Friday, 25 July 2025

Hay Pride

 Hay Pride will take place at the Globe on Saturday 2nd August.

(I think I mistakenly said it was 5th July earlier - but that was last year's date).

There will be stalls during the day, and entertainment in the evening.  Tickets are £5 for a wristband that lets you in to everything from DJs to drag artists from noon to midnight.

The event is fundraising for Stonewall and MindOut, an LGBTQ+ mental health charity. 

 

Thursday, 24 July 2025

Sink Hole

 I went into Hereford this morning, to find there was a diversion around Commercial Street, where a sink hole had opened up!  Commercial Street is the one leading from the ring road to the railway station.

It wasn't too bad, though - the bus just took the next turn in that direction (Kyrle Road, I think), down by the hospital, and there wasn't much of a delay.

I met a friend on the bus, and she had a good look at the road works.  She said that it looked like one of the trenches that had been opened up for utility pipes was the problem - the fill of the trench had been washed away, or something similar.  It wasn't anything like as big as the sink hole that opened up in Norwich all those years ago and swallowed a double decker bus!

On the way back into town, it was sad to see the mural on the side of The Commercial pub - the plaster of the wall has fallen off, taking most of the picture of Arthur's Stone with it.  However, good news is that the artist who painted the Hereford cow and calf on the side of the Herdsman pub has been painting another mural, of birds this time, on the side of the hospital.

Meanwhile, the cathedral is getting ready to host the Three Choirs Festival, and there are flower arrangements everywhere! 

Tuesday, 22 July 2025

Lunch at the Blue Boar

 My sister and her family were somewhere near Cardiff for a car rally, and they decided to come home via Hay to drop off some furniture for me for my new home.

So I am now the proud possessor of a blanket box and a quite remarkable table - it seems at first glance to be a long, narrow table, and then the top folds out, and out, and out until it's enormous!  It's too big for me to open it all the way up, but it is just right for the space in the kitchen which is long and narrow, and it looks so much tidier in there.

It was a little bit difficult to find parking for the motorhome with the trailer on the back for the rally car (they won a prize - I don't really understand the details, but they were very pleased), so we ended up in the coach parking area of the main car park.  The Blue Boar was the closest option for lunch, and they already knew from previous visits that you get big portions there.  They had another four hours' drive to get home, so they wanted something substantial to keep them going.

And they got it.  Father and son went for the cheeseburger, my sister had venison, and I had the spaghetti bolognese, and they were all very filling, and tasty.  So a good choice for a hearty meal before a long journey.

It was lovely to see them all again, and I'm very pleased with my new furniture. 

Monday, 21 July 2025

Classical Music and Berlin Cabaret from Hay Music

 The next Hay Music concert is on Friday 25th July, at 7pm at St. Mary's Church, and it sounds fascinating!

Lotte Betts-Dean is the mezzo soprano who will be singing with the Marsyas Trio and friends.  They've performed in Hay before.

It's a varied programme, with Haydn and Debussy, Claude's Girl by Marika Hackman, and a piece by Schoenberg called Pierrot Lunaire.  This is described as a piece that changed musical history.  It was written in 1912, based on the Berlin cabaret, and is a cycle of 21 songs about the bizarre world of the clown-like Pierrot.

Tickets are £20, or £10 for the under-25s. 

Sunday, 20 July 2025

Summer Show

 I didn't say anything about the Summer Show, because I can never go - I'm always working on a Sunday - but I did feel sorry for them today.  After all that fine, hot weather, today the heavens opened, and we had a thunderstorm!

Saturday, 19 July 2025

Touring the Local Ancient Monuments

 We set off from outside the Library yesterday afternoon for our Enchanted Hour tour.

In the end, there were only two cars - several people gave their apologies, including poor Mary Anne, who organised everything!  She had a delivery to attend to, and wasn't able to change the date.

That made it easy for parking at all the sites we visited, and John Price kindly brought along some extra information about the Roman fort - pictures of the donkey mill that was found there (and is now in St Fagans), along with pictures of a similar mill in Pompeii!  The Romans really did keep things the same right across the Empire!  It's called a donkey mill because a donkey was harnessed to a beam to turn the grinding stone round and round.

Seeing so many local motte and bailey castles in quick succession really put them into context for me.  They weren't just little outposts - they were substantial buildings in the landscape, and they all had very good views of the surrounding countryside.  

We got a special treat at Motte House in Llanigon - we were allowed to climb to the top of the mound!


 I'm in the middle - thanks to Jackie Andrews for all the photos.

In the background, wearing a hat, is the owner of Motte House, Liam Madden, who told us all about the castle, and the way it controlled a trade route from the Black Mountains down to a ford of the River Wye, where it was paired with another castle at Llowes, in much the same way as Hay and Clyro castles are paired together.

Liam only bought his house by chance - he isn't from this area - and when he moved here he was delighted to find that the little area around his house has such a rich history.  There's the castle, of course, and John Price found the information (from Llanigon Place Names by WET Morgan in 1918), that William Thomas, who was tutor to King Edward IV, lived there.  Is that where the name Llanthomas came from?  Or was it derived from something earlier, as Liam suggests in his Wikipedia article?  (type Llanthomas Castle Mound to find it).  There was a pre-Conquest settlement called Trefynys.

Again, this was a substantial castle - the bailey extended into the next field - and was well defended, with the Digedi Brook on one side.

And then there are all the Kilvert connections - the walled garden of Llanthomas is just across the road - and we had a good chat about St Eigon (daughter of Caractacus, or 6th century monk?).

Then we headed up to Hay Bluff, via Penywyrlod Farm (there was nowhere safe to park to get to the tomb, sadly).  This is another place with a fascinating history, as a local centre for Non-conformist worship in the 17th century, when the owner was William Watkin, who had been an officer in the Parliamentary forces during the Civil War.

And here we are in the middle of the stone circle at the foot of Hay Bluff:


 We found quite a few of the stones!

We finished off at Twyn y Beddau - no scramble bikes this time, but two ponies standing on the mound.


 It was great fun, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves!  Some of the people on the tour grew up around this area, and had played as children on some of the sites, but they were commenting that they hadn't realised just how much interesting history there is in this area.

John was also filming during the tour - he puts the films up on YouTube, but they can only be viewed if he shares the link with you.  This one, of course, is still in the process of being edited. 

Sunday, 13 July 2025

Book Fair

 Lots of interesting stalls, on two floors of the Castle.

There was even a good collection of classic SF, which I never expect to see at antiquarian book fairs.  There was a good selection of classic crime (green Penguins!) and children's books too.

I treated myself to a rather nice folio edition of Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff - upgrading from my old paperback copy (this is a story I keep going back to).

There was also one stall with a collection of books from the library of John Kenyon.  He was related to the archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon, and his special interest was Welsh castles - there were a lot of good books on the subject on the stall.  It's always interesting to see other people's collections. 

On the way out, I cut through the old stables, where there's a shop selling posh hats and other accessories.  In the yard on the other side there's a new art gallery, full of beautifully detailed pictures of animals, bones and the Moon, amongst other things.  I have wall space in my new home, but I think putting picture hooks up in 200 year old stone walls is probably not a good idea, so I contented myself with a small greetings card of the moon on a gold background, and framed it when I got home with a background of stars from an old Space calendar.  The artist is Rosie McLay.