Gwernyfed Walled Gardens

 

I was having such an interesting conversation that I forgot to take any photos until we were leaving!  Here's the sculpture of the heron next to the duckpond, which is drained at the moment.

 

I've never been to Gwernyfed Walled Garden before, mostly because I thought it was more difficult to get to than it is.  Just up the drive to Gwernyfed School there's a side turn, and the walled garden is just there.  So it's really close to the bus stops, and I can get there easily on my own when I go again.

A friend was treating me to lunch, which we had in the old glass house after a stroll round the garden.  It's full of produce and flowers at the moment.  She also pointed out the part of the garden wall which has been rebuilt in breeze blocks - a reminder of the explosion in the munition dump during World War Two!

I had the Thai curry, she had the parsnip soup, and we shared a pot of tea between us.  I noticed that there were some delicious looking cakes on display too - maybe next time!

As we left, we passed some building work in progress, where they are adding an extension.  It will be interesting to come back next year to see the results. 

Author Event at Hay Distillery

 Clocktower Books are holding an author event at Hay Distillery on Saturday 17th October at 6.30pm.  (They don't really have much space in the shop to host events there).

AJ West will be talking about his latest book The Deadly Inheritance of Everest Macdonald.

Initially, I thought Everest Macdonald was a man's name, but I saw a video on Instagram from AJ West - and Everest was a girl, the niece of William Terriss, a famous Victorian actor who was murdered at the stage door of the theatre he was performing at!  So there's a fascinating back story for the novel.

The event is free, but places should be reserved by either scanning the QR code on the posters around town (there's one in the Cinema Bookshop), or by calling in at Clocktower Books. 

The Kitchen Shelf

 

I only went away for a few days, and when I got back a new bookshop had opened!

The Kitchen Shelf sells cookery books, along with a few condiments and accessories for kitchens.  They're in the shop that used to house the Haymakers, who have now moved next to the Buttermarket. 

Fragility Into Form

 The Cabinet of Curiosities is putting on an exhibition of the work of Dotty Brotherton-Ratcliffe.  She's a weaver and dyer, and a lot of the exhibition is formed of pieces she made for her degree at the University of Brighton (she got a First!).

She works with natural dyes, and makes some rich deep browns by, for instance, adding rust to oak galls.  Hence the pieces of rusted metal which are part of the exhibition.

These pieces are dyed with madder.

 

Because the house on Oxford Road is still in the process of renovation, this is a travelling exhibition - round the corner into the garage/studio in Bear Street.

This will be the last exhibition to be held in the Bear Street studio, as they are selling it to the family who live next door.

The exhibition is on until Saturday 17th October, from 11am to 6pm. 

Witches and Healers Exhibition in Manchester

 

Here's a video of the Witches and Healers exhibition at the Portico Library in Manchester - I was invited because I'm one of the exhibits!  In fact, when I arrived I was delighted to find that Rosie Reed Hillman had used three of the photos she took when I took her to the Swan Well.

The video was taken by Claire, from Middlesborough, who was likewise delighted that her book on telling fortunes by casting lots is on sale at the Library.  She runs a Facebook page called Hedge Witchery UK.

It was a wonderful event, and the exhibition is on in Manchester until March, when it moves to Glasgow.  There is also a film about three of the women in the exhibition, but that isn't being shown until the end of the month.

There was even a link with Hay - and Timbuktu!  The lady with long grey hair (seen communing with a rock in her photo, somewhere near Fishguard), travelled a lot around Africa in her younger days, and spent some time in Mali and Timbuktu.  She was asked to come to speak to the Timbuktu Twinning committee when the twinning project started, and talked about the storytelling traditions in Mali.  Some stories can only be told on one night of the year, and when that night comes round, the community stays up all night to listen to the stories. 

Normal Service will Soon Be Resumed!

 I've been away on holiday twice over the last couple of weeks.  The first one was a trip to North Wales to revisit some scenes of my childhood holidays:

 This is the bridge at Llanrwst, with the tea shop covered in Virginia creeper on the far bank (the cakes are awesome!)

And today I got back from a couple of days in Manchester, where I had been invited to the opening of an exhibition in the Portico Library entitled Witches and Healers.

I had an absolutely brilliant time!

I know that quite a few things have been happening in Hay while I've been distracted, but I hope to get round to talking about them soon! 

Drone Flight

 Hay is busy with visitors for the Fungi Town events and the last Saturday market of the year, in bright sunshine which is unseasonably warm for the beginning of October.

Meanwhile, I was up in Cusop churchyard with members of the Cusop Castle Dig committee and the Cusop Dingle Research Group, and a man with a drone!

It was fascinating watching him work.  The drone has a legal height limit of 120m, and a voice on the control panel warns the operator when they've reached that height - but that was quite high enough to get good views of the churchyard and over towards the castle and the Dingle.  The photos and 360 degree panorama he took will be used for research by the groups.  We will be looking for any archaeological features which are visible from above, as well as things like how field boundaries fit together.  Some of this can be done from maps, but it's so much better to have the photos to work from.

For some reason I've been getting clips of Gerry Anderson's UFO series on my social media recently, and the drone looked just like something Gerry Anderson would have dreamed up for Thunderbirds or one of his other puppet series - except we can do it for real now.