New paintings and regular art updates.
#bandofsketchers prompt ‘prop’ from a couple of weeks ago.
Old drawing of Jodrell Bank radio telescope, takes tons of metal to prop the dish up….previously used for a different band of sketchers prompt ‘holiday ‘ but it seemed appropriate. Cheshire, near Holmes Chapel,
What’s a job you would like to do for just one day?
WordPress does not have a photo of Jodrell Bank radio telescope near Holmes Chapel in England, so I’ve chosen a random photo of a radio telescope from their image selection.
I love visiting the place, but I wish I had an astrophysics qualification so I could sit in the control room and actually be involved in the discovery of something spectacular, like the radio signal of a pulsar, or the signal from an alien civilisation. To be the first to hear something new. Like Jocelyn Bell-Burnell who discovered the first Pulsar, a fast spinning neutron star that gives off radio signals which can be detected by the radio telescope. She didn’t get credit for the discovery and wasn’t included the nobel prize when it was awarded for the work she did.
If I could be there I’d even enjoy making tea for the astronomers, or just sit quietly in a corner, listening out for signals. I used to be a member of a citizen science group looking out for alien signals. SETI is really interesting and I also like the ZOONIVERSE group that looks at data for several citizen science projects.
The trouble is if you let me in…. You won’t get me out!
What is your favorite place to go in your city?
My city stands on its own, not really part of a conurbation. It is between Birmingham and Manchester and there are small satellite towns dotted around it.
When I first came to live here, what always struck me, was how close the countryside is. South and East are Staffordshire farmland, West is Shropshires rolling hills and also Cheshire with it’s flat plain and salt mines, North East is Derbyshire with the pennines hilly beginnings and also the Staffordshire moorlands with old industrial buildings hidden in its valleys.
The area is crisscrossed by canals, rivers, train tracks and roads. Alton Towers is a few miles to the North east, further north is the old silk mill towns of Leek and closer to Manchester is Macclesfield.
The Trent and Mersey canal runs through the mile long Harecastle tunnel at Kidsgrove, where the water runs orange (from old iron mine workings?).
There are forests, fields, caves, lakes, walking and cycling routes. Bakewell is reasonably close, home of the Bakewell tart (pastry with raspberry jam and an almond paste topping?). Also famous for food is Market Drayton to our west. I think they make Gingerbread there.
There are National trust properties like Little Moreton Hall and Biddulph Grange. Big garden centres and antique centres. Not forgetting the gem that is the Dorothy Clive garden.
The city is not without its merits, Gladstone and Moorcroft, Middleport and Emma Bridgwater potteries and the potteries museum and art gallery all tell the history of the city.
But I like to get away from the hustle and bustle into quiet surroundings. Not forgetting the coast which is about 80 miles away in Wales.
Stoke on Trent is full of industrial heritage, a lot of it needs rescuing. But I love the place.
Third painting. I used the reference photo less and added leaves on the left hand side that were further towards the centre than was on the original photo. The lady who lent me the photograph told me this was taken at Delamere forest, which I think is in Cheshire.
I tried to emphasise the blues in the background to give it a distant feeling. Then I emphasised the reds and greens to ring them to the fore. The leaf litter was fun to paint trying to shape it and add light shining through the leaves onto the ground. It’s a small acrylic on canvas.
When it’s warm, not hot, when the scent from plants wafts gently in the air. Then it’s time to visit the Dorothy Clive Garden in Staffordshire. It’s on the border of Shropshire and Cheshire. As you look down from the tea rooms you can look down over the three counties. It’s pleasant to sit out on the lawn with sandwiches and a cup of tea or scones and jam and cream. I’m imagining that I’m there now. That the cold chill in our living room is actually a gentle breeze blowing over the hill behind us and cooling me down! I might even indulge in an ice cream from the tea room. We would definitely be buying plants to take back to our garden.
The Dorothy Clive Garden was created in memory of her. It is built mainly on a slope with perennial plants in beds around beautiful and unusual trees. Some of the plant combinations are spectacular. There is also a quarry garden filled with trees and rhododendron bushes in glorious flower in the spring. There is a lovely view of a waterfall in the bowl of the quarry garden. Then an extended area of the gardens with drought resistant planting and a laburnum walk under planted with purple Alliums rings the changes. This year we also visited a hothouse with tropical plants at the lower part of the garden. It’s a good place to visit on a summers day.
The Dorothy Clive Garden is at Willowbridge in Staffordshire on the border with Shropshire and Cheshire. It costs £10 for adults to visit.
At this time of year the garden is coming into bloom. It is planted on a sloping site and the main garden is full of blues, whites and purples at the moment. White and purple Alliums, Aqueigia, Irises, and other plants made a lovely display from the pond at the bottom up to the tearooms at the top. Then into the quarry garden. This is full of rhododendron and azalea flowers, the mature trees are in leaf and the waterfall drops from the rim of the quarry into its base.
We also walked along the Laburnum arch which is in full flower and is under planted with purple Alliums. Then there are ferns and lots of other interesting plants. We’ll worth a visit for the day.
Rode Hall is a small stately home on the borders of Staffordshire and Cheshire. It’s on a lane running between two major roads, one of which is the A34, which is in England.
Each year they hold a Snowdrop walk at about this time. The weather today was cold, crisp and bright. The various varieties of snowdrops glowed in the sunshine.
We had a very pleasant walk along a pathway to a lake in the grounds below the hall. Then back along the path a short way and up the small hills around the grounds of the hall. Finally we visited the walled kitchen garden with glass houses full of award winning vegetables.
I took lots of photos and I will post more on other blog posts. It wasn’t expensive. The only thing was there was a massive queue for the tea room but we ended going off and getting refreshments at a local church.
Any drive out towards Chester means a stop off at Snugburys Ice Cream centre. It’s a lovely little group of farm buildings set back off the A51 in Cheshire. We stopped to also check about the Road Closed signs we had seen along the road. We had a couple of delicious ice creams and found out that there was a diversion up ahead that would take us down a tiny narrow lane for a couple of miles
The only fly in the ointment was that when we sat down to eat the ice cream in a lovely sunny patch by some hanging baskets of flowers the wasps arrived. I made a swift retreat round the corner to a shady spot but hubby was fine.
We did take the detour, it was long and very narrow, unsuitable for HGVs but we arrived safely.
Four sketches I did at the Dorothy Clive Garden. The view from the hill it’s on over to Shropshire and Cheshire. The Quarry garden with the waterfall. Sculpted woodpecker in the bark of a tree stump and my hubby sitting in the cafe garden.
I was pleased to find this picture of the Jodrell Bank Observatory in my Facebook memories recently. I think it’s from about 2012.
Jodrell Bank radio telescope was built on the Cheshire plain in the 1950’s near Holmes Chapel. It was built there because it was far enough away from the radio noise given out by big cities like Manchester and Liverpool.
The radio telescope is a large dish shaped telescope, supported by a massive superstructure. Part of it was made from two gun turrets from world war two battleships that act as the pivots for it. The dish can rotate around its axis and from horizontal to vertical so it can scan most of the northern hemisphere.
It’s worth a visit for the day (covid safely). There is an arboretum, the radio telescope, a discovery centre and other interesting exhibits. Check their website for details at https://www.jodrellbank.net
Mallaband-Brown