In the UK summer is a fickle mistress at the best of times, so scheduling an open air event can mean you’re living a bit dangerously but it’s something we natives have just got used to. All of that said, this weekend past I went along to the fifth annual Chorley flower show, held as always in the grounds of the delightful Astley Hall, a large manor house dating from […]
It was a Thursday, the sun was shining high in the sky and I needed to go to the bank, paying bills is always such fun. I had a couple of options, there are two branches near where I live but where’s the fun in parting with money on your own doorstep? Like I said it was Thursday, so that would be market day in Ormskirk, not too far away […]
Sometimes I find it more productive just to ease back, relax and do a bit of nothing. Instead of chiselling away at a project that has become a little “sticky” and uncooperative, I just step back and leave it for a while. I know this isn’t a new discovery, I certainly didn’t invent this method but it can be easy to overlook the benefits of pausing things for just a […]
Okay, I’m a big kid. I like travelling by rail and there’s a new train service in town. It’s a reopened route that had been mothballed for a quite a few years and it connects the West Coast Main Line with the route out to Chester and North Wales, cutting a corner off the journey into Liverpool from North Wales. This set me thinking, it meant I could get into […]
The sunshine was back again but with guarantee for how long, so not wanting to see it go to waste I headed out to Liverpool and the Another Place art installation at Crosby on the Sefton coast. This is the stretch which runs north from the city along the Mersey estuary and then up to the resort of Southport.
CROSBY. One of the figures which form the Another Place art installation by the artist Anthony Gormley. There are one hundred of these figures placed in different positions along the beach, allowing them to appear and disappear as the tide rises and falls. As you can see people like to make sure that the figures are okay, they are out in all weathers after all.
Another Place is an art installation created by the artist Anthony Gormley it consists of 98 identical iron figures all cast from a plaster cast of the artist’s own body which are anchored into the bedrock beneath the sands in various positions which allows them to appear and disappear as the tide ebbs and flows.
CROSBY. One of the Iron Men stands an contemplates a navigation beacon on the River Mersey.
This stretch of the coast is also attractive in it’s own right, a little further along towards the resort town of Southport are the towns of Ainsdale and Formby, between them the stretch of coastline contains National Trust woodlands and sand dunes with a colony of rare red squirrels. The species was once more populous but encroachment by the larger grey squirrels diminished their numbers over the years leaving them with just a few strongholds across the country. The Sefton Coastal Path a twenty two mile walking route also runs through the area.
LIVERPOOL. Crosby, an offshore windfarm on Burbo Bank at the mouth of the River Mersey.
I used the train to get into Liverpool and then out to Waterloo on Merseyrail’s Northern Line route which connects the city with Southport. Its a short walk from the station down to the shore where I picked up the path along the coast for the couple of miles walk to the statues. On the way I stopped off at the excellent Waterloo place coffee shop, I wanted to fuel up before the walk…….
LIVERPOOL. Waterloo Place Coffee House.
The sun had brought the people out and the sands were full of activity and after an easy walk it came to where the statues stand, gazing out in silent contemplation as the people and the ships busying up and down the River Mersey all pass by.
CROSBY. Three of the figures look out across the Mersey. On the far bank is New Brighton once served by the famous Mersey ferries but sadly no longer since the demolition of its pier.
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OTHER STUFF.
Rain, rain go away and come again another day. Up here in this part of North West England we have had an unwelcome visitor in the shape of storm Gareth. While its effects around where I live have not been too bad I know that it has caused quite a large amount of flooding, damage to buildings and travel disruption for others. Set against that a few weeks of deathly […]
