I did not know Allen Smith, but I’ve been fortunate to be able to call his brother Lawrence a friend. Allen’s funeral will be held at the West End Methodist Church in Hexham on Tuesday. His life has been extensively…
Month: January 2019
St. Cuthbert’s on a Sunday
So on the third (and the first, incidentally) Sunday of the month (that would be today), Rev. Jon Russell, the rector of the Allendale with Ninebanks and Whitfield Anglican churches holds the 9:30am communion service at St. Mark’s of Ninebanks,…
Higher Ground for all . . .
I was right about the provenance of the name of this exciting Social Enterprise (it comes from a song) — just wrong about which one! Not Joe Cocker’s ‘Lord lift us up where we belong’ from ‘An Officer and a…
The golden heart of the village . . .
‘Coeur de lion’ was the given title of King Richard I, while in exile in Brittany, France, after his escapades in the Crusades, or as he became known later throughout the British Isles, Richard the Lion-Hearted. Intriguing, then, that The…
AGM season: Catton VillageHall tonight
Just a lovely dusting of fresh snow on the high fells this morning — makes everything look fine, and doubtless will be gone by later today after the sun warms us up. But just to say we’re trying to keep…
Pocket Directory 3.1
It’s newly printed as of yesterday, and out in the shops and other special places today . . . the third yearly edition of the handy little Allendale and Allen Valleys Pocket Directory. Invented in 2017, this directory is unique…
Downhill all the way . . .
As Liz Conway notes, life feels like it’s all going downhill when you reach 70, but on the other hand, a ride downhill on a bicycle is one of the most exhilarating adventures you can actually have. Especially if there’s…
“Waste not, want not”
When our daughter was growing up, just at the point of beginning school, I often took her out on a ‘special adventure’ — it was only when she was well into talking with her new school friends that she discovered…
MarketPlace: 3 in one!
It’s a Visitor Information Point It’s a Post Office with Money Machine I was just chatting with a good friend about the heroic stint Elsie Archer put in, maybe a decade ago now, when the Post Office was between owners…
The BaynesTravel enterprise . . . steady as she goes
The big ‘B’ is everywhere, as I found to my delight when catching photographs at the beginning of this little diary. All the vehicles seem to start, and finish, here in the yard around the Hen House, but they travel…