be any traffic after 18:00 hrs. In the time I was there I only saw some hills when I left East Kirkby and headed to Horncastle. There were hills and corners and all sorts of roads, it was actually quite exciting. I didn’t stay in Horncastle for long as I wanted somewhere to eat and it didn’t look like the town for me. I headed instead to an American themed diner at Langrick which I had driven past a few times and it was nice to stop and appreciate the views.

On my first evening I went to the cinema in Boston and there’s a communication covering my thoughts of Colette here. The next day I watched some Typhoon action at RAF Coningsby and then went for a tour around the Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight hangar at the other end of the airfield. It was interesting.

I then drove to the International Bomber Command Centre, a memorial to those who died as part of bomber command, which was based in Lincoln. I drove past RAF Waddington but there wasn’t much going on there. Just three E3-D sitting on the pan.

There’s an amazing view over Lincoln from the IBCC. In this next shot you can see the castle and cathedral looking through the monument which is as tall as a Lancaster bomber is wide.

That evening I had dinner booked in Prezzo in Boston. I’m not sure what I think of Boston yet. It’s kinda of pretty in places but an utter dump in others. Cheap petrol at the Asda superstore though.

On the final day of my trip I took in RAF Marham in the morning. There was a NOTAM out for a display and it turns out there were five Tornados practising their formation flying ready for the last-last flypast. Before that as I left Coningsby the C-47 took off in light fog shortly followed by two Typhoons. As they passed in front on the sun their shadows cast over me at 150 knots which was really cool.

After Marham and a refueling stop in Boston I went to the Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage Centre at the ex-RAF base of East Kirkby. They have a Mosquito and a Lancaster there along with tons of bits and pieces from the war. It was lovely and sunny and there was definitely a certain atmosphere at the place. Really interesting.

Finally I had a meal at the American Diner at Langrick, next to the bridge. It’s such a strange place. I do wonder how people find their way around these parts. There aren’t any hills to use as hints to where you are and the sky is so big.

February 17 2018January 13 2020

Boston – Not New England

I wrote about watching a film in Boston in this communication and I also mentioned the place when explaining how far you can see from Tattershall Castle. I went for a proper look around, just to see what this place was like. Boston made its fortune many years ago and some parts of this town show that age old wealth. I guess the main problem at the moment is that the wealth is no longer around. This town struggles somewhat.

While driving back after seeing the film the other night I got a little bothered by the canals and roads and the utter straightness of this place. There were roads which were perfectly straight for about three miles, it’s a strange sensation when you are from the south east of this country.

This view gives an idea of the canal/drain, not the river Witham, I particularly like the roads either side and the tree lined avenue. Also, the complete lack of safety barrier which I’m sure would be knocking around down in my usual haunts. My first discovery was driving out past the windmill, somewhat a surprise, and I drove back in using this route to see the windmill in the daylight.

After I got parked in the town centre I went on the hunt for stuff. Also, I wanted to see the Stump up close. There was an area next to the river where the old customs house stands with a buoy for display. This lump of red steel was an original from The Wash and looked pretty. Boston had an unusual tidal surge in the past and the buoy was nearly covered in water, giving an indication of how bad floods can be for towns.

Saint Botolph’s Parochial Church of Boston wasn’t open by the time I got there and I suspect that I wouldn’t have been able to climb the tower but I am keen to have a go. It’s always worth getting up high in any town, it lends such perspective to human geography. There were plaques around the church celebrating the pilgrims who had headed off to the new lands of America to practise their religion freely. This country got rid of them because they were so damn weird and so they were sent away.

The Stump is certainly impressive in this barren flat landscape. It stands proud.

I’m not sure if it’s me but I noticed some strange things around the town. I’m possibly being slightly snobby here and I will have to declare that I haven’t really been in any town centre for probably a year, especially during the day time. I just don’t go into my local towns. There’s no need for me to head into the town centres and so my data set is rather limited.

