Grassington and Kettlewell

A week ago on Sunday, my friends and I took the bus to Grassington, a village to the north-west of Bradford. Grassington is a small village and although nice, there's not much to see other than a few pubs and shops. Maybe if we had more time to walk further, we could have seen more, but we wanted to see the Dales so we hopped on a Dales Rover bus (£5!) which took us to the nearby village of Kettlewell. The scenery along the way was green rolling hills, something I'm still not tired of. The weather wasn’t too great though - cloudy most of the time with light rain every now and then. The two photos above were taken during those brief periods when the sun was shining. But then again, it's the company that counts, right?

Haworth

Immediately after Saltaire, I went once again to Haworth. I’ve been here before when I came for the 1940’s Weekend in May but I really like this place. Somehow, I find most English villages very appealing. It's probably because I've lived in big cities almost my entire life. Haworth is much quieter this time of year, with just a few tourists walking about. I walked around Main Street for a while before heading off to the side lanes and roads. There are hills around Haworth that are not very high but still offer beautiful picturesque sights of the moors. Once again, I snapped happily away with my camera. (Aren't digital cameras great?)

Many photographs later, I made my way back to Main Street with the intention of visiting the same spots I visited the last time I was here. I passed by a book store at the top of Main Street and decided to have a look. As I paid for one of James Patterson’s books, I started a very pleasant conversation with an elderly lady behind the counter about life in Haworth. Her name is Margaret and she is 71 years old. Joe, her 12 year old grandson who was helping her joined our conversation, giving his take on life in the village. I found out this bookstore used to be a post office and the counter where I was paying for my book is the exact spot the Bronte sisters posted their manuscripts to be published in the mid-1800s.

But life in Haworth is slowly changing. Neighbouring supermarkets are making business difficult for shops in the village. There's a sweets shop a few doors away from the bookstore that has been there since Margaret was a child, but according to Joe, he and his friends would rather go to Spar for their sweets as it's cheaper. When I asked him where Spar was, I was told it was in front of the train station. On the way home after saying our goodbyes, I passed by the train station and sure enough, I saw a modern convenience store called Spar opposite. Well, I guess all good things…

Saltaire

I spent Saturday morning in Saltaire, a village on the outskirts of Bradford that is now listed as a world heritage site. It was founded in 1853 by Titus Salt, a rich industrialist in the wool industry who built the entire village for his workers at the mill, providing them with housing, a library, and even a church building.

At this time of the year, the Saltaire Festival is on (from the 6th to 16th September 2007) and the streets are alive with activities including a street market (with very interesting and varied food from different countries), stage shows and also street performances. Among the places I visited were the Salts Mill, the David Hockney Art Gallery, and the Saltaire United Reformed Church building, apparently one of the finest Italianate buildings in this country. I didn’t have time to visit the River Aire or the canal, which is a pity as I really wanted to.

Slava's Snowshow

University life is now over. All my projects have been handed in and my exams are done. Now, it's just a matter of waiting to see if I graduate in December. I'll also be using my time to produce a showreel, but first, a bit of rest and relaxation. Last Wednesday evening was spent at the Alhambra theatre watching Slava’s Snowshow, a unique 'clown' act that was surprisingly very, very good. There were not many laugh-out-loud moments, in fact, one act about a clown who was going on a journey and had to leave his coat behind was quite poignant. But the entire performance is, without a doubt, an artistic theatrical showpiece with the stage transformed into an ocean for one act and a snow-covered mountain for another. One part of the show had a huge piece of cobweb fall down unto the stage from the ceiling and dragged unto the audience! It was fake cobweb, but I was still finding it on my clothing two days after the performance! The finale included a blizzard that blew fake snow unto the audience. All in all, it was a very interesting and entertaining evening. More information on the show can be found at http://www.slavasnowshow.co.uk.

Screenshot from my film

I was doing a short film project and I thought my deadline was a week and a half away but then a few days ago, I found out I only had half a week! Naturally, I pushed the panic button and worked till 4:00 am in the morning in the computer lab. I finished the film but barely had enough time in the remaining few days for my paper. But it's all good... it's all done now.

The Lake District

The past weekend was spent on holiday with my friend Christine in the Lake District. The Lake District is situated in North West England and is a popular tourist destination because of its beautiful scenery of lakes and mountains. (Didn't that sound just like a quote from a travel brochure?) Having seen beautiful photographs taken by my friend Sandro when he came back from his trip there, I decided I had to go look for myself and all I can say is – the Lake District is absolutely awesome! One weekend is not enough to take in all the sights, especially if you intend to do some hillwalking (or fellwalking, as it is known here). The map above shows the walks we took, to High Sweden Bridge on Saturday and Wansfell Pike on Sunday. It rained almost the entire day on Saturday, resulting in washed out photos but the climb on Sunday was thankfully in sunnier weather. The third red dot at the bottom of the map is the Ambleside YHA, where we stayed, right next to Lake Windermere. The photos below show Ambleside YHA, Lake Windermere and the view from the top of Wansfell Pike, which at 482 metres isn't high enough to be categorised as a mountain (in the UK, it needs to be 600 metres or higher), but it sure felt like one during the steep climb up! The view at the top is definately worth it, though. Beautiful hills, valleys and lakes. It was a great getaway for the weekend, and I’m already thinking of going back! :)

Summer Rain

Ok, now I understand all the comments people make about English weather. It has been raining every day for so long that I cannot remember the last day it did not rain. This past weekend was Veterans' Day Weekend in Bradford and I was looking forward to it because I wanted to watch the Spitfire plane flypast, but it rained the entire weekend so I did not bother going. I'm guessing the flypast was probably cancelled. It was cancelled due to bad weather during the Haworth 1940s Weekend when it rained then, and the weather this past weekend was much worse. This morning was really windy but there was no rain and I thought to myself - oh good, a day with no rain. But nope, it started raining around lunch time. At least it has stopped now and the sun is out.