Originally published October 29, 2008

Because of the topography of England, there is an artery of roads running north-south, connecting the major cities.

There are fewer roads running east-west but at a few points there are connecting arterial roads, such as between the city of Leeds to the east of the Pennines,and the cities of Machester and Liverpool to the west.

But move away from these arteries and the feel of the countryside is quite different. To the north east of Leeds, off the arterial roads and towards the coast, the villages and small roads have an old-fashioned look to them.

There are hedges and fences and buildings and signposts that have an air of being undisturbed. And there is a quality in the light and the style of the buildings that is particular to coastal towns and villages.

Perhaps there are things that the senses take in that one is hardly aware of. Perhaps it is the grasses that grow by the roadside. Perhaps they are cleaner; not coated with the oil of exhaust fumes. Whatever it is, there is a feeling of having stepped out of twenty-first century Britain.

Near this line of windblown trees there is Flamborough Head, a headland that reaches a long finger of cliffs into the north Sea, and just north there is Bempton Cliffs, one of the foremost sites for seabirds in the country where kittiwakes, razorbills, gannets, puffins, and guillemots roost in their tens of thousands.

Originally published November 1, 2008

Almscliff Crag in North Yorkshire, England, is an outcrop or tor of gritstone, visible for many miles around. It is a site of special scientific interest – a protected site under the Wildlife and Countryside Act of 1981 and a venue for climbers who boulder on it and walkers who want to look around the area from a high vantage point.

Bouldering is a branch of climbing concentrating on difficult technical problems, often just a few feet off the ground. Gritstone is a hard rock and, not surprisingly, feels very gritty and rough to the touch, and provides very good friction for climbing.

For the climbers who come to do some bouldering, Almscliff is within easy reach of Harrogate, and quite near the road, so dragging a crash mat up from the car is not hard. A crash mat is a kind of portable mattress onto which a climber can jump down to avoid landing on hard or stony ground.

Yorkshire gritstone is also called millstone grit because it was used for making millstones for grinding wheat. Whilst millstone grit is a hard rock, the grit must surely have rubbed off and become mixed with the wheat. Certainly, from time to time a stone would have to be dressed, which involved cutting fresh furrows in the stone where they had worn down rubbing against the opposing stone.

Walking around the base of the outcrop on a bright October day, cow pats dotted the grass. We could imagine cows wandering around the base of the rocks high above the surrounding countryside.