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A Cheeky Walk: Bungalowland

I woke up on May Bank Holiday Monday to the sound of rain. I considered cancelling my plans but decided that a damp walk was better than staying indoors all day. Bungalowland is the last of the Cheeky Walks outside Brighton. It was left to the end, in part, because of the name – it doesn’t sound as promising as most of the others. It was a pretty good walk though, along the cliffs near Peacehaven then through to Telscombe, taking us through areas that were attractive and areas that were less so.

This time there were six of us. Katharine, Kaylee and I started out in the strangely unwelcoming Smuggler’s Rest pub. The clouds were thick and menacing, but soon eased out. The pub food was all right, but I am sick to death of sweet bread on burger buns. Katharine has also been following the walks and has the more recent edition of the book. In mine, Peacehaven is compared to Jimmy Saville, a reference that is now removed.

After dessert (sticky toffee and apple pudding), we were joined by Dr Bramwell, Jo and Cara. Since Dr Bramwell was one of the Cheeky Walk book’s compilers we had no chance of getting lost on this one.

We set off along the bungalow-lined cliffs. Some of them stood out, such as the house-with-the-boxing-ring-on-its-roof and the Rubik’s Cube house. I couldn’t persuade David to knock on the door or the latter and find out the story behind it.

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We crossed the meridian, re-enacting the picture on the nearby signboard:

Once away from the bungalows and caravans we found ourselves among the gorse. The signpost that should have been a way marker was no longer there, making it hard to work where we were supposed to go. We ended up in a tangle of gorse and weren’t sufficiently convinced to press through it. After backtracking and exploring, we decided to try again, dragging ourselves through the thorns, forced to crouch almost to a crawl.

Once out of the gorse, we found some lovely views of the Downs that looked straight out of a Ravilious painting.

The road led to the village of Telscombe. It was very beautiful, but we were tired and in no mood to explore (we’d also missed the farm open day), so we hiked across Telscombe Tye common back towards the pub. The group took slightly different directions here, and Cara and I rescued a laptop on the way back to the pub. After a drink, I headed home where Kaylee and I watched Guy Martin’s India DVD

It was a pretty good day. There is just one more walk left, a short stroll around central Brighton – and then the book is finished. What will I do then?

Spirit of Place conference

Over a month back, at the start of April, Lela and I went to Liverpool for John Reppion‘s Spirit of Place conference, a site-specific event linked to the Calderstones, a group of standing stones in a Liverpool park.

I don’t know Liverpool well – I last went with my Dad and sister back in the nineties. But the list of speakers was so interesting that I thought it would be worth the trip. John Reppion described the event as something “people who live in London, or Brighton say, might be quite used to seeing advertised but which there never seem to be very many of up here in the North.” Brighton could definitely do with events like this one.

The day brought together a range of speakers, including archaeologists, psychogeographers, historians (an epic description of the wrecking of the RMS Tayleur), artists (a premier of short film The Menhir Motorway) and a magician. The sessions were incredibly inspiring while avoiding a game of psychogeography bingo, and I wanted to note down some of the things that I responded to. I came out of it fizzing with ideas, and things to follow up.

