And when one appears over the back garden it’s impossible to resist running outside with a camera.

As ever, click for the full-sized version.

Further along the road, after I’d switched the camera off, he had a mate who was having a fine old time, waving at the cars and mugging for the drivers who were taking photos of him.

This chap, though, looked like he wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole…

Worst job ever?

The taste of summer...

It’s been a long time since I lived in Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft, after all, and even longer since visiting family in Lincolnshire occasionally included a jaunt to Skegness. Nor did I get to see many of the sights as an observer at NUS conference in Blackpool as a student.

So, back in March, we loaded up our metaphorical bucket and spade and headed off to the seaside.

While what I really wanted was somewhere seedy and run down, the need for an enjoyable day trip meant that instead we went to Hunstanton and Cromer on the north Norfolk coast.

The season hadn’t started yet – not by a long chalk – but it was starting to heave into view on the horizon.

There’s nothing bleaker than a seaside resort in the depths of winter, with howling rainstorms lashing boarded-up seasonal attractions, and that atmosphere was missing in both towns.

But the few visitors that had ignored the calendar to make the journey to Hunny had the air of endurance athletes, not holidaymakers, while barbed wire, barriers and boards were much in evidence along the front.

By the time we reached Cromer it was dark, and the heaving waves around the pier – though nothing particularly special – were a reminder why the town is as famous for its lifeboat as for its bucket-and-spade brigade.

Photo gallery

Click each thumbnail to see larger version.

The full tale of why we were there is on our walking blog, where Beloved Other Half wrote up the visit as our contribution to the Celebrate Our Forests Day activities.

But for me it wasn’t just about activism, or a return visit to a location that the hobby of geocaching has pulled us into several times over the last few years.

It was also a trip back into a time long-gone when I camped there in the Scouts – memories of cooking dough strips and sausages over an open fire, sleeping in fern-covered bivouacs or brand-new two-person tents, tears and crippling homesickness, brittle oak twigs and papery dry leaves, wood smoke, and a sense of adventure and possibility that couldn’t even see the boundaries of the wood, let alone of life.

The place seems smaller now, and I noticed the roads and fields and houses beyond the edge of the wood as I never had before. But in the heart of it, I could still see the past staring back at me.

Apparently founded by the Knights Templars in the 12th Century, it’s got a suitably historic town centre with lots of remarkably unscathed architecture.

What look like the survivors of mediaeval merchants’ houses extend back endlessly from the street, cheek-by-jowl with the best that Georgian and Victorian-civic styles have to offer.

But poke around for a while and all is not well. For every thriving gem of a building, there seems to be another shuttered and semi-derelict, its internal floors reduced to bare joists and its windows boarded up.

It’s rather a shame, and it makes you fear what might be coming down the line for this wonderful street scene as the economic screw tightens.

Anyway, here are some photos – the good, the bad and the bizarre.

Photo gallery

By this morning it had gone, but yesterday when we went for a walk it was at its finest. The far-off Wymondley Wood posed on the horizon as if auditioning for a Christmas card, and the broad skies over the frozen Common gave a passing glimpse of the infinite.

Lovely. Buggeringly cold, but lovely with it.

Photos

Click to enlarge.

The opposition for this Herts Senior Cup first round tie was Ware FC, a team that hadn’t won away all season and which Hitchin had already dumped out of the preliminary rounds of the FA Cup.

Looked good on paper, but they don’t play football on paper.

The dedicated few

A dank evening developed into a shiveringly cold one and we were among only 64 spectators who braved the conditions. It felt rather like that old joke – the crowd was so small that, before the game, the names of the spectators would be announced for the benefit of the players.

For Beloved Other Half it was the third visit to Top Field, for me only the second – and this despite me growing up in the town. More to follow, I hope.

Our first game as spectators was against North Greenford United, and you can read Beloved Other Half’s write-up here, or see some photos here. That was a good definition of a thriller, with late goals sealing the victory and their man-of-the-match keeper sent off for dissent in the dying moments.

Ware’s website report used the same word for this one, calling it a “seven-goal thriller in which the lead changed hands three times”.

Perfectly accurate as far as facts go, but it didn’t have the feel of a thrilling game. It was deeply frustrating, with Hitchin’s passing misfiring and Ware squashing us further and further back into our own half.

Free kick just outside the box

There was a short, happy, period when we were 2-1 up and the cold seemed to have disappeared (freshly-cooked chips, steaming tea and a Mars Bar had something to do with that, too).

But after 60 minutes there was a crunching tackle in the home penalty area and a confused period during which not a lot seemed to happen. With every spectator clustered optimistically behind the away goal, it wasn’t at all clear what was happening so far away – and only those following the game on Twitter realised a Hitchin player had been sent off.

The penalty made it 2-2, another goal followed within two minutes, and a fourth arrived after 81 minutes. Hitchin pulled one back in injury time, but it didn’t spark much hope – faced with the prospect of an equaliser, a voice from the crowd was heard to say “I hope not, or we’ll be stuck here another half hour”.

Ah well, there’s still the league to look forward to – and Hitchin are top of that, 10 points clear with a +25 goal difference. And it was great to experience Top Field under floodlights. It’s a uniquely historic place, protected from developers (and prevented from modernisation) by ancient covenant – as the essay with this set of photos from the North Greenford game explains.

We’ll definitely be back, hopefully bringing better luck with us.

Photo gallery

Click to enlarge.

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