Just got back from the Camino using the St Jean Pied de Port route. Lots of bells along the way – mostly cracked and none hung for change ringing of course.
These at Larrasoana played a lovely carillon during a vino stop.
These were at Zabaldika, 1 k off the main path, but worth a diversion even on a hot day. If you climbed all the way up to the old church, then all the way up the belfry, you could chime them twice. Got a special stamp on the credencial too! Trying to get ahead on karma.
A bit of careless talking by Greg at the last DRC AGM led him to be volunteered as organiser of an outing to Oxfordshire on Saturday, July 12th. As this was a trip to the countryside with little public transport and a tight schedule, car sharing was arranged for the attendees.
First up at 09.30 White’s of Appleton.
As Greg’s trip notes read ‘Visit the oldest bell-hanging company in the UK, and ring the ‘Balscote Ring’: Rings of 12 + 5: tenor: 1.2.16 in Bb. No stays or slides’. White’s are not really a bell foundry, but they have lots of bells in various stages of being worked on. They also have a storeroom with a mini-ring up in its attic.
The Balscote Ring hiding in the attic at White’s (photo by Andrew)
I do not particularly get on with mini-rings as it’s a bit like drinking half-pints and I just don’t see the point. It turned out that Greg grew up in Appleton, and was aware of White’s as a boy, but had no interest in those days. So, a bit of unfinished business for Greg, and off we went to –
11.00-12.00 St Michael’s Church, Cumnor 8 bells (13.1.4 in F)
Ed did a very nice sketch of Cumnor, which I attach here
Cumnor was a lovely old church with a wonderful wooden staircase as these pics by Elizabeth show –
Graffito on staircase at Cumnor (photo by Elizabeth)
Ringing at Cumnor (photo by Nolan)
12.15-13.45 Lunch at the Rose Revived
An eponymous pub on the river with a nice view as captured by Ed –
Sketch from The Rose Revived pub (by Ed)
14.00-15.00 St James’ Church, South Leigh 8 bells (10.1.26 in G)
After an excellent lunch, we resumed our itinerary. I must mention Greg’s directions here – I don’t know whether this was Greg’s natural playfulness, poor typing skills, or just general silliness, but just about every direction had an error ‘turn left’ actually means ‘turn right’, postcodes were incorrect for satnavs etc. I thought this added to the ambience as our cars scattered across South Oxon with people making different judgements.
15.30-16.30 Church of St Peter & St Paul, Long Hanborough 6 bells (13.1.24)
17.00-18.00 St Mary Magdalene Church, Woodstock 8 bells (12.3.24 in F)
Kings Arms, 19 Market Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1SU
We actually went to a different pub on the recommendation of the gentleman who let us into the church. A couple of pints and we headed back to London in the cars. An excellent day out to a part of the country that I didn’t know. Well played Greg for organising the outing and dealing with late cancellations and changes. Thanks to Chris and Andrew for organising the ringing.
p.s. as my memory of the afternoon’s churches is non-existent, pls send me text and I will add it. Same for photos.
Just got back from two weeks in Eastern Anatolia looking at the various archaeological sights and trying to find clean food. Climbed a bell tower in the castle of a town called Erzerum and found a bell hanging there. An inscription showed that it had been cast in London in 1877. I wish I hadn’t deleted the other picture (which showed the company name – somewhere in Croydon as I recall), but I was running out of space on my SD card and the Van cats needed to be kept. The inscription is visible if you enlarge the top of it (technical term needed).
Tasteful photo of Van cats – they are pure white with different colour eyes and enjoy swimming
The DRC website was reactivated earlier today after being offline following a hacking incident. The hosting service couldn’t say when the site was hacked as the logs have been overwritten, but apparently it was being used as a ‘zombie’ site to send out spam emails.
I have removed a couple of trojan files, reinstalled the underlying software and changed all the admin and system passwords. The hosting service have re-scanned the site and reactivated it.
Please let me know if you come across anything that doesn’t appear to work properly over the next few days and weeks.
Andrew Larsen (webmaster)
The Bermondsey AGM was held in the ringing chamber on February 24th 2014. Both Andrew Clark and Alison Hammond stood down from their posts as Tower Captain and Secretary respectively. To thank them for their efforts, we presented them with flowers and an engraved tankard.
Andrew and Alison presentation
Andrew checking his tankard for leaks