Monday, 17th July, 2023…………. the last tram home!

Today was the last real day of flettrek2023 and the last post on the flettrek blog itself. The weather was forecast to be a bit doubtful and so Steve suggested we return to the fabulous tram museum at Crich where cover was always close AND because we knew it was going to be open! A mate of Steve’s had been involved in starting this fabulous Museum 60+ years ago and so we had even more reason to go there. A quick summary of the museum was that the site had been a quarry with lime kilns and contained A LIGHT GAUGE RAILWAY to feed the kilns. A few keen people had been collecting trams from light rail networks that were closing down in the late 50s and early 60s and someone realised that this quarry in Crich was THE place to store and display them! Fast forward quite a few years and this site also started to save listed buildings that were at risk by dismantling those buildings and re-erecting them at the quarry. The final result is a village of genuinely historic buildings serviced by a light rail network and containing a complete set of tram restoration workshops! Bridges, street furniture and A PUB finished off this tram village within the village of Crich and the result is truly stunning, vibrant and not just realistic ……. BUT REAL!

The Sun shone often enough to gift me photos which are some of the best of flettrek2023!

A few years ago, I paid the blog host a few shekels to grant me a higher amount of storage and I’ve decided to blow that storage by posting all of these photos at higher resolution because this is the last flettrek post ever.

I really want to thank those people who have been here with me since day 1.
I don’t want to list them because I will have forgotten some but a few are deserving of a ‘mentioned in dispatches rating’ such as Max, Luscious Kerrie, Crowie, and Ray.
The blog has become a bit of an anachronism as it has been overtaken by other social media and I am sad to see it go but I will keep it going offline just for me because I have come to rely on it to help me remember where I was and when.

I love you all and thank you for sharing my journeys. I won’t bore you all with a blog post on packing and travelling back but please know that you will all stay in my heart forever ❤️

Saturday, 15th July, 2023 …….. Thunderbolt and Lightning, very very fright’ning!

Flettrek23 was bookended by airshows, Shuttleworth on June 4 and Flying Legends on July 15 and 16. Flying Legends had always been staged at Duxford but (apparently) they were basically evicted in 2019. In 2023, after a lot of searching and reorganising, Flying Legends was held again but at East Leeds Airport which had been RAF Church Fenton, an historic military airfield. I bought tickets before leaving Australia and, luckily as it turned out, I bought the posh tickets which included preferential parking, a reserved viewing area AND a marquee!
Well, on the day, the weather forecast was dire and the actual day was even more extreme than the forecast! There was rain, hail, thunder, lightning and sunshine and the posh marquee was about the only available protection on the whole Aerodrome. I could stand in the reserved viewing area, take photos and literally run for the marquee as the thunder squalls flew across the event. At one stage I didn’t think that the flying display would even proceed, but thankfully it did.
These first 2 photos were taken within minutes it each other…..

I was targeting a particular aircraft which has a rich connection with Australia having been flown by its Australian owner, Sidney Cotton, over Germany secretly photographing military facilities in the days immediately prior to WW2! It was at the airshow but covered against the elements and stayed firmly on the ground.

Those who know me won’t be surprised to find out that, in spite of the weather, I still ended the day with over 1000 images with just a few below…….

With this post finishing appropriately with Thunderbolt and Lightning, very, very frightening……..

Thursday, 13th July, 2023 …….. the steely resolve of Sheffield

As we are both manufacturing engineers AND Steve was born there, it was inevitable that we would one day visit the Kelham Island Industrial Museum in Sheffield. The city of Sheffield in the 18th, 19th and 20th Century became synonymous with steel, cutlery, hand tools and armour. There are still pockets of these industries in the City and it was fortunate that one of these pockets moved directly from industry to museum in one step. The Kelham Island Industrial Museum is one of those fascinating places where its location and buildings are as historic as the museum’s artefacts. Kelham Island was formed when part of the River Don was directed to form a ‘quoit’ or canal 600+ years ago so that the water flow could be used to power mills before the water rejoined the river. That redirecting of the Don can still be seen in the following image where the river continues down the weir to the right and the ‘quoit’ continues to the left. This now idyllic scene replaces the gritty industrial scene that existed up until the 1970s !

