Showing posts with label Trelawnyd. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Trelawnyd. Show all posts

Historic Trelawnyd

The Churchyard used to be surrounded by trees and strangely a low stone wall ( much lower than it is today)
This photograph was probably taken from where the houses now are on London Road

A similar shot from Cwm Road....sans trees

The Mostyn Arms pub ,cottages and a shop have  been demolished to make way for the pensioner bungalows
The Memorial Hall is on the right

The pensioner bungalows and the "green"

On old shot of the memorial Hall ( with its original dome!) The rather neat looking house on the right has now gone to wrack and ruin

The memorial Hall today,still going Strong

High street with the imposing Plas Yn Dre house built by John Wynne in the 1600's
Bonc terrace is on the left of the house which used to be a private school
Bonc terrace is now a car park although the cottage gardens ( now allotments) still remain

Plas Yn Dre yesterday

One of the old cottages on London Road

Today four cottages knocked into one house
I thought I would blog these photos that were given to me by neighbour Pat. I have been after some historic photos of the village in bygone days and will publish some more when I get a chance to scan them.
Working last night and the monitor alarms have given me a banging headache.... as I type this William is sitting behind me on the sofa..licking my forehead with a cold tongue
who needs paracetamol

A Town Full Of Wheat

I felt a bit muzzy this morning but had no hangover!
The village was deserted and quiet so I took the dogs along London road for their first walk and it was nice to have a few moments of reflection.
Trelawnyd literally means Town of Wheat or Townful of wheat..It has an ancient history, dating back to the doomsday book, but it was the Trelawnyd born but Oxford Educated John Wynne who had a vision to develop a hamlet into something much bigger way back in the early 1700s!
He developed a school, a weekly market and minor industry in the village and had the Welsh village name changed (like you do) to the more "optimistic" Newmarket in the hope of developing the place into a market town proper. 
The village did develop but not to the extent that Wynne had envisioned. and in the 1950s the old name of Trelawnyd was reinstated.
This history has ingrained a certain identity to the place.
This morning in the mist and wet of an early New Year's Day, it was easy to recall the history of the village and to mentally reconstruct the likes of the village well (next to the pond), the Black Boy public house on High Street (apparently it had wonderful curved stone steps) and the shops and bakery along London Road.

I like living in the village. I like the fact that Mrs Hopkins gave me a pair of mittens after seeing me walk the dogs without any on. I like the fact that poultry Bob will stop and share an anecdote or 50 with me on Bron Haul and I like the fact that Auntie Glad will tie scones to the cottage door handle and that a silver foiled bara brith was left for us by Pat on the garden gate only two days ago
That's what village life is all about

An Autumn Trip Around Trelawnyd

 The change from Summer to Autumn is almost palpable and today the village is shrouded in mist and rain as the fields seemed to have changed from deep green to a slight muddy brown.
When out walking this morning I decided to "snap" a flavour of Trelawnyd as winter approaches, and got bloody wet for my sins!.I also effectively Superglued my right foot inside my wellington as I put on the boot after "fixing" a hole in the upper by filling in with too much adhesive!
After some painful pulling and grunting ( and NO farting) I managed to free myself from just a little bit of skin.

Anyhow the following photos are literally a brief snapshot of Trelawnyd on a somewhat wet and sleepy Friday morning 
This is the view from the Gop overlooking the Northern part of the village. Trelawnyd nestles in the Gop's shadow and occupies the Head of a small valley which drops down towards the flood plain and eventually the sea. Trelawnyd is around 600 feet above sea level 
The below photo is the main village proper