John Reppion introduced the day with Invoking the Spirits of Place. It looked at some of the ways folklore connected with the park. Many of the trees had been brought from overseas, and he discussed the idea of tree spirits from different cultures. I loved the quote from Pope, his advice on gardening: “Consult the genius of the place”
Kenneth Brophy (AKA The Urban Prehistorian) gave a fantastic talk on ancient monuments in cities and the response of local people. He talked in particular about the Cochno Stone, which was buried to protect it from locals, mentioning the shame many felt at not being trusted with the monument. We also saw examples of how prehistoric monuments in cities are often fenced off, producing the strange spectacle of caged standing stones. Personally, I’m still disappointed that Silbury Hill was inaccessible. With the Cochno stone, there are plans for a replica to be made and placed above it. May Miles Thomas has produced a short film, Cochno Stone Revealed.
The session that influenced me most was one by David Southwell and Gary Budden on ‘Landscape Punk and Re-enchantment’. David spoke about how myth grows and escapes; where folklore comes from and what it’s for. He also talked about how walking is the best way to learn a place. There were some amazing turns of phrase in this session – “ghost soil”, “layers of story”, the “dark sediment of decomposing memory”,”every walk scuffs up… spirits”. David’s current project is Hookland, a fictional English county providing a chance to put back some of the weirdness in a conscious act of enchantment. “Landscape gives us the myth we need”
Gary Budden spoke about landscapepunk, which he saw as emerging from anti-road movements and squatters, and a culture of visionary English music like Crass and Zounds – he saw punk as a type of folk music. The talk grappled with the risk of interests like nature writing and psychogeography creating a sort of “hippie nationalism”, a negative island culture. He also spoke about the trope of the “Lone White male author” with time and leisure who reported back to office workers. The books these men produced were not the world he knew, and he compared his childhood experience of birdwatching to the lyrical descriptions found in nature writing. These didn’t reflect the nature he knew, of damp sandwiches in car parks and the Really Wild Show
Richard MacDonald worked as Heritage Story Maker, which is the best job title I’ve ever heard. If I knew that was a possibility, I’d never have become a programmer.
It was good to see Cat Vincent talk again. When he announced that he was a practising magician, someone in the audience gasped ‘Oh wow!’. His talk, Where the Buddleia Grows made the point that when most of the world’s people live in urban areas, magic should not continue to privilege the rural above the urban. He also discussed how people say that history repeats itself, then suggested geography does not repeat, but it rhymes. He spoke about his own connection with buddliea, the ‘bombsite flower’. which often grows in the city. It was a lovely talk and well worth reading via the link.
The final session was an interview with horror author Ramsey Campbell. It was fun to listen to someone I’d been reading for about 25 years, since I used to borrow Best New Horror collections from Harlow Library in the 90s (that shelf of horror was probably the only good thing about that town). Campbell talked about his connections with the local area, the shop where he first discovered Lovecraft, and about Bartleby the Scrivener as horror. His latest book is based on the folklore of Liverpool. He claimed that he’d made notes of ideas among his research and now was no longer sure which parts he had made up.

It was good to visit Liverpool, even if we didn’t have a long time there (we did our best to visit the Tate in 30 minutes, and made a fairly good go of it). We also stayed in a Beatles-themed hotel, with a night-manager who’d never been to the top floor until he showed us to our room. Terrible breakfasts, but fun decor.

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All-in-all, it was well worth the journey and I’ll be keeping my eyes open for John Reppion’s future events. I also note that I’ve become the sort of person who is excited by megaliths

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The fate of Rabbit Island

IMG_20160423_194423 — BN1 Game card by Paul Stapleton

Rabbit Island was a bit of Brighton folklore. An overgrown roundabout on the way out of town, you’d sometimes see rabbits peeking out from the undergrowth. The story was that someone had placed a couple of pets there and they’d raised an empire. I’m not sure that makes sense – putting rabbits there rather than the neighbouring park would be ridiculous – but there were definitely a lot of animals trapped in a small area. It was a leporine equivalent of the TV show Lost.

Earlier this year, the council cut back the vegetation on Rabbit Island. There is no cover, and there are no rabbits. All that remains on the island are a few pieces of metal piping. Apparently this was for safety, although the excellent Brighton Bits website points out that the foliage cut down headlight glare. It’s also a poor welcome for visitors to Brighton.

A Cheeky Walk: Grooving in the Ghost Village

Doing the Cheeky Walks has introduced me to several amazing places I should have visited during my two decades in Brighton. I’ve found stunning countryside a short distance away and walked along Devil’s Dyke for the first time. But Sunday’s trip to the Castle Hill Nature Reserve was the best discovery so far, and I had no idea it existed.

