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.