19th September 2016
Double Stile Denby
Today, attempts at getting a full set of babes together
was highly successful, albeit not necessarily with all the regulars. Honorary babes Jane, Cheryl and Charlotte
admirably filling in the empty spaces left by Maggie, Jo and Pam, all otherwise
busy decorating, working or festivalling.
One would think that the prize for making the best
efforts to get to Denby would be Jane travelling from Wales, or Charlotte from
Staffs.. but no, Alison managed to arrive in Denby (via Mickleover) having left
her car in Ashbourne. Time travel is a
wonderful thing and one which the babes need to investigate further.
As we all know, some babes are not as tech savvie as
others, and whilst plans to extract Jane’s mobile number from her worked, it
was a pity Helen J had forgotten to instruct Jane to make sure her phone was
not ‘on silent’. Fortunately, Cheryl knows Jane’s little ways and managed to
get her to the car park in time for their lift. Telepathy is also something
which needs further investigation.
 |
| Betty just loves meeting new friends |
Meeting at Denby Lodge, the babes settled in for a light
lunch and a good chat. After a bit of
putting the world to rights, Jane entertained us with one of her stories as a
young lass and how, nearly homeless for the night, she ended up sleeping in a
bed reserved for a famous archbishop surrounded by gladioli with said famous
archbishop looking down on her.
Something was moving in a mysterious way, even way back then!
The September Seven in their finery…
Check
out fashion statement #1: painted toes and open-toed sandals.
Now, fashion statement #2: the slightly more sensible
one
sock in, one sock out look.
All footwear is fine for the moment.
But perhaps, paws and hooves are better equipped for
what’s ahead.
The odd glass of wine at lunchtime is fine, but ….
Really Jane …. seeing double?
And so, we continued along footpaths and across dimply
fields, where it started to become apparent to the ‘barefoots’ Cheryl and Jane that
perhaps the fashion of ’sock n shoe’ would
have been a more sensible choice for traipsing through nettles and brambles. And
whilst admiring
the occasional view…
We arrived at Denby Cricket club, a beautiful setting,
but oh dear, perhaps they need a new groundsman as
this poor ‘duck’ seems to have lost more than his ‘wicket’…
We learned several
facts about Denby’s famous residents: Mr Joseph Bourne Snr, founder of Denby
Pottery and builder of the chapel, the Drury-Lowe family and of course, our
very own babe, Helen M lived here for a while..
The ‘blue plaque’ proves it…
Our walk now started to
become a little more challenging, with Helen M eager to lead the way
Put the right leg
over
Then the left leg over..
Much easier without bag, dog and slightly longer legs…
And, as if one stile wasn’t
enough
We meet the double Denby
complete with brambles, stingers, tree stumps and nowhere
for Betty to crawl through….
But, super ’stilish’ babes that we are, we came finally found
habitation, with Cheryl declaring that this is where John Flamsteed was
born.
The round window, perfect for large telescopes.
But, Cheryl is not an experienced babe and is not aware
of the need for precision is such matters, as John Flamsteed was actually born
next door…
The blue plaque proves it…
As if dimply fields, single stiles and the double Denbies
were not enough…
this was just a….
bridge too far ….
But luckily, the dimply bits in the field seemed to have
served their purpose, and with a bit of balance and luck, we safely overcame
the final obstacle.
To round off our lovely walk we dropped into the Flamsteed Memorial Park to
learn exciting facts about John Flamsteed such as being born at precisely
7:16pm and that he was a true ‘star’ of his time….
Aspiring astronomers…
Our bird list did not add anything new to our list, but for the
record we saw: blackbird, chaffinch, coot, crow, kestrel, mallard, magpie, robin and
sparrowhawk .