David Thoreau warned his readers to “beware of all enterprises that require new clothes”. The Cheeky Walk around Castle Hill and the Lost Village of Balsdean required a new piece of equipment and a CD. The disc, 1 inch/ ½ mile by Grasscut is intended to be listened to at various points along the walk. I also bought a headphone splitter so that Lela and I could listen to the soundtrack simultaneously. And, in a departure from Cheeky Guide protocol, the walk is accompanied by a map.

Balsdean dates back to the 12th century and was a small farming community. For a time the manor house was used for a mental hospital. It fell into disrepair and the few remaining residents were removed in the second world war. The village was then used for artillery practise. Little trace of the buildings remain. Even online it’s hard to find photographs of what it once looked like.

Listening to a soundtrack on a walk was an interesting innovation. Some tracks worked better than others (I caught Lela removing her headphones during one of the noisier, glitchier tracks). On the whole, it did enhance the walk, particularly when wind whistled around the headphones. I’d not heard of Grasscut before, but they seem to be an interesting band.

The scenery here was stunning, a long right-angled valley with derelict farm buildings in the middle. There were also fearless lambs coming up to say hello as we walked down the avenue of trees. A few weeks ago, we’d passed Saddlescomb Farm while the lambing was taking place; now there were young lambs out in the field. I like how the countryside can tell stories like that between walks.

The only traces of the old village are some half-buried foundations, and a plaque left where the church’s altar once was. It seems a shame to have used a Norman church for target practise.

As we walked along the valley we occasionally heard screaming noises. Sometimes they sounded almost human. They had to be something to do with the flags near the derelict farm buildings.

On our way back through the bottom of the valley we found that the noises were drone racers, from the Hidden Valley Group. Four of them were flying, piles of battery-packs beside their chairs – a drone can only fly a few minutes on a charge. Even so, when the racing is going on it looks exhilarating and the manoeuvrability is amazing. You can see examples on sites like FliteTest or RotorRiot .

We stopped to talk with Ed, one of the racers. We also got to have a look at the viewscreens – the drones fly with cameras, allowing the pilots to fly with a first-person view. The drone racers told us about an air-show and drone-racing competition coming in early may.

After talking to the racers we were faced with the climb out of the valley. I’ve encountered a fair few hills on the Cheeky Walks, but this was the steepest of them all. But we did it bravely and without complaint.

We followed the trail back to the start of the walk and then to the car. I think this hidden valley is one of the most beautiful places I’ve seen in Brighton. I can’t believe we passed so few other people as we walked through it. Had everyone found better things to do? I’d wasted so many weekends when I could have come out here.

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A Cheeky Walk: Walking With Werewolves

The Cheeky Walk ‘Walking with Werewolves’ has an exciting premise. It’s intended as a night-time stroll, best carried out at full moon. Since full moon only happens once a month, this required planning ahead. By the time Friday arrived the weather wasn’t looking good, but we’d made an arrangement and we would stick to it.

Lela and I met up with Romi and Katharine in Firle’s Ram Inn. With darkening, gloomy skies, the place had a slight Slaughtered Lamb feel. This ambience was worsened by the creepy sticker in one of the parked vehicles. Who thinks that sort of thing is funny rather than disturbing?

After a quick drink, we set off through Firle’s deserted high street and were soon in the countryside. A narrow path went up onto the ridge of the Downs, joining the South Downs way. Climbing up to the hilltop, rain whipping and bitter wind, it occurred that this walk is another that might be improved by waiting until later in the year. It was still fun to be wandering about in the countryside by torchlight. It reminded me of the days when I’d sneak out of school at night to explore.

Given that it was raining, the moon was hidden behind clouds. Apparently the effect of moonlight on chalky downland paths is quite something, but we will have to take the guidebook’s word for it. The views were still pretty good, with the night-time world moving below us. And, of course, the i360 back in Brighton, for the first time a welcome sight, pin-pointing where we’d come from.

IMG_20160422_213416 — Stunning view of Sussex

The walk was pretty tiring – a few points we weren’t sure if we had overshot the route and needed to check it on google maps. We did find the two stony humps said to be bishops who lost an argument with some witches.