 Trelawnyd School was completed in 1860...apparently the children would be reprimanded and punished if they spoke Welsh on the school premises and in the school log book on the 19th of January 1866 actually documented this fact. At the end of the First World War, the school bell was rung that loudly that eventually the bell rope snapped! 
 The Church of St Michael and All Saints seems to have not changed at all when compared to old photos from the late 1800's. Hughie and Ivy, the Guinea fowl can be seen picking pests out of the newly cut grass.
 Well street leads down to the Village Pond ,the site of the old public well and the Still House, which is one of the oldest houses in the village dating from the 1700's. The Still house had, is was said,two springs which rose in the cellar, and was known as a beer making house.
 London Road, showing the old cottages that line the street, and the old post office.. The house just out of shot to the right used to be the Central stores and Cafe at the turn of the century. In the rear of the shop ( down well street) there used to be a bakehouse where the villagers used to bring their own bread to be baked for a penny. Down well street there is a small cottage which is called "Baker's cottage"
At the end of the road, you can just make out the sturdy chimney stack of the village pub The Crown
 This shot is of the stone cottages up High Street. These were known as lower Bonc terrace.The impressive stone houses to the left of the photo is the former "Plas yn Dre", This was a former grammar school set up by a John Wynne in the late 1600's
 This is a shot of the High Street from the the top. Plas Yn Dre and Bonc terrace are situated beyond the hedge of Bryn Hyfryd farmhouse
 Down Chapel street is the Ebenezer Congregational Chapel. It used to be a market Hall in the 17th Century and was converted into a chapel in 1701 
Behind the Chapel used to be located a row of terraced cottages long since gone now. In their place is a series of gardens and allotments. This allotment is run by friends Sandra and Rob, and makes mine look rather amateur and scruffy
And finally I had to photograph the Village Memorial Hall. The Hall was built by the Greek Consul of Liverpool, a Mr M.A.Ralli, who lived in Mia Hall (Just North of the Village) Today the hall is the centre of Village activity as it houses the friendship club, Community Council meetings, youth club, and bingo. It is also hired out to the likes of the Flower Show committee, the Village Male voice Choir (they rehearse here every week) and even for strange animal mad villagers who run "how to look after chicken" courses

A lost duckling and Village news

Chris has gone down to Broadstairs to support a somewhat sore and worried Sorrel during some minor shoulder surgery, so I am left to man the cottage and allotment.

Slightly upset this evening as when I was turning the 8 runner duck eggs in the incubator, William, who was play fighting with Meg, knocked into me and caused me to drop one of my own eggs.(we only have two of our original four eggs left from the first clutch)

I was convinced that our own embryos were not growing properly, so I was upset to see that there was a tiny black ducking dying in the broken yoke. The poor little thing didn't live long, but at least I now know that the little chap nearly made it. The last remaining chick will be due to hatch on Sunday, with the "new" bought clutch due 2 weeks later. I hope they all do a little better than this poor duckling did today.

I worked nights last night, so took the dogs to the beach late with the hyperactive Jess in tow. I dropped some eggs off for Auntie Glad and took a minute to see the work completed on the New Memorial Hall's boundary wall (right)

The day was glorious, as was the view from the lane (below) The field seemed to burst into a bit of a wildlife zone as a large male pheasant with two females stalked around the coops (much to the irritation of Duncan who shadowed their movement with a large group of hens in tow) I tried to get a pic of the fun but the photo below doesn't quite show the wild birds clearly.
I know there is a lot of badger activity in and around the field at night, but we also have one hare and several rabbits living in the hawthorn hedges just behind the duck house that can be seen during the day.The hare is constantly being "flushed" out into the open ground when I am clearing the weeds and dead grass, and makes a rapid, slightly hysterical circuit around the field boundary.

It was warm and sunny today, so warm in fact that most of the girls were sunbathing for long periods this afternoon. Mind you,I was dismayed to find out that the weather reports from the BBC indicated that we are due a severe frost tonight ( the five day report omitted this fact when I checked on Thursday- and on the strength of this I planted all of my first early potatoes!!!)



Spuds cannot suffer frost and I had gone and planted 6 bloody long rows of them!!!!!!!!!! What a bloody waste.......Village Elder Steve, (as usual) has come to the rescue by loaning me all of his tarpaulins from his his grave digging job, and although it looks untidy and slap dash, the seed potatoes have all been protected somewhat from the -3 temperatures expected tonight.













Things.......

It is 5pm and I am having my first sit down with a coffee.It has been another lovely day, but I haven't seen a great deal of it outside as it has been a errend sort of Tuesday.

