Yorkshire Dales and Skipton

Michael and I thought that Jeremy's spending the summer in Darlington gave us a very nice excuse to take a few days' vacation in the Yorkshire Dales, because of course good parenting "required" us to check on him.

Taking the convenient Perugia-Stansted flight, we landed around one and then lingered around at the airport until three because airports are so great. Just kidding! I waited while Michael fumed in his immigration line, then we eventually made it out to the rental car plaza, at which point Michael got to show off his driving-on-the-left skills for about, oh, 5 hours. We eventually made it to our B&B in Kettlewell, where we got a warm welcome, dinner in a local pub, wandering around the village, and bed.

 The next day was when our holiday really started. Obviously, an English breakfast was the start of the day, and then we decided to drive to Skipton. We had read that there were some lovely woods to provide a bit of a walk, as well as a great castle to visit. Sounded like the perfect combination!

In the woods at Skipton; I loved the reflections in the water

Sheep!

It worked out to be just as nice as we'd hoped. The forest was pleasantly cool (England's suffering from a heat wave, but their highs are lower than Italy's "unseasonably cool" highs are at the moment), and we enjoyed seeing some tiny birds fluttering about and looking for insects on the forest floor. We ended up following the canal (turns out that there was local limestone quarrying, so a canal was a very practical way to transport this material for conversion to lime at its destination) well down into the center of town. At this point, we meandered about town for a while, enjoying the shops and generally killing time: we wanted to have an early lunch before going into the castle, because we wanted to avoid hunger pangs that might cut a visit short.

View of Skipton Castle from path

And guess what! We found not one but TWO wool shops. So, yes, we contributed to the local economy as I purchased our "souvenirs."

Then off to the castle! It was really lovely to see this intact structure that was over 1000 years old in some places, as well as to wonder at the very claustrophobic living conditions "enjoyed" by the people of the place throughout its history. Obviously, when you have a rather cold climate, body warmth can do wonders in a draughty castle, but still!

The castle withstood a three-year siege

It turns out that the castle's heirs died out in 1956, at which time it was bought by a local goldsmith...who turned out to have a very Italian name. We enquired further, and were told that this person's forebear came from Italy in a very direct response to the Napoleonic wars: having had his ancestral lands robbed by Napoleon, he had the very clear desire to join the English forces to kill Napoleon himself. He arrived in England just in time for the news of Napoleon's capture, and was therefore constrained to make a living for himself and his family there in Skipton. Clearly, he knew what he was about and managed to create a large patrimony for his descendants, who then built upon his base and eventually ended up owning the local castle!

A bridge over the canal

Yes, there was a wool shop here. Yes, I bought some wool

The castle!

The original doorway, dating to 960

The original courtyard

The bread oven.
Wood was burned inside the ovens until
the masonry was hot enough, then removed.
The bread was placed in the ovens at that point
 and burning wood placed in the front of the oven
to provide continuing warmth and protect against cold drafts.

 

"Desormais" is inserted into the tower; it's the family motto ("Henceforth")

This is a charcoal-fired stove in the "modern" kitchen (dating to 1600s),
prized for the clean-burning technology

Opening into the main yard

Michael and I had a delicious tea here! The garden was really pretty.

We weren't quite ready to go back to Kettlewell for the evening, so we drove further north and found a darling tea room. After tea, we went for a walk on the local footpaths to a town called Hubberholme (because it seemed an irresistible target with a name like that!) and then a little beyond so we could enjoy the countryside some more. Then it was time to head back, where we had a lovely dinner in a really wonderful pub in Kettlewell. Before dinner, though, we went into the churchyard. We'd discovered it our first night, and it was such an interesting mix of overgrown wilderness and lovely herbaceous border areas that I had to go back to take photos. The grave markers weren't terribly old, dating back to the late 1800s at the earliest that we could distinguish, but it's probably because of the "tend it or lose it" policy of many European cemeteries.

I love the stacked stone. A few cheat with mortar, but they're mostly dry-stacked.

The hare in the middle was having a grand time in the hay

This sheep was too lazy to stand on all four legs.
When we first saw him, he was grazing with
his back legs extended and resting on his front knees.

Cows!

Hubberholme!

Gate carving detail for church in Kettlewell

Church in Kettlewell. I loved the carved gate.

Some of the wilder areas

We thought this a very unusual way of marking graves

About half of the cemetery was like this...very "gardeny"

A little stroll, and time to get ready for our next day.

Love,

Alexandra

Making a bow (continuation of the continuation)

Yesterday, I said that all I had left was the leather on the grip.

This afternoon, Enzo and I put that on. It was pretty simple. First we chose the leather, and cut a 10 cm wide strip (because that is roughly how long my grip is). Then we used a little string to measure the circumference of the grip, and cut the leather a bit shorter than that. At this point we had a 10x11 cm rectangle of leather. Then we marked the edge that would need holes in it (the 10 cm long one). Using the markings, a little dowel thingit, and a hammer, I whacked little holes into the leather.

Holes made!

Next we got the string and doubled it up (one strand looks wimpy). Then we threaded needles onto both ends. Then a bit at a time, we glued down the leather, stitched it up, tightened the stitches and stretched the leather. We got to the bottom, and then we used a little stick to tighten the stitches some more. After that, we used a hammer to flatten down the seam a bit. Next, we used another little stick to put some glue next to the arrow rest, and we tied spare pieces of wood around it to get the leather as close to the arrow rest as possible.

Holding the leather down

The finished product

The front

In my hand!

Then I thanked Enzo and walked back up the hill, getting funny looks all the way.

On to the string!

Ciao,

Florence

Making a bow (continuation)

I left this blog post longer than I thought, so I hope I can remember what all went into the work I did.