We didn’t see any werewolves, but there was a creepy moment when a car approached us on the muddy coach lane. We stepped to the sides and waited, and the car stopped and reversed away once more.

Another fun walk, and actually pretty tiring. I want to do more night-hiking!

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Vindaloo at the Catalyst Club

On Thursday 14th April I gave a talk at the Catalyst Club about the History of the Vindaloo. This was my sixth talk at the night, and it’s one of my favourite events. The programme is always varied – recently Rosy spoke on Body-Building and Masochism, and ChrisP talked about The Eating Habits of Politicians.

The other talks this month were fascinating – Larissa talking about Effective Altruism, and Cara Courage talking about her BDSM relationship with The Archers. I was particularly interested to learn about the Archers’ active fan culture, which has a higher average participant’s age than many others I’ve heard about.

My talk outlined the history of English curry, although I cut a lot to fit the 15 minutes I had. I also spoke a little about my recent trip to Goa and the idea of authenticity in food and travel. I made things a little more interesting for myself by deciding to serve curry to the audience. This was delivered by the Shahi Tandoori and handed out during the Q&A session.

I mentioned a vegan vindaloo recipe that I particularly liked. This can be found on Happy Cow Vegan. Being vegetarian rather than vegan, I tend to swap the aubergine in this recipe for quorn chicken pieces.

13009951_10100196004021034_1158397897_o — Photo by Emily Yates

One of the interesting things about public speaking is how it can be hard to gauge the audience response. Parts of the talk were very comfortable, with lots of jokes – laughter means you know exactly how it’s going. But I wish there were a few more jokes in the middle where I go into the history of the curry. I’m booked to give the talk again in August and November, and it will have some significant changes before then. I’m also hoping to put on the longer version in Brighton as well.

A Cheeky Walk: The Lord Lucan Experience

The Cheeky Walks Guidebook isn’t particularly kind about Newhaven, the location of last weekend’s walk. It compares the town to “a limbless toy discarded and left to rot in the attic, its stuffing long since eaten by rats”. Despite that, this was another fantastic journey, featuring the ghost village of Tide Mills and some lovely cliff-top views.

The town is definitely very run down in places. On leaving the station at Newhaven Harbour, we were immediately faced with Industrial Decay, with the old abandoned station buildings. A little further on was the third train station in a short distance, Newhaven Marine. This is now only used as a stop for Ghost Trains (also known as Parliamentary Trains). Although we didn’t visit, there are some good pictures of the station online.

IMG_20160417_125246 — Newhaven Marine station

From the stations we walked down to the seafront where we found the ghost village of Tide Mills. After flooding in 1937, many of the houses were condemned, with the remaining residents evacuated in 1940. The town was then used for artillery target practise during the war. It’s an eerie location.

We did the first part of the walk in a group of four, with Rosy and Olive, who left us at a Cafe on the High Street:

Our meal was filling, but not particularly tasty. The toilets doubled as chair storage, which made using them an adventure, but there was some latin graffiti out the back – non temere beneficiis, which seems to translate as ‘do not fear benefits’.

The second half of the walk took us onto the cliffs of Newhaven Fort, which has some amazing views of the sea. It was a little breezy when we were there, but this would be an amazing place for a summer picnic.

Despite the urban decay in much of Newhaven, this was still a pretty good walk. Lela and I even got a trace of sunburn. We ended up at Rosy’s Dad’s house for a cup of tea. It was a good day.

Just 4 walks and 18.5 miles remaining. If the weather holds, we’re doing a pair of walks next weekend. Whatever are we going to do when these walks are finished?

A Cheeky Walk: The Devil and Miss Price

I’ve discovered some great places from the Cheeky Walks, but this week I visited a place I should have been to before. In 4 decades living within 5 miles of the place, I’ve never actually walked Devil’s Dyke. I’ve been around it many times but never actually inside. The Devil and Miss Price was one of my favourite of the cheeky walks. It’s themed around the “model, children’s author, novelist, businesswoman, philosopher” Katie Price, aka Jordan, but it is really an excuse to plot a walk to Poynings, Saddlescombe Farm, Newtimber Hill and Devil’s Dyke.