Dogs have all had their boosters (100£ in total!!!) and we have a new Polish vet who is all fingers and thumbs. Bless! very nervous and very BAD English ( which willl go down here like a pork chop at Barmitzvah) I kind of liked her as she wanted to know all about the psychology of each dog, but I guess she didn't quite understand my explainations as she looked blank as a piece of paper for most of the time I was talking.
Took Meg for her haircut at the dog groomers(pic),popped into work for a case conference on "my" spinal patient, then off to Sainsbury's and the farm shop for food and chicken food shopping. Just had time to clear out the car of rubbish,set up the new feed bin (pic) in the field and round up Duncan and a couple of girls who had escaped before taking the dogs for their walk and then go to the cinema.
Tommorrow I am getting the new tyres on the belingo sorted and will buy another 12 volt battery for the new hen fencing.
Its all go

Scala stories,Clearing the dry stone wall and William


The first photo was taken in the early 1980's and shows a night out centred around the Scala Cinema in Prestatyn. Outdated (even then) the Scala had an all enclosed "booth" in which a middle aged lady would dispense the tiny "admit" one ticket; an ice cream lady with an over the shoulder tub tray standing in the aisle at the interval; a small "exclusive" balcony and the obligatory brown and orange decor so fashionable in the seventies.
The reason for the motley collection of hired and home made outfits our family and friends are wearing can be laid directly at Aunt Judy;s door, as she was appearing in the local production of OAKLAHOMA ( as one of the chorus), and after a few barcardi and cokes we all decieded to turn up in fancy dress to support her. The still was taken by friend Ian ( who got it published in the Prestatyn Journal) and from left to right (let me try and remember) the group consists of
Stu and Caroline ( Cousin and first wife),two young women I don't know, Tim (Brother in law),Ann (sister),Andrew (brother),Debbie (friend),Jayne (sister in law),Janet (twin), Ronnie (fellow C.B enthusiast), Nia (who now lives in Australia), Me!, Nerys Griffith (ex girlfriend),Andrew and Helen ( She used to work for Ann) and the woman with the beard on is the affable despot that was Joan Walkden- Williams (Tim's mother who must have been in her seventies)
The evening was a great sucess (helped along by copius amounts of Jim Beam swigged straight from the bottle!) and the local am drams' quite charitably overlooked the fact that we were singing along with the songs with gusto and gave poor Judy a standing ovation so such a small supporting role..
Recently the scala recieved the funds for a 21st Century revamp (right pic) and it would be nice to think that the new "art houe cinema and community centre" would use older pictures like this for some sort of " trip down memory lane" exhibition.

The weather has been cold but sunny today, and I have cleared a lot of dirt and weeds from the side of the dry stone wall in the lane. It is a dirty heavy job, but worth it as hopefully it will placate one of the neighbours (the old girl who was non-plussed with the arrival of the roosters). It was approaching dusk when I took the dogs to the beach, and the bad light was a pity as I love the picture of William and I
Spoke to Nige this evening too!, we had a fun semi planning my stag night ( no date for civil ceremony just yet readers) watch this space.....

Early Morning photos


The photo of the mini daffodil is ever so slightly out of focus, but it looks pretty enough. The lane outside the cottage is lethal and as usual has never been gritted ( or will ever!)
but looks pretty.
William has seemed to have left some of his annoying puppy behaviours in the past, and is slowly developing some of his own personality traits. Caught him this morning curled up with his nemisis George in the kitchen basket













Thanks to Jeni Barnett


Thanks to new LBC presenter Jeni Barnett we now have a usable dining table.
I was listening to her the other day banging on about nothing too important, when her hysterical laughing caught my attention. Actually, I had to stop what I was doing (humping black bin bags of rubbish to be precise) to listen to her phone in about Londoners' embarrassing stories. The one about a stewardess mistaking Cofe Annan for Morgan Freeman sent her into lengthy cackles, and her obvious enjoyment of the subject matter warmed me to her. Anyhow I digress. This in turn made me listen to her later phone in about the importance of eating at a family table, and she was so passionate about it, I was inspired to clear our own table of clutter (which included seed potatos,coats,paperwork,allotment books a battery charger and various vegetable catalogues).
Before taking Chris to the station this morning, I caught him sitting at the table with a cup of tea, enjoying the feeling of fomality, a table gives you! I am at this moment enjoying the same sensation, but with a filter coffee and a bagel!


