Three Inch Fools at the Castle

 It's the tenth anniversary of the Three Inch Fools theatre company, and they are celebrating with two grand tours, with two troupes, each performing their own show.  Altogether, they're visiting 112 different venues around the UK.

On Friday 8th August, they'll be performing on the lawn of Hay Castle, at 7pm.  The audience is invited to bring a picnic, and suitable outdoor clothing - but not umbrellas, so that they don't obscure the view of the stage for other people.  The play is - not exactly Shakespeare, more Shakespeare-adjacent.  It's called The Most Perilous Comedie of Elizabeth I, in which Queen Elizabeth herself takes to the stage, with lots of backstage plotting - rival playwrights, devious dramatics.... it sounds like a lot of fun.

Tickets are £20, and only seem to be available online. 

Birthday Cards

 The new girl at work has a birthday coming up - her first as a real bookseller - and I wanted to get her a book-themed birthday card.

Should be easy in Hay, shouldn't it?

Well, it used to be.  There was a very good card supplier that did cards with spines of old books, or amusing book covers, and Broad Street Book Centre used to carry them.  When I got there, though, they only had a couple left, and the rest were landscapes and nature pictures.

So I went to Booths - I think they may have had the same supplier at one time - but they only had one, a portrait of a woman reading a book.  Lots of variety of other stuff (they've got some cute Moomin cards, for instance) and several of Hay and Booth Books, but not what I had in mind.  I bought a bookmark in the shape of a pile of books, just in case I couldn't find a card anywhere else.

Bartrums had a few general cards.  North Books had nature designs.

Then, at Oil and Oak, I struck paydirt.  A card with a photo of shelves of books.  They said they often have cards with books on them, and they always sell out quickly.

There are a couple of other places to buy cards in Hay - the Craft Centre, for instance - but I stopped there. 

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. 

 

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! 

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. 

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. 

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!

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. 

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. 

Book Dealers' Party

 It was a perfect evening in the garden of the Cinema Bookshop.  Not so many people came as last year, but that was probably because Gay-on-Wye were holding an event at more or less the same time.  Some people went to both!

I think we probably had the superior nibbles, though - with an Asian theme.  I've never been a fan of tofu, but the little squares with decorative bits on top, served on a little bamboo spoon, were delicious, as was the spicy aubergine - and everybody loved the little Scotch eggs!

The conversation was fascinating, too - I ended up talking about the history of marmalade with a Portuguese lady who lives in London.  And I solved the mystery of the cat who visits my garden, when I had a chat with his owner, who is a close neighbour (and also a bookseller).  Bob used to visit the previous ladies at the almshouses, so I'm very happy to carry on the tradition.  

Trip to Hereford

 A hot and sticky bus ride into Hereford today, made infinitely more bearable by interesting conversation with a friend I met at the bus stop.  I never realised she had such an interesting life!

I was trying new things today, so I went into the Asian supermarket near the Cathedral.  I had no idea what half the names on the packets were, but I came away with some Horse Gram (brown lentils), ginger and soy sauce, and I will return with a list after I've done some research!

As it was so hot, I went into the Eden coffee shop by the Old House to try their frappe - I used to drink frappes all the time (there should be an accent over the e - frapp-ay) when I was in Greece.  This was not much like the Greek ones I remember, but I'll certainly go back and try other things on their menu.

The town centre was full of interesting food stalls, with food from all over the world, though I don't know if they were doing much trade in the heat.  I was too hot to try anything.

On the way back, the bus was held up for a while for some sort of carnival parade from Peterchurch school.  There were a lot of children dressed as monkeys, for some reason! 

Trial Run for Ancient Monuments Tour

 I went up to Hay Bluff this morning, by a roundabout route, with Mary Anne.  We were checking out the route that the Enchanted Hour Tour is going to take around the local sites of historical interest.  

Mainly, we were checking that the route was easy to follow, so we didn't get lost, and that there was enough parking at each place we wanted to stop.

So we're doing two loops, one round Clyro and one round Llanigon.

For Clyro, we're stopping at the Roman fort at Boatside Farm, and Cwrt Ifan Gwynne (which was a Welsh castle).  We overshot the entrance to Cwrt Ifan Gwynne, which is also a Radnorshire Wildlife Trust site featuring dormice - distances that seemed quite long when I was walking are a lot shorter in a car! 

From there we go into Clyro and up the main road just past the petrol station.  Right next to the house there, in the field, is a Bronze Age barrow.  Then we head back to Hay, stopping at Clyro Castle on the way. 

