Wheels from Ivy Cottage

  It took a low gear to keep me cycling up the hill out of Cottesbrooke towards Creaton. At the summit the view up ahead to my left drew me to a lane-side pause. What caught my eye first was the curving, swooping edge to a defined swathe of woodland at the opposite side of the shallow valley formed, over centuries, by a narrow tributary of the River Nene. Creaton Covert, the name of the wood tells of the reason for its planting about one hundred and fifty years ago, possibly more, which was to nurture the population of foxes hereabouts. For the countryside I surveyed before me has long been hunting territory, and has been shaped by the sport. The hill I had climbed gave me sweeping views to the horizon where, beyond the bounded wood, I could make out the spire of the great Saxon church of Brixworth, in its day the greatest building north of the Alps, dignifying the hilltop stronghold of the Mercian kings. Almost monochrome, the colours laid out before me were predominantly deep gre...

Oh how it raineth every day in this year’s month of February. In a mood of self-mockery for trusting my fate to the various weather forecasts, I found myself, nose to pane, staring through sliding globules at the drenched driveway. The forecasts pronounced confidently rain, but for now it was easing off to a still-visible, but fine drizzle. This was my free day of the week. I’ll chance it I thought. On with the gear. To my bicycle, waiting and pre-prepared the day before, I was off into the gloom. But immediately I felt the relief of an escapee, free from confinement and celebrated my decision to get out. If I don’t cycle on days like this in February, I thought, I’ll never get out. Nothing from now on could spoil the admixture of self-congratulatory delight and the joy from my lifting my face into the breeze as I turned to confront the east wind, nothing could quell the elation, not even the road closures that scuttled my plan to cycle into the wind for the first half of the ride, to...

This had been the day of the ‘water-music’, the music of the field drains, the splash of tyres though puddles and temporary fords, the rush of the swollen Welland. I cycled in the overhanging gloom of last night’s hurtling darkness, as the biting east wind continued its troubled buffeting into this half-day. I cycled up the north side of the Welland Valley, turning off to Gumley before reaching Foxton. Crossing over the canal bridge, I could glance to the right to glimpse the top of the famous flight of locks. I passed through Gumley, once a centre of Mercian power, where historical matters of church and the Saxon kingdom were debated and passed into charters and law. Some contend that the great King Offa lies buried here, and that his hilltop sanctuary high above the wet and once forested claylands below may have provided the model for the Norman French rendition of the Arthurian legends, this place being Camelot, this thin place where old crosses into new and reality into legend. But...

The Grange, Cottesbrooke I cycled down Haslebach Hill, through the shade of Shutterdown Spinney, to the village of Cottesbrooke. After passing the entrance to Cottesbrooke Hall, I pulled up to look at The Grange, a substantial, elongated manor house, with impressive chimneys. I turned to look behind me and chanced upon a delightful view of thatched cottages, nestled amongst trees by the roadside. Riding back through the village and beyond, I turned left, passing through a gate to follow a lane through a wide open field grazed by sheep. The ridge and furrow were extensive, bearing the imprint of their medieval creators, much as they were before the sheep were introduced to replace the strip field peasantry. The open nature of the large field gave just a flavour of what the treeless landscape of strip farming must have been like before enclosure changed communities and landscapes forever. Passing through another gate, I cycled on to join the undulating road to Naseby.  © John Dunn. ...

      Carpet bagger at Harrington       I cycled up the rise to Kelmarsh, through a chorus of birdsong, after a shower of warm summer rain, passing the church at the summit to my right. Crossing the main road, I passed estate cottages to my left. A plaque recorded a project at the height of World War Two to rehouse people rendered homeless by a domestic fire which got out of control during a strong wind. THESE 10 COTTAGES WERE REBUILT IN 1948 BY COL. C. G. LANCASTER MP  ON THE SITE OF 13 ELIZABETHAN  COTTAGES DESTROYED BY FIRE ON  4TH MAY 1943. There are undulations and ground workings in the fields at the top of the rise after Kelmarsh, unmentioned on the OS map. Was there quarrying for stone in the past, perhaps providing building materials for Kelmarsh Hall, the church, or estate workers’ cottages? Or were they something to do with the tunnelling work for the now disused railway up ahead. An avenue of trees leaves those earth workings and...

  Cycling along the quiet lane from Clipston to Sibbertoft, I was drawn to a halt by my curiosity when I saw an information board, erected in a field just before Lowes Farm. I was surprised to see that it had been erected by the Woodlands Trust; surprised because there is no woodland in the immediate area. Nevertheless, The Woodlands Trust informed me that in the field beyond were the remains of a medieval settlement called Nobold (a name supposedly derived over time from New Build), remains which lie underground. An agricultural community once scratched out a living here, before the place was abandoned in the 14th century. It had already been abandoned 200 years previously when the Royalist Army commanded by Charles I and Prince Rupert tramped past here, on their way to meet their fate on the battlefield of nearby Naseby in 1645. And it was after passing through Naseby that I cycle down the quiet, narrow and delightfully rural lane to Thornby, a village straddling the old turnpike...