There were many people using cash points. There were queues for the cash points. This was around 15:00 hrs on a Friday and maybe that is what happens in many towns but for some reason I was surprised and thought it was odd. I’m happy to be told I’m wrong, that this is a common occurrence around the country.

There also seemed to be many people smoking. I rarely go anywhere with a huge number of smokers and I suspect that my experience is somewhat limited. I could even smell smoke on me when I was back in my car. If I was so bothered I would go into towns near me during the daytime to get some comparative data, but this is unlikely, I doubt I will go. I don’t care enough about being wrong to want to check. This general hypothesis is not important to me.

Here’s the stretch of straight road, almost 5 miles but with a very, very slight kink.

The longest part of this road had warning signs saying that the road was uneven and the speed limit was 40mph. This, is a good thing. The road was very uneven and any faster could cause losing control of the vehicle. I doubt this will be fixed as it acts as a deterrent to driving with excessive speed.

While driving around Boston I noticed some red signs marked “out ER”. I wasn’t sure what these were but a quick Google informed me that they are Evacuation Routes for when there is a high risk of flooding. This seems pretty reasonable to me. It is sensible to have these routes planned so that people are aware of how to escape. It’s also sensible to have plans in place, here’s a link to the Lincolnshire council explanation [this link was removed as the page location was changed, Jan 2020].

February 16 2018February 16 2018

Flat Of The Land

I’ve been on a trip to Lincolnshire and the Fens. The journey up here was surprising from Peterborough onwards as I hadn’t really realised just how far these low lands and fen lands go. I haven’t seen a hill for a whole day now and while that might not seem strange you only have to come here for it to freak you out. The roads here a remarkably straight following the line of the irrigation canals, the highest points are road bridges over the canals or railways. Houses here are dotted around, few and far between with a loneliness that seems saddening. My initial thoughts about this place are that the four walls poking out from the ground must be expensive to heat, there is nothing to stop the winter winds. The landscape must be fantastic in winter although I would imagine it’s a struggle, a 4×4 is definitely required. I wonder what the broadband bandwidths are like?

Tattershall Castle is not far from where I am staying and so I visited. It’s a pretty large building that protrudes out from moated grounds to accentuate the plane aspects of this countryside.

This castle is pretty old and the high ceiling rooms are impressive. The beams used to support the floors above are immense. I didn’t go for the audio tour, I didn’t want to be stuck to a particular routine. I actually wanted to get to the top to see RAF Coningsby. The flight line is quite a clear sight from the top of the castle, along with the hangar that houses the Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight. Unfortunately nothing took off or landed while I was in a suitable place to see.

I was surprised that the Boston Stump was clearly visible to the south along with Lincoln Cathedral almost directly to the north. The Stump was about 19 km away and the cathedral is 27 km to the NE. This is how flat this land is. You can easily see for miles. The trees, houses and road signs punctuate this barren landscape. My normal “escape” is the English mountains in the Lake District and this place is the exact opposite.

The churchyard next to the castle had some early signs of spring grasping the sun light and air:

I didn’t spend ages at Tattershall. I had heard that the RAF Typhoon display pilot was going to have a practice and I left the castle with fifteen minutes to spare to get to a suitable viewing point. The morning practice had been cancelled, although reasons I have none.

My favourite part of Tattershall was the ramp going to an ante-room. The ramps takes you up the first step but look carefully at the picture and you can see where once up one step you are fucked because the second step is pretty much straight in front of you with no room to manoeuvre. It’s brilliant placement.

Yes, I know that plane is spelt plane and not plain in this case normally but I decided the ramp was boring and useless, hence plain.

November 26 2015October 25 2018

The Lincolnshire Coast

Over a weekend in the summer Sally and I travelled to the North Sea coast and Lincolnshire. We drove from Rugby, towards Leicester and then followed the A46 to Lincoln and the coast. We had booked to spend a night on a campsite near Mablethorpe. The campsite was called Grange Leisure Park and was predominantly a caravan park but with good camping facilities. We didn’t use my tent [see this communication for a picture of that], we used Sally’s. It’s a pretty good summer tent although not quite as nuclear proof as my gorgeous Vango!

