Wheeldale Moor

On Saturday I had my picnic lunch (rather late in the afternoon) sat on a track by the roadside overlooking wheeldale Moor. My companions were 2 ventriloquist dolls made by Dave and myself. One is of the Kaffa Djinn (a genie from Dave's book) and the other was noneother than Jaques, leader of the Ninth Legion, who built the road on the hillside in the distance we were facing. My destination was Botton to give a concert in the evening as part of the Festival. (I loved Botton, by the way!) The last time I had been close to here was when I was 11 or 12. At boarding school Saturday afternoons were thankfully very laid back. The morning was taken up with Games and Latin lessons. We filed past the pantry door after lessons had finished and collected a small paper bag containing a white bread cake with a thin layer of margarine and either peanut butter or marmite (both of which I absolutely hate). Occasionally we had a dried out small slab of orange cheese and we always had an apple or an orange. If we wanted a drink we had to fill any water container we could get hold of and in those days that wasn't easy. I actually had a goatskin flask which my Dad had brought back from Switzerland for me! We were then supposed to file out in a neat crocodile for our Saturday walk. Some Nuns were more vigilent than others but most were just too overweight to start tramping up and down the hills near Whitby. This meant FREEDOM if you were clever enough to slip away un-noticed and also clever enough to be back by tea-time. I was an expert and managed to get as far away as Danby Castle once. Accompanied by a friend who lived nearby we knocked on the door of the farmhouse nextdoor and asked for the key. A smiley lady duly obliged and we unlocked the door up a flight of stone steps and played 'princesses' in the great hall. From memory there was a long oak table and benches each side and a large oak chair at one end. There were also tapestries on the walls. I have just been asked to do a wedding there.