Yorkshire
13 - 20 September 2003
    
   A restful week in the Yorkshire Dales

   

This is a typical Yorkshire mill town, where grim looking mills dominate the skyline while the bucolic dales roll blissfully in the background. 

14 September 2003 10:27 AM:
     We're sitting in the sunshine on a bench in the front garden of our rented cottage here in Carlton, North Yorkshire.
 The sky is nearly cloudless and the sun is already hot.  The bees are buzzing in the garden and delicate white butterflies are flitting between the pumpkin-colored nasturtiums while the neighborhood cat lolls at our feet encouraging us to rub her tummy.
     Beyond our small, flagstone garden, just outside the dry stonewall, the street is slowly coming to life.  Kids are calling to each other, men are talking over garden fences and women are throwing pans of water into the beck that runs between our tiny street and the lane across the way.
     It's such an idyllic scene, and the cottages--not just ours, but all of them--are so well kept and cozy it is hard to imagine the dire, desperate dreariness that was life here for the two or three hundred years prior to this.
     Our lovely little cottage is a 'two up two down' affair, meaning it has two rooms on the first floor (living room and kitchen) and two rooms on the second floor (bedroom and bath). Years ago, it would have been two bedrooms--one for mom and dad, the other for the 5 to 10 children.  The toilet would be in the garbage dump behind the row of houses that now serves as a bucolic communal garden.
     This tiny town is dominated by the huge factory that sits in its center.  In years past, when it was still active, the factory would have dominated life as well.  The work horn would have called all living here to the factory in the morning and released them all to make their weary way home at the end of their shifts.  At least they didn't have far to walk.  During their time off, the factory still loomed over them, and the horn still beckoned as others went in for the second shift.
The single pub in town--The Swan--would have been their only social outlet, the rest of their time being spent in these dark and crowded rooms.
     These homes would have been hot in the summer and dark, damp and cold in the winter.  They would have been grimy and filled with smoke smudges from the fires and lanterns (when one could afford fuel) and the smell from the privy must have been horrendous.
     But now, the cottages have been spruced up.  Second bedrooms have been converted into large and luxurious bathrooms.  The derelict mill is being turned into luxury apartments and all these old factory row houses have become homes for young, growing families or holiday cottages for the throngs of tourists who swarm over these areas now to walk the beautiful landscape and gape at the quaintness of the towns.
     I suppose I could get all new-age guilty over being one of the 'rich' tourists swooping in to marvel at the landscape, leaving bags of money in my wake, but I have to say I am nothing short of pleased that I am living in a situation where I am able to do this.
     But those are thoughts for another time.  Right now the sun is hot, the grass is green the breeze is sweet and I need to stop searching for hell here in this little bit of heaven on earth and get on with enjoying my holiday.