{"id":751,"date":"2018-10-21T16:23:46","date_gmt":"2018-10-21T16:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=751"},"modified":"2018-10-23T09:48:31","modified_gmt":"2018-10-23T09:48:31","slug":"north-country-2018-06","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=751","title":{"rendered":"NORTH COUNTRY 2018. 06"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday we relocated from The Lake District to North Yorkshire via the A66.\u00a0 Of course, the A66 was closed completely near Appleby and then reduced to one lane for miles approaching Scotch Corner.\u00a0 Everyone seemed to be out for a Saturday stroll and wanted to do the speed limit minus 10 mph.\u00a0 Once we did get moving on the A1M, we had to leave the main road almost instantly at Catterick.\u00a0 Here we immediately tangled with the traffic leaving the race course!\u00a0 All in all, a slow trip to China\u00a0 – well, to Danby Wiske anyway.<\/p>\n

On the way we noticed some significant moorland fires.\u00a0 Presumably these were controlled burns, although we did see a fire engine heading out that way with blue lights flashing.<\/p>\n

We passed a “smoot” while we were out walking.\u00a0 At least it might have been one.\u00a0 Which leads me to ask what “footings”, “courses “, “throughs”, “cams”, “stoups”, “bee boles”, “creeps” and “smoots” have in common.\u00a0 Well, any ideas?<\/p>\n

Of course, they are all bits of dry stone walls.\u00a0 Although, strictly speaking the last three are holes in the walls.\u00a0 A rabbit “smoot” is a cunningly placed (usually square) hole left in the wall at ground level.\u00a0 Rabbits were invited to pass (or were chased) through the tunnel and were caught in traps with swinging lids.\u00a0 Food!!!\u00a0 “Creeps” are taller, narrow gaps, again at ground level, to allow sheep to pass through.\u00a0 “Bee boles” are built into walls near vegetable gardens to encourage bees to colonise.<\/p>\n

“Stoups” are vertical posts with holes drilled through.\u00a0 One of a pair would have round holes and the other square ones.\u00a0 Poles (known as stangs) (each with one round and one square end) would be fitted between the “stoups” to form a removable barrier known as a\u00a0 “slip-gate”.<\/p>\n

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If you look carefully you can just see that one of these re-located posts has square holes.\u00a0 Had I known what I now do about “stoup-holes” when I took the photo, I would have made sure the different shaped holes were visible.\u00a0 There is a rumour that the expression “square peg in a round hole” might have derived from wrongly orientated poles… just maybe!<\/p>\n

A survey in 1986 established that there were over\u00a08,000 kms of stone walls in Yorkshire.\u00a0 At a density of 2.5 tonnes per cubic metre, that means there are at least 20 million tonnes of rock involved in this business.\u00a0 Luckily there’s lots of it lying around in these parts!<\/p>\n

That’s enough educational facts for a bit!<\/p>\n

Today (Sunday) we went for a walk with Sarah and Ian on the Cleveland way at Sutton Bank, East of Thirsk.\u00a0 The path runs along the top of the scarp slope to a white horse carved into the ground in 1857.<\/p>\n

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While admiring the horse’s ears (about all you can see from the top path), we were strafed by planes towing gliders off from the field immediately behind us.\u00a0 Also by powered gliders which effectively tow themselves up before switching of their engines.<\/p>\n

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The Cleveland Way runs 109 miles from Helmsley to Sutton Bank then all the way round the West and Northwest edge of The North Yorkshire Moors to Saltburn.\u00a0 It then runs down the coast to Scarborough and Filey.\u00a0 We walked a sedate four miles of the route (two out and two back)!<\/p>\n

Now a (rather long) contribution from Mad Mary…<\/p>\n

A<\/span>\u00a0couple was invited to a swanky costume party.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

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The woman got a terrible headache and told her husband to go to the party alone.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
He, being a devoted husband, protested but she argued and said she was going to take some aspirin and go to bed and there was no need for his good time being spoiled by not going.
\n<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
So he took his costume and away he went.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
The wife, after sleeping soundly for about an hour, awakened without pain and, as it was still early, decided to go the party.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
Since her husband did not know what her costume was, she thought she would have some fun by watching her husband to see how he acted when she was not with him.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
She joined the party and soon spotted her husband cavorting around on the dance floor, dancing with every nice looking woman he could, and copping a little feel here and a little kiss there.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
His wife sidled up to him and being a rather seductive babe herself, he left his current partner high and dry and devoted his time to the new babe that had just arrived.
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She let him go as far as he wished, naturally, since he was her husband.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
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Finally, he whispered a little proposition in her ear and she agreed.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
So off they went to one of the cars and had a quickie.
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Just before unmasking at midnight, she slipped away, went home, put the costume away and got into bed, wondering what kind of explanation he would make for his behavior.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
She was sitting up reading when he came in, and she asked what kind of a time he had..<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
He said: “Oh, the same old thing.\u00a0\u00a0You know I never have a good time when you’re not there.”<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
“Did you dance much?’<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
“I’ll tell you, I never even danced one dance.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>\u00a0When I got there, I met Pete, Bill Brown and some other guys and we went into the den and played poker all evening.<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
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But you’re not going to believe what happened to the guy I loaned my costume to…..”<\/strong><\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday we relocated from The Lake District to North Yorkshire via the A66.\u00a0 Of course, the A66 was closed completely near Appleby and then reduced to one lane for miles approaching Scotch Corner.\u00a0 Everyone seemed to be out for a… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-north-country-2018"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=751"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":797,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions\/797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}