After starting to shape the "flettenti" I went back and filed my "rough draft" making it closer and closer to what I wanted. It was many hours of "a little bit here, a little bit there" filing and filing...

Eventually, it was close enough that I could make little notches in the wood to hold the string. We marked these out with a little piece of cardboard that gets the angle right, and then we cut them using a little saw. We made two cuts: one on and one the line, and one at a bit of an angle to meet the first. This allows the string to move safely when you are using the bow. We finished off the ends (for that moment anyway) by using a piece of sandpaper to get in the crack and to smooth it out.

Then we strung the bow and put it on a funny instrument that keeps it at full draw (or at least the fullest draw you can get). While it was at full draw we looked at the bow to make sure that it had a nice shape and started using a two handed blade to shave off parts where the bow was too stiff. There was more "a little bit here, a little bit there" work (several hours of it).

Next, we tested how strong it was. 63 pounds. I may be strong, but 63 pounds is well over my limit so we knew that we would have to bring it down. At this point I shot the first arrow. I could only draw back 13 inches (half of my normal draw). I hit my arm with the string, and it turned somewhat red. At this point I had already spent close on twelve hours on my bow)

My somewhat red arm

The next thing to do was clearly weaken the bow enough that I could shoot it. This was very similar to what I had done to make sure that the bow had a nice curve. Using the two handed blade, I had to shave off little pieces wherever I could. I say wherever I could because the wood had plenty of knots and dips in it which made it challenging to work with. Once we got closer to a strength that was manageable, we started using a coarse sandpaper.

At one point, we took a break in weakening the bow in order to properly shape the tip of the bow. We did this by tracing a rough leaf-like shape and then sanding off the edges and smoothing everything out with sandpaper. After we had shaped the end, we used a round file to connect the two grooves. That part isn't necessary, but it looks nice.

The tips of the bow

Once we had the bow down to an okay strength (41 pounds, which is still a bit stronger than my usual bow), we used sandpaper to soften any edges and to remove the signs of filing. Then, we used steel wool to remove any signs of sanding. 

Clearly what was left was adding an arrow rest, oiling the bow and putting leather on the grip. 

To make the arrow rest, Enzo used a piece of wood (which has a great double coloring). He used one of those electric saws that looks like a sewing machine to cut it into a drop shape. Then we tested which side of the bow shot better. As it happens both sides shoot equally well, so I chose to make the bow have the same orientation that the tree had when it was growing. Then we filed the appropriate area so that it was flat, and glued the arrow rest onto the bow. We then sanded it down so that it didn't stick out or have any edges that would hurt when I used the bow. 

The arrow rest

On to oiling! I imagine that you can figure out what this step consisted of. We used what I think is linseed oil (Enzo told me what it was, but I promptly forgot). The bow became the most BEAUTIFUL color and the arrow rest looked AMAZING. I expected the bow to polish up to be a somewhat yellow color that is fairly common, but it was lighter than that.

MY BOW!!!

The front 

The amazing arrow rest

All that is left now is the leather on the grip. I'll be working on that tomorrow. I've chosen a leather that I think should go pretty well, in that it is quite light and hopefully won't overpower its natural tones. 

Ciao,

Florence 

Aida and other adventures in Verona

Even with the stop in Bologna, our early start meant that we were already installed in our apartment just before lunchtime. The three of us sauntered off to the restaurant we'd had recommended to us, only to find that it had moved. Nothing daunted, we ended up in the new location and found they had a few tables open.

We got to chatting with the older gentlemen at the table next to us, who gave us a different origin for the inclusion of horse and donkey in the Veronese diet: as we had been told, it was the result of famine following wars and the availability of warhorse and donkey meat on the battlefields. However, according to these people, it dates to the late Medieval period. Since my curiosity has now been aroused, I've done some quick research, and the answer is that no one really knows why they eat horse and donkey particularly in this area. Some say it dates back to the Roman empire, when other horse-eating tribes inhabited the area. Others, the Napoleonic wars. Regardless, they know how to make a wonderful ragù!

Verona is a great city for wandering. The city center is rather small, but there are lots of shops and a good deal of activity, plus churches! We came across the Church of the Jesus Windmill inadvertently (to be perfectly honest, I'd forgotten that this particular event had happened in Verona although I had thought about it with a snicker from time to time) and went inside. This time, undistracted by silliness, we had the chance to admire the frescoes properly. They are quite lovely and well worth the amount of time we spent in them. We also scouted around for dinner spots, happily running across various restaurants in which we'd dined during our earlier visits.

By that time, it was the appointed hour to meet Jim at the apartment, so we could enjoy the time with all four of us!

Highlights of our time together include:

Seeing the props hauled into the Arena. The afternoon of the performance, we happened to be down that direction, and had the delight of seeing all the props for the different productions piled in what appeared to be a haphazard manner around the back side of the arena. We were lucky enough to witness the crane in action, bringing huge sections of the prop pyramid over the top and into the stage area.

Aida. The performance itself was stupendous. They did not include the live animals as in previous years, but the stage was absolutely full of marvelous performers: singers, dancers, and musicians. They ended up using all of the tiers of the seating area behind the stage as well as the stage itself, and the effect of the sound's arrival from different sections of the arena was magical.
 
Marching band. On the day we left Verona, we happened across "Bands from the North," a festival of Scandinavian music schools. They marched into the city center, and then proceeded to play for several hours. It was a delight to see such young talent! One of the directors was so dynamic, we were all dancing along with the music as we watched him and his band.
  
And then it was time to get home! We had a few hours in Bologna, which we spent in an outside bar chatting and reminiscing about what we had seen.

Love,

Alexandra