The photo on the right is the nearly completed Church wall, at the back of my field. The first of the fence posts are going in (you can just see it lying against the stone wall) and I can almost "taste" my boundary fence being finished . For those remotely bothered about such things, the churchyard is open to the back of my field, so when the odd chicken escapes (generally it is Stanley) they wander freely amongst the gravestones.
When the boundary goes in, another hundred square yards of "pasture" will be free for me to use.

Bert and the first snow storm!

It's strange how history repeats itself. Called in to wish Uncle Bert a happy 80th Birthday with a card and flowers and found myself photographing him in exactly the same place and pose as my grandmother ( his mother) did some 30 years ago.I still have the poleroid of her somewhere in a box and the similarity between her and Bert is striking.

Bert and his wife Margaret are two of the oldest surviving members of the Gray family ( Judy being the other), and he is the middle son of three boys with my father being older and Tom being the baby.Strange to think that I remember my mother saying that she and Bert went to see King Kong together (THE ORIGINAL!!) in Prestatyn Scala.....so many years ago!

The weather has been bitterly cold today and some of the older hens like Robina have not even left the warmth of the coops. To keep my hands warm, there is nothing better than wrapping them around a newly laid egg-an organic hotwaterbottle! We have had snow, blusterly winds and rain, and the hills near Caerwys (5 miles away) and Denbigh (8 miles or so) are dusted with snow this evening, as is the field (see pic)

My bean closhes have been whisked away by the winds this morning. Pippa (The Doctor's wife) brought back one from the vicarage gardens, but the other two have dissapeared
With the weather so bad, I have spent a gay old day shopping,and rearranging the kitchen. The dogs have had their usual run on the beach with Janet's Ruby, but I think I will limit Meg's participation as Ruby bullies her terribly. Taking William to a dog training class on monday with Janet and an overactive Ruby which should be fun.



5.45am storm


This blog will still show on yesterday's date ( why is that? are we on American time?) but it is ,in fact 5.45 am! Gale force winds and rain woke me first thing, so muttering like an old psychi patient I donned a pair of tracksuit bottoms and an old jumper and dragged the dogs out into the storm for poos and pees.
The weather IS awful!
A quick trot down the lane and we are all soaked to the skin, at least the hens seemed to be ok, as I can just hear Duncan crowing against the howl of the wind.
I am now tucked up in bed with a coffee and blog ( I cannot believe I am blogging at this time!)
hey ho

The field is ready...(almost)

Another duck egg today, so hoping another will be banged out tomorrow I have amended the sale sign in the cottage window-I know it is a case of counting my duck eggs before they are laid but the girls seem to be on a roll.
Below is a photo of William in his favourite position in the passenger seat of the Belingo. I may sound like a modern parent/pet owner, but I try to give each of the dogs some individual time and attention. For George and Maddie, it is sitting in the lounge in an evening.For Meg it is coming to bed with me after her early morning walk and for William it is sitting in the passenger seat with me, when I go shopping or when I get petrol.
Watching william excitedly getting into "his position" next to me in the car today, I found incredibly moving. Dogs love adhering to their routines, and they adore simple "treats" like a trip to the shops. It is a simple thing to make happen
and one that gives such reciprocal pleasure.to me.

I know the news that I have finally dug over all my old and new vegetable patches today, may not excite anyone but me, but I don't care as it gives me a huge sense of achievement
I plan to have a large potato veg patch on the sight of the bonfire (below left). The main vegetable plot ( below right) is flanked by the first of my smaller flower growing areas. And the final soft fruit plot (not shown) is completed and ready further down the field.The weather closed in at 1pm (AGAIN!!!) but most of the work had been done and dusted by then.




















David Cameron has withdrawn the Tory whip from Derek Conway after the MP was reprimanded over the amount he paid his son for working as his researcher I heard today! Big deal! The MP should be sacked for manipulating the system and paying his son 13 thousand pounds to do nothing ( and also "employing" his elder son in another researcher post. Fellow MP ( and former blue collar Northern Union rep) John Mann, who brought the complaint to light, was eloquent in his arguments why all M.P business should indeed be transparent, but he did concede (rather worryingly) that many many MPs should and would be looking over their shoulders at the moment as a "signified number" of them "employ" relatives in junior support positions.
So much for the whiter then white public servants