#24 Chasing the Lancasters

It’s Sunday. According to the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum website , both Lancasters (Vera, the Canadian and Thumper, the British one) will be flying past South Rauceby near Sleaford at 3.20pm.

#12 Camper Van in Northumberland

“Good prose is like a window pane.” (Orwell, 1946, Why I Write)

A friend’s wedding, May 2013, Northumberland.

We exit the church to find a camper van parked; the windows are splattered with water. Yet, despite the recent rain, the panes reflect sunlight and bowing branches from the churchyard. They arch over the picnic and champagne bucket laid out inside, as if they are praying.

 

#9 Steep Hill, Lincoln

The snow-coated rooftops make these buildings look wonkier. Harlequin sells vintage books; or, rather, it displays them on the window sill, brown titles pushed against single-glazed glass.

#6 Lincoln Cathedral

Lincoln Cathedral. 7am. Two black eyes un-shutter themselves on the north-west tower: they survey the mist-blinded turrets. The peregrine falcon struts himself awake, flickers on a ledge, then drops. His call stabs the echo of the seventh gong. Latticed in a gothic frame, the sleep-fluffed chick watches his parent free-fall into ghost’s breath.

#4 Christmas in Langdale

Moss-shrouded stone walls line the road from Grasmere to Chapel Stile. In the Wainwright Inn car-park it’s clear they’re expecting rain. We pull on boots, jackets and head for the fells.