Underneath the spreading chestnut tree

The Westwood, Beverley 

Pirate Bay

You could let yourself go and abandon all sense of what is called "common sense" and take a wee trip round the bay with these Depp lookalikes

Home from the sea

Birds

Had an afternoon in Bridlington, came across this Hitchcock scene on the fishing pier.

I'm beginning to see the light ....

Chapel Lane 

Mermaid Fountain

At some time in the 1870s life in Hull was so unexciting that it was decided to liven things up a bit by installing a set of six mermaid fountains in what was then the rich part of town, the Avenues. Over the years these beauties have been moved around, destroyed,  rebuilt and become part of the community. I hear strange things happen around here on New Year's Eve ....

This picture shows the Westbourne Avenue fountain, just visible in the distance is Park Avenue's version. Recently a working mermaid fountain was installed on the Boulevard but I haven't been to that see that yet. 

If you're interested in the rebuilding process there's a website here.

Lowgate

This is the other end of Lowgate seen through the entrance to St Mary the Virgin , an old church dating back to the early 14th century. Dimly in the background lurks the statute I featured yesterday. Lowgate houses many law firms and so on; this may be because the Crown Court is at one end and the Magistrates' Court at the other, what do you think?

Our great deliverer ....

This ridiculous piece of Whig triumphalism stands in Market Place, Lowgate, Hull. Strangely, like the Victoria monument, this too overlooks a public convenience. Is this a Hull thing? Do other cities pee under their royals?

The inscription on the plinth reads "This statue was erected in the year MDCCXXXIV, to the memory of King William, our great deliverer". It doesn't say what he delivered ....

Follow my leader

Tiger tiger burning bright ....

A couple of years ago the local football club was promoted to the Premier League. Gosh what fun and games! It was the dawn of a new age. Hull was to be a "Top 10 City". Well, the reality was just a tad less exciting and now the club are no longer a Premier Club and Hull is , well, still Hull.

In the euphoria of the promotion the local bus company painted one of  its buses as you can see. The Tigers  reference is the clubs nickname, on account of the colour of their strips, not, unfortunately, the quality of their playing.

Narrow Racket, Beverley

North Bar Without and Within, Beverley

Beverley is an old, old town, much older than Hull. A monastery was founded here in the early 700s AD. It used to have four bars or gates as we would now call them (in those days a gate was a street, still is is some street names, compare with  gata, gade of Swedish and Danish ) protecting it. There is only one bar left, the North Bar. A plaque informs the visitor that the Bar was built in 1409 and cost £96/11d. As it's still there 600 years later I suppose that was a good price.

The top picture shows North Bar Without, on account it's outside the walls of Beverley, the one below shows North Bar Within. I'm sorry to say the Tudor looking half-timbered affair above is a much more modern building than it looks.

Minster behind bars

Beverley Minster seeming to rise from the rubble.

Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear ....

Und der Haifisch, der hat Zähne,

Und die trägt er im Gesicht.

Und Macheath, der hat ein Messer,

Doch das Messer sieht man nicht

This little beauty stands outside the entrance to the Deep.

The Deep

Situated at the mouth of the River Hull, the Deep is an iconic building housing a world important aquarium. It calls itself a submarium. The building was designed by Sir Terry Farrell so you know who to blame. You can find out more here. Lots of people have been to see the little fishes go round and round. I guess the fishes would rather be somewhere else.

The odd looking thing in the background of the second photo is the Hull tidal surge barrier which has been keeping the city dry for a couple of decades.

Making a splash

Another view of Princes Quay.

Robin

As it's the weekend I thought I'd do something different. This pretty little bird is nesting in my neighbour's cherry tree.

Tilting at Windmills, again ...

Following yesterday's ancient mill here's the modern version. At over 400 feet this monster towers over area. It supplies power to a chemical factory by the riverside. Local people seem to differ in their opinion of this thing. Many welcome it as a change to a drab industrial view, others complain that interferes with their TV reception. I don't think I would like to live next to it.

I'm afraid I couldn't resist a bit of trickery and blended some images to produce the following messy picture.

The Mill, Holderness Road

You're walking along an ordinary city road with houses and shops, the last thing you expect to see is an old fashioned windmill.

Opposite East Park stands this imposing old mill that dates from about 1820. At one time there were about a dozen mills like this on Holderness Road, they ground the grain from the countryside and supplied the city with flour. This is the last one remaining and has at various times been used as stone masons yard and florist shop. The buildings surrounding it are now a pub called  The Mill.
The sails have recently been renovated after they fell off a few years back.

The Empress in the Queen's Garden

This colourful hostelry was once a dockside pub but the dock got filled in and became Queen's Gardens. If you want a taxi this is the place to head for.

My bank's become a trendy wine bar ....

This is a detail from the rather elegant building below. It was for years a bank and survived the air raids that destroyed many buildings in the centre of Hull during the WW2. It could not however survive the changes in fashion and it has now become a outlet for some international chain of caffeine vendors.

East Park, Hull

Hull has a river running through it which effectively splits the city in two. People tend to have an affinity to one side or the other. East Hull has the docks, west Hull had the fishing and food processing factories. Even the buses do not run from one side to the other. To get from where I live in west Hull to east Hull, I have to go into town and change buses. There is no through service.

This lake and fine restored bridge are in East Park, off Holderness Road, the main shopping area in East Hull. The park was recently cleaned up and renovated, not necessarily for the better. The lake, for example, had four or five small islands that broke up what is now a dull stretch of water. They were simply removed. I suppose they had to do something about the general decay that was overtaking the place but I miss the old mess and clutter. It's too clean and tidy for my liking.

This picture was taken about three weeks ago; the trees are more advanced now, though the weather is, if anything, much colder.

Blue

Blue water and blue sky; it's like a child's painting.

The strange looking ship was the lightship at Spurn point, the entrance to the Humber. The background church is Holy Trinity and is in the centre of the "Old Town", the original mediaeval part of the city. We do have cloudy days in Hull.

Queen Vic blocks out the sun

In the middle of town there's Queen Victoria Square. This resplendent statue sits in the middle, built by public subscription in the early years of the last century. The thrifty burghers of Hull killed two birds with one stone by sitting the Queen on top of the public toilets.

Unfortunately anyone who might have needed these facilities was obstructed by some BBC enterprise to enthuse young people to be "creative". Blast the BBC.

Maritime Musuem from Princes Quay

A different view of the museum I mentioned a few days ago. This is Princes Quay, an old dock that is now a shopping mall. The dock used to lead  past the Dock Offices to another, larger, dock that has now been filled in. Where the lamppost is in the middle there used to be large monument to William Wilberforce. 

Princes Quay and the Dock offices were painted in the 19th century by John Atkinson Grimshaw.

Choices, choices

Democracy in action, or should that be inaction?

Cornflower

Paragon Street, Hull

The domed building in the distance used to be the Dock Offices and is now a maritime museum complete with a mermaid.
I should mention that the swifts are here at last. "They’ve made it again/ Which means the globe’s still working . . ."

Trade: old and new

This is the entrance to what is now Hull's Marina but what used to be a busy trading dock. During the nineteenth century hundreds of thousands of emigrants from Europe passed through this dock on their way to the train for Liverpool and the boats to America. The tide is out showing a gloriously muddy basin.

The glass construction is a World Trade Centre; a different sort of trading goes on in there.

Liminality

This welcoming sign is just across the street from my house. The city boundary is the middle of the road, literally. No-one is quite sure who runs what in this area, the City council or the neighbouring East Yorkshire County council. For example, the streetlight on the left is apparently the responsibility of neither council and both refuse to fix it when it fails.  

Mayday Bee