The route starts on the top of Devil’s Dyke, looking out across the Weald. A sign told us that the painter Constable had described this view as the grandest in the world. I think the view from Newtimber Hill later in the walk had the edge, but it’s still an amazing scene. It also takes in most of the places where I grew up.

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We walked down the slope to Poynings via some of the most treacherous steps I’ve ever seen. How we didn’t end up slipping, sliding and covered in mud is a miracle.

The mud stopped soon after and we passed through Saddlescomb Farm and up onto Newtimber Hill before dropping back to the farm.

Until doing the Cheeky Walks, I’d not realised that Saddlescomb Farm had a connection with the Knights Templar. Facts like these that provide a testament to the long hours of research put in by Bramwell, Bick and Ashton.

The walk through the Dyke felt magical. How had I missed this? And what am I going to do when I’ve finished these walks?

IMG_20160410_135801 — My friend @dpashley says that behind every sign there’s a story

Brighton Fringe Festival Highlights 2016

My friend Vicky Matthews asked what I was going to in this year’s Fringe. I thought I’d do a quick blog post in case anyone else is interested.

There are lots of exciting events, although the best one sold out within a few hours. Alan Moore, John Higgs, Daisy Campbell, Shardcore and others are appearing at the Odditorium for Adventures on the Edge of Culture. I’m particularly excited by John Higgs’ piece Ziggy Blackstar and the Art of Becoming. Also, Alan Moore’s first visit to Brighton since who-knows-when is a big deal. .

Some of the other events I’m looking forward to:

There are three other Odditorium events: Rupert Sheldrake, Everett True, and Boing Boom Tschak, a night devoted to Kraftwerk. I’ve bought tickets to all of these.
A couple of years after his prize-winning show, Chris Parkinson returns with Apostrophe’s. I’m going to the showing on the 27th.
Mathilda Gregory’s show My My Immortal is going to be amazing. There’s an interesting backstory to this but, even if you’ve never heard about it, the performance will awesome. Mathilda did part of it at the last Slash Night and killed.
My friend Kaylee is helping produce a show called ‘Am I Fuckable‘. I don’t know much else about it, but what she’s told me makes it sound awesome.

There are a few other events I’m considering but not sure about. I think I’ve booked tickets to a workshop on pilgrimage, but the Fringe booking system is being somewhat inscrutable. And that’s without even considering the usual free events, open houses and so on. May will be a busy month!

A Cheeky Walk: Bottoms Up

Good Friday was a perfect day for a Cheeky Walk, the first proper sunny day of the year. We opted for ‘Bottoms Up’, an innuendo-laden tour of Stanmer Park and Ditchling Beacon – ‘bottom’ being a common Sussex place name. This was also the first time when we got lost.

One of the directions was via a carved tree-trunk. We missed it the first time past, because a couple of people were sat covering the carving. It didn’t help that I also missed one of the sentences in the directions. We retraced our steps and met a famous dog, who turned out to be half shitzu and half poodle – meaning it was either a zoodle or a shitpu. His owner told us a story about the risks of birdwatching, and how they had once watched a heron, amazed how still it was, only to learn that it was a statue.

IMG_20160325_131539 — Lela takes photographic evidence of the gate I missed

We were misled once more by the Keymer Finger Post – it looks as if the field has been re-fenced, as the gate was now in the wrong corner of the field. Still, with the aid of Google maps, we found our way back on course. We also passed close to the route of the Earth, Wind and Fire walk – what a contrast the weather was.

I think this walk was one of my favourites. It was hard work on the legs, but it gave some wonderful views. And it ended with a portable creperie. Despite only being seven miles, it felt a lot longer – perfect for a bank holiday. Now it’s just 28 miles and 6 walks to go.