The various water mills that existed on the island that used the power of the quoit water rejoining the lower river water, ended when the last mill, a steel rolling mill, became the museum in the early 1980s. The marquee ‘player’ in the museum is an incredible 12,000 hp steam engine that still operates for the museum’s visitors and even had a movie role in ‘Titanic’……

The other highlights for me in the museum are the displays demonstrating hand tool manufacture and history……

Vehicles………

…… and weaponry, particularly given my family’s connection to HMS BENBOW which extended to my own father’s name being William Donald Benbow Flett……

…… but there is still so much more to see. DEFINITELY RECOMMENDED!

Woohoo, the blog is up-to-date 👍

Wednesday, 12th July, 2023 ……….. when you fall off, get back in the saddle!

We checked the fine weather bucket list this morning, consulted with the gods of chance and decided to visit Newby Hall in North Yorkshire. Unlike many properties I have visited during the modern era of flettrek, Newby Hall isn’t a ruin, it isn’t even derelict! It hasn’t been gutted of its interior to pay death duties nor gambling debts and even still includes its legally purchased Roman statuary dating back to the first century BC! It was pretty impressive! It is even STILL in the ownership of the same family for the last few centuries. It is however, expensive to visit and only after I had taken the first photo inside the building did I find out that photography INSIDE THE HOUSE is prohibited! The grounds and house are amazing in their own right but the 2 other attributes that fascinated me were the dolls house collection and the presence of Chippendale furniture that was purchased for the house AND ARE STILL IN THE SAME ROOM for which they were purchased!
I’ll post some general outside photos and the one ILLEGAL interior photo……..

Then I will cover the truly amazing dolls house collection! This collection includes knods to the classic architecture of Charles Rennie Mackintosh AND the chaos of Steptoe and Son……

However the most amazing exhibit is the incredible detail of the miniature decoration found within these dolls houses. The next images show the tiny items that are included inside these dolls houses and a macro photograph of these items shown with a drawing pin to give scale……

AND, on top of all of that, there was a Morgan in the carpetk

Tuesday, 11th July, 2023 …………. heading back

Today was to be a travelling day. I had tickets for trains from Inverness to Doncaster but, courtesy of the efforts of a wonderful person in the Inverness rail ticket office, I had a particularly comfortable journey plotted for me that didn’t require a change at Edinburgh AND on the same train and in the same seat from Inverness all the way to York! It was also HALF THE PRICE!

My hotel is basically ON the station and so I walked under cover from my hotel to the train after breakfast. I am still sad at leaving Orkney but I take a deep breath, board the train, settle into my seat, and head south!

I took a few photos from the train…….

Changed trains at York……

Was met at Doncaster Station and taken to my second home……

A puffin addenda

The earlier post on the puffins on Westray created a lot of interest and a few messages. When I post on the same day that I take photos, I have a quick look on my iPad to choose which photos I will post but this time on the ferry, I only had my iPhone handy and not unsurprisingly, I didn’t choose the best images? I’ve had the time this afternoon to go through them again and have chosen what I now hope are better images?

Monday, 10th July, 2023 …………. farewell Orkney ❤️

I do love Orkney and its people and so it is always difficult to leave. It has shown me new and special things every visit and the light show she put on this morning to try to stop me from going, hints that there is still much more she wants to show. I hope I will get to see it! This morning as I drove to the ferry, I was bathed in undoubtedly the best weather I have ever experienced here. The ancient town of St Margaret’s Hope is the site of the ferry port and, until today, this little town has always worn her dour, disinterested face as I leave but this morning she was all lit up to keep me there…..

The morning light also accentuated her pro-Ukrainian stance as did an older couple in their quirky Ukrainian van who were also boarding the ferry. This couple had coincidentally been at my separate visits to the Scapa Flow Museum, the Earls Palace Concert, the Westray Ferry and now the Gills Bay ferry and AT THE SAME TIME AS I!

I got to the ferry and boarded but, just after casting off, threatening clouds suddenly appeared in the direction of Scotland…….

….. although the same clouds looked softer and inviting as they hovered over the Orkney Islands giving me one last reason to stay……

…… but turned into a major thunderstorm and rough weather the closer we got to Scotland!

The last invitation to stay was a succession of sea birds flying past our ferry but all heading back in the direction of Orkney.

We docked safely at Gills Bay on the Scottish coast and I buckled down and drove 3 hours through the storms to Inverness where I returned the hire car and was offered a lift to tonight’s hotel.
Farewell Orkney ❤️

Sunday, 9th July, 2023…………. last day on Orkney

Today is my last full day on Orkney this trip. Being a Sunday I went to St Magnus Cathedral where I am now being recognised if not understood.

