Interesting Times

[sarcaustik]

Following the ten day rollercoaster of court-then-Whitby-then-eddie777's-operation, I was hoping for the chance to catch up with useful things like sleep over the weekend. Needless to say, that was wishful thinking. Saturday's trip to Scarborough didn't go entirely according to plan. I walked in on a bit of a psychodrama chez WWINOLJ, and waking up (or

Comments

[steer]

Oooh.. you are just being deliberately anti-lancastrian. Lancaster itself is beautiful.

[blue_condition]

There's really precious little difference between the East Lancs mill towns and the West Yorks ones, although (IMHO) the West Yorks ones are a bit prettier. Most of them have a few bits of good 19th century architecture, it's really all down to how the decay has been managed and Yorkshire seems a little better than that.

[inulro]

I have spent so much time travelling between Leeds & Manchester over the years, I can tell whether I'm in Yorkshire or Lancashire just by the style of the terrace houses.

I tend to prefer Yorkshire, because (at least when I lived there) it was very easy to get on a bus from the crappy bits and in very little time be wandering about some lovely moors (you have to like moors to think that's a good thing, but I do. so there)

[blue_condition]

I guess the back-to-back is slightly more prevalent in Lancashire, but larger-scale architecture is pretty similar!

[sarcaustik]

Don't be so paranoid, I doing nothing of the sort! Crewe, Widnes and Runcorn are all in Cheshire! So might Wigan be, but I'm not 100% sure.

Blackpool and Preston aside, Lancashire is a beautiful county. On the way home yesterday we detoured via Pendle ("Witches") Hill, and the view from the top was amazing.

[steer]

I think it's been mentioned before that Pendle Hill means Hill Hill Hill (Pen = Hill, I think in Welsh, the Dle suffix means Hill in some later language).

[sarcaustik]

Possibly. But it's the biggest hill for miles around so that's entirely justified.

It was probably the fact that we used to pass Pendle Hill once a month for twelve years, on the way to and from Blackpool and the duty grandparental visit, that turned me into a goth. My dad pointed it out without fail and made me believe that I could see the witches dancing on its summit. Yesterday, I was sure to tell Kitty the same thing.

[blue_condition]

Ah, you must've been typing that at the same time as me ;)

[blue_condition]

Ever catch the etymology of 'Pendle Hill'?

"Pen" is Celtic root meaning 'hill'.
So when Old English started to happen, Pen picked up an Anglo-Saxon suffix "-le", which means hill.

So it was called "hill hill".

Then of course Modern english came along, and "Pendle" became "Pendle Hill"....

or "Hill Hill Hill".

I'm sure someone with stronger linguistics will correct this ;)

[sarcaustik]

See above! ;-)

[redshira]

Lancaster itself is beautiful.

Seconded. When I lived there I seriously considered the option of staying for a number of years. (this from the woman who moves on average every seven months)

[steer]

The view of the city from the Ashton Memorial is absolutely beautiful -- one of my favourite views in the world but maybe that is because that building and those gardens are so gorgeous.

[redshira]

It's a shame I only lived there for five months, and have had no real occasion to go back there. It was five months of angst and woe, of course, so I never got a chance to get to know the place.