On the other side of Hay we're going up the side road to Llanigon that leads up to Llanthomas Farm, for the site of Llanigon Castle (now a bungalow).   I was amazed at how many new houses have been built there since I last went that way!

Then we head up the lane next to Old Forge Garage to Penywyrlod.   Sadly, it wasn't possible to find a place to park near the Neolithic tomb, but there's plenty of space on the road at the old farmhouse, which also has a fascinating history.

And from there it's a straight run up to Hay Bluff car park, for a game of Hunt the Stone Circle (it's really quite easy to miss!).  Back when it was built, it was an important local monument - the family tombs down in the valley all have a view up to the stone circle, and what probably happened was that small rituals happened at the tombs, but several times a year people would hike up the mountain for more elaborate rituals at the circle.

On the way back down to Hay, there's also Twyn y Beddau, another Bronze Age tomb.  This one's even got a noticeboard to read.  It also has rocks on the top to stop the scramble bikes from riding over it - but that didn't stop one young man when we were there.  "Oi!" I yelled at him, "that's a 4,000 year old tomb!"

"Uh, sorry," he mumbled, as he rode away.

If anyone wants to go on the tour, it starts from Hay Library at 2pm on Friday 18th July - tickets available from the library.  No-one so far really wanted to go in a minibus, so it's going to be a fleet of cars (hence the checking to make sure we could all park at each site!).

Mary Anne asked me to give a quick overview of the different periods of history and prehistory for this area, so here goes:

For our purposes, we start with the Neolithic, the New Stone Age.  There would have been earlier people in the area, but they left very little trace that  we can see today.  The Neolithic people lived in extended family groups, each with their own family tomb, and centred around Hay Bluff, where they built their stone circle.  This would be around 5,000 years ago.

Then came the Bronze Age, and a change in burial practices.  Tombs got smaller, with only a small number of burials (I don't know where everyone else was buried).  Often the tombs are in places that overlook the tribal lands of the group that built them.  This would be about 4,000 years ago.

The Iron Age tribe in the area is the first one that we know the name of - the Silures.  They were the ones who attacked the Roman fort at Boatside Farm and drove the Romans out of their tribal territory.  Iron started to be used around 800BC.  The Romans arrived in Britain in 43AD, and built the fort at Boatside around 60AD.

The traditional date for the Romans leaving Britain is 410AD, and by this time the Silures were becoming Welsh.  The Normans arrived in 1066AD, and very quickly moved across the country, building castles everywhere, especially in disputed territory like the Welsh Marches.  This is also the time that the medieval monasteries were an important part of the landscape - right up until Henry VIII closed them down.  Disputes about religion are part of the history of Penywyrlod Farm, which was an important local centre for Puritans to meet and worship together, to the disapproval of the Church of England.

 So that's a very basic timeline, but it at least gives an idea of the periods that the ancient monuments belong to.

 

Tin Zoo

 I never thought I'd be one of those people who fill their gardens with little statues and knick-knacks, but I couldn't resist this.

I saw the collection of bats on the Tin Zoo stall on the Saturday market some time ago, and thought they were wonderful, but at the time, I had nowhere to put one.  I'm not entirely sure where he'll go in my garden yet, but here he is in his temporary roost, while I think of a better place for him.

 

Tin Zoo get their stock from artists in Africa, who source their materials from scrapyards.  Since they started in 1998, they've supported artists who have been able to build homes, pay for medical care and send their children to school.  They are regulars on the Saturday markets in Hay.

 

Kilvert's Portrait

 I was sitting in the bar of Kilvert's earlier today, waiting for my washing in the launderette, and I noticed the portrait of Freddie they have over the fireplace.  Freddie was, of course, the Kilvert dog, who died a couple of years ago.  It's a very good likeness, but the red light in the background does make him look a little bit demonic!

Book Fair

 On Saturday 12th July, there will be a PBFA Book Fair at the Castle.  This is becoming an annual event in the PBFA calendar - they organise book fairs all over the country.  Also, as is becoming traditional, Hay Cinema Bookshop is hosting a  party for the book dealers on the evening before the Fair.

Entry is free, and the books will mainly be antiquarian and collectable. 

[Edited to add: on the same day, at Tomatitos, there will be a pop up kitchen.  Tomatitos are no longer serving food themselves, but they are hosting other food businesses.  This one is Keralan Karavan from Cardiff, serving Raj Burgers, chicken curry, spicy rolls and fries]