……. and after the service I went for a bit of a wander but most shops are closed on Sunday mornings. I have walked and driven past a particular corner every visit and have recognised that there is a nice photo there but only if it isn’t parked out. Well, today there were fewer cars than normal …… so I took a few but only on my mobile……

I returned ‘home’ for lunch, which was lovely, and I was reminded of the ‘free concert in the Earl’s Palace’. The weather has been so poor that most of these concerts have been driven indoors but today there was a good chance that it could be held in the palace ruins …….. and it was!

There were pipers….

The bard…….

Accompanied singers……

Romeo and Juliet ………who were EXCELLENT!

And a father and son playing a medley of Orkney tunes …….. INCLUDING ‘FLETT FROM FLOTTA’

What a wonderful way for me to leave tomorrow…..

As I was already in the palace grounds, I lingered with intent!

Tomorrow will be a ferry and driving day so there probably won’t be a blog post unless I do something really exciting like stopping for a bowl of Cullen skink?

Saturday, 8th July, 2023 …………… the BIG day!

Today was the planned visit to Westray, another of the Orkney Islands. It is a 1.5 hour ferry trip from the main island and, unlike last years trip, this time I took my hire car on the ferry because I intended to cover much more of the island for a couple of planned quests. Unlike when I am writing the blog, the day dawned bright, dry and sunny which was a fantastic piece of luck considering what I had planned to do.

My first quest , photographing both the take off and landing of the Worlds shortest scheduled commercial flight was a FAIL! This flight is from a nearby island Papa Westray to Westray which takes only 2 minutes and you can actually see the take off runway from the landing runway! Unfortunately there were no people and no aircraft at the Westray end and I still don’t know what happened?

My second quest was to photograph the puffins that have come ashore at Burian Castle to breed. These comical little birds spend most of their life at sea and only come ashore to breed in a few predictable locations. Burian Castle is actually a very high and rough headland with sheer drops of up to 60 or 70 metres straight down to the crashing waves below. It is rough and dangerous but this quest result was a CREDIT!

WARNING: HISTORY CONTENT!

The Norse history of Scotland is documented in a book written about 1000 years ago called the Orkneyinga Sagas. One of the more noted and fearful characters in the sagas is Thorkel Flettia where ‘flettia’ is the old Norse word for “flayer”! It is believed that my own family name comes from the shortening over the centuries of “Flettia” to Flett. Dear Great, Great, Great …………… Great, Great Grandfather Thorkel lived on Westray! I was going to look for remnants of his life here even though I knew that a couple of recent discoveries relating to him are currently under wraps and slated for future archeological study.

Quest 3 was finding physical evidence of Thorkel the Flayer and the result was PASS CONCEDED. Via a visit to the lovely heritage centre, prior reading, fading plaques like the one above some ancient engraved milestones and luck I found Tuquoy. I wandered along the shoreline over some very recent but crude attempts to stop coastal erosion and found what could be the only remaining corner of the church that allegedly was built by Thorkel. I have attached a few inconclusive images but I wish I had found more to justify the cuts, grazes and bruises?

Quest 4 was to re-explore Noltland Castle and have have a sunny day look around this fascinating island. The result is PASS!

It’s a lovely place and I’ll leave you with one last touristy image of an island whose history is rich and whose people are welcoming.

Friday, 7th July, 2023 ……….. but wait, there’s more!

In spite of the number of times I’ve been to the Orkneys and the miles that I have driven criss-crossing the islands when here, there are still surprises around almost every corner. The day started with a bit of window shopping ………..

…….. and then lunch at the Sheila Fleet jewellery workshop based around a beautifully restored church before heading on to see a photo exhibition documenting the building of the barriers during WW2. These barriers had the dual purpose of protecting the Royal Navy fleet from submarine attack and providing a road link between islands that previously were only accessible by boat. The exhibition was held in St Nicholas’s Kirk in Holme (pron ‘ham’?) and I was amazed that I had never seen this amazingly well cared for building and cemetery before. It is no longer an active church but it was built in the traditional but austere style of a Scottish Kirk which suits it well for exhibitions like this. There were the obligatory number of Flett graves in the cemetery but, to my knowledge, none of them are my Fletts.

One highlight for me was seeing a painting done by Fergus Wylie which had been donated to the permanent collection by his brother and my friend, Magnus Wylie!