We arrived, set up base camp and then headed to Mablethorpe to experience the Great British seaside. Oh, wow, it didn’t disappoint. It was a classic seaside town. There was plenty of shops selling tat. Plenty of punters on holiday and a few crazy golf courses. One of the purposes of this trip was to start a crazy golf championship between Sally and me. Our aim was to play as many of these courses as possible along the coast in the two days we had planned to be there.

Seaside selfie with @trusmoov pic.twitter.com/L7hnT0qaAp

— Ian Parish (@iparish) August 20, 2015

Within Mablethorpe we found the following courses: Pirate Hill, a win to Sally. Pirate not on the hill, a win to Ian. Dinosaur Park, a win to Sally.

So after that we spent some money in an arcade. It was fascinating. It was a huge place where you can win tickets for playing the machines. We won about 50 tickets quite quickly but then realised you need well over 1000 tickets to claim a prize. We just gave our tickets to someone at a ticket counting machine. We also played some of the “tipping point” games because they are quite fun, whereas the TV show is utter shite. So, at this point Sally was winning the golf competition and we looked around for somewhere to eat dinner. I found the Kings Head a few miles away and we travelled there for food. It was quite a “local” pub but was also friendly and welcoming. The food was delicious and very impressive, it was nice to be treated well and have the chef actually speak to us about what to eat.

The Lincolnshire coast is a rather amazing place if you like caravans, static or otherwise. We spent some time looking at the caravans for sale at the camp site and I was also amazed at the number of re-sale places along our journeys.

2-1 down now. @trusmoov — Ian Parish (@iparish) August 20, 2015

On the second day we packed up camp and headed along the coast road after having breakfast and another round of golf at Queen’s Park in Mablethorpe. Sally won this round. I was 3-1 down in the series. Breakfast was good though!

We drove towards Anderby Creek, a place that Sally had visited as a child. I’d not been there as far as I know. The only Lincolnshire coast place I’d been to was RAF Donna Nook in the 1980s. I think I wrote about it here. Anderby Creek was a small place with chalets and caravans. We spent time on the beach flying the kites and then had morning tea in the restaurant near the Cloud Bar. By the way, a cloud bar isn’t a bar. It’s a platform from where you can look at the clouds [because you can’t do that from ground level!].

Here’s us flying kites. I managed to mess up my control cables and so had to order more from Amazon. It turns out there’s a kite specialist shop in Hinkley which is close-ish to Rugby.

After Anderby we headed to Chapel St Leonards. The beach here was quite nice and there was another arcade we visited. But this trip was about the crazy golf and so we managed to find a course just outside Chapel on the road south to Skegness. The course was based on a theme of elephants and I managed to win this one. It was now 4-2 to Sally.

It was now time to head to Ingoldmells. This is a part of Skegness to the north of the town. There was a theme park where entry was free and you just have to pay for the rides. There were some awesome ice cream shops and the whole place was manically busy. There were also plenty of caravans. Check out the aerial view of the town and spot just how many caravans are packed into the area.

We had a wander around and ate some food at a fish and chip shop. I have to say I found the whole experience rather surreal. It was a very odd place. We found two crazy golf places. We played an indoor course which was reasonable fun. I won that. Then we found a Pirate course that was suspended above the beach. I also won that. The scores on the doors were 4-5 to me. I felt quite pleased at this although Sally wasn’t happy about it.

4-3 up in the crazy golf challenge with @trusmoov

— Ian Parish (@iparish) August 22, 2015

The journey home took a while. We skirted Skegness and headed home via Boston and Grantham as there were awful roadworks on the way to the coast near Newark. We also went through Melton Mowbray. I did my best to avoid heading to Coningsby, Cranwell, Waddington and the air museum near Newark. One day I will do a tour of the RAF bases of Lincolnshire.

I loved this short break. It was really good fun.