Today we woke up to the first snow of this winter. It wasn’t forecast! My new header shows the front garden and the photo below is of our back garden. See another photo David took this morning – here. As you’ll see he wished for snow!
A Saturday Snapshot post – see more on Alyce’s blog At Home with Books.
A few Saturdays ago I posted photos of Newcastle uponTyne’s bridges. Today here are some more photos I took on that grey, gloomy day. This time they are of Newcastle’s Castle Keep and Black Gate.
Our first sight of the castle was as it appeared behind the railway line:
The Castle was was built in stone during the reign of Henry II, between 1168 and 1178, at a cost of £1,144. There was an earlier castle on the site, a wooden motte and bailey castle built by William the Conqueror’s son, Robert Curthose. This was replaced by the stone castle – hence the name of Newcastle! It stands high above the River Tyne – Newcastle upon Tyne.
This is the Castle Keep, which is the only remaining part of the 12th century Castle:
It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and is open to the public, but we didn’t have time that day to go inside. On our next visit to Newcastle, we will make time to have a proper look at the Castle Keep!
The Gatehouse to the Castle is still standing – the Black Gate. It was added to the Castle site in 1247 by Henry III. The wooden footbridge was originally a drawbridge.
Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Alyce at At Home With Books.
Time to revisit old family photos. This week I’m featuring my Granny Leighton, my father’s mother. I loved visiting her, she was the epitome of a grandmother, with her white hair done up in a bun, and her lovely smiley face. She even sat in a rocking chair by the fire knitting, when she wasn’t dashing around the kitchen, singing whilst she cooked.
Here she is with her sister, who wasn’t such a happy lady – I was rather scared of her. I don’t know when the photo was taken or where they were, but they’re sitting on a wall, maybe on holiday or on a day out, both with their knitting. Granny is on the right of the photo – smiling, Great Aunty Alice on the left – not smiling!
And here she is in her garden with my cousin, Sylvia:
And another photo taken in her garden, this time with her big black cat:
Granny and Granddad had a large garden, divided into many sections for flowers and vegetables, and they also had an aviary full of birds. I loved going there, although I was scared of my Granddad’s dog, which fortunately for me, he kept tied up to his chair when he was in the house. It was a horrible dog, with a very fierce bark and growl.
See more Saturday Snapshots at Alyce’s blog At Home with Books.
On Wednesday we walked alongside the River Till in Northumberland, England to its junction with the River Tweed, in Scotland.We started at the medieval Twizel Bridge – the bridge crossed by the English Army on their way to the battle at Flodden in 1513. The bridge is now a pedestrian route, the traffic speeding along a new main road. Both bridges across the River Till are shown in my photo below. (The medieval bridge is in front of the new bridge) :
Here is a closer look at the medieval bridge:
As we went along the river bank the salmon were leaping out of the water, but no matter how quick I tried to be with the camera I couldn’t snap a fish as it leapt out of water. This is the closest I got:
The nearer circle is where the fish jumped out and the further one where it went back into the river!
We carried on down the river bank to Twizel Viaduct. This stands 90 feet over the Till and used to carry the Tweedmouth to Kelso railway line. It was built by the York Newcastle & Berwick Railway between 1846-9. This line closed in 1965:
The autumn trees still have most of their copper leaves:
But when we got to the junction of the Till and Tweed there were these leafless trees on the opposite side of the river. The angle of the trunks is just amazing:
We weren’t the only people out enjoying the autumn sunshine – the fishermen were there too.
There is a ruined castle on the ridge overlooking the Till, but more about that in a later post.
A Saturday Snapshot post, hosted by Alyce, At Home with Books.
Every now and then we go to Newcastle upon Tyne, usually only managing to go round the shops, but on Tuesday we decided to see a bit more of the city.
Even though it was a grey, misty day (as these photos, taken in the early afternoon, show) we decided to have a look at the River Tyne. The river is crossed by several bridges and went to the High Level Bridge, designed by Robert Stephenson and built between 1847 and 1849. It’s a road and railway bridge. Below is the view of the pedestrian/road crossing below the railway line.
From this bridge we could see more bridges crossing the river. Below is the view of the Queen Elizabeth II Metro Bridge between Newcastle and the Gateshead Metro Centre :
We walked about halfway across the bridge to see more bridges across the river. The photo below shows the Swing Bridge (red and white) and the Tyne Bridge, in the centre with The Sage, an international music centre in the background:
East of the Tyne Bridge is the Gateshead Millennium Bridge (white):
Standing on the High Level Bridge, my eye was caught by this statue on the top of a building below:
This is King Neptune with two fishwives seated on both sides. This was the old fish market, erected in 1880.
A Saturday Snapshot post, hosted by Alyce, At Home with Books.
Autumn is now well set in here. Our garden is well on the way to being covered in leaves. There are still some leaves clinging to the trees like this red maple:
whereas others still have their leaves, like the Japanese Maple shown below.
I was a bit concerned earlier this year that this little tree wouldn’t survive because its leaves were scorched by a late frost soon after the new shoots had opened.
A Saturday Snapshot post, hosted by Alyce, At Home with Books.
BooksPlease 