A City Walk

Hubby and I discovered this walk a few years ago when we dropped the kids off at the cinema and decided to walk from Attercliffe (a suburb of Sheffield ) into the city centre itself, along the canal towpath. Now this walk is littered along the way with hazards - litter being one of them ironically!! and its certainly not pretty for most of the way, but I think it is a really interesting walk. Tell me what you think.
The Sheffield and Tinsley Canal was opened in 1814 to carry boats to the city centre from the navigable bit of the river Don. Its only about 7 miles long and in its hey day, before the railway came along. It has several industrial looking, but pretty bridges along the towpath.

It also features a very famous film set. Can anybody guess which film this stretch of the canal featured in? If you need a further clue, try here.

The canal was totally frozen over from start to finish. Once in the city centre, the canal turns into a huge basin called Victoria Quays. I don't know what this building used to be, I'll have to do some digging.

The basin is home to lots of houseboats that are actually lived in, a couple of houseboat hotels and a couple of pleasure boats that are for private hire. The whole area fell into decay and disrepair in the 1970's, but it got a fabulous makeover in the early 1990's. They have turned some of the buildings into apartments, but they have left many of the original features in place. It really is a fantastic site, and I think they should really do more with it.

This is "The Straddle" - a warehouse that straddled the canal.

This is part of the "Grain Store" - if you peep in, you can see the massive hoppers that held the grain. Grain was brought to Sheffield as we had big bakeries and also several really large Breweries - sadly all gone. I say sadly, but when I was little. I hated this part of Sheffield because of the smell - it used to smell like "school dinner carrots"!!! It was the hops from the nearby brewery.

This is "Merchants Crescent" and was for the Coal Merchants - this pretty row is now used as offices.

I loved the old clock.

Once in Sheffield, you can cross the road and walk beck up to Attercliffe via the "5 Weirs walk" along the industrial river Don - obviously not navigable at this stage, because of the weirs. Modern bridges have been built so that you can walk alongside - and even over the river at this point. Can you see what is hanging over the bridge, under the railway arch?

A huge stainless steel spider. There were 3 of these.

A bit further up river is an area called "Salmon Pastures". Before the river was heavily polluted by the Steel Works, salmon were very common apparently. These days, there is no heavy industry alongside the river, and fish are now returning here. I don't think any salmon have been spotted yet though. I remember on a tour of the Steel Works museum being told that they pumped hundreds of gallons of Arsenic into the Don in the early days. There was an old saying that if you fell into the Don, you would be killed by pollution before you drowned!

At Salmon Pastures, the old Stone plaque from the school remains.

One of the weirs is Sanderson Weir. It was constructed in 1580 by the Earl of Shrewsbury who was the husband of Bess of Hardwick. He constructed it to power the production of Iron products (I think).

I looked back down the river as the sun was setting, a bit prematurely because of the snow cloud that was approaching.

You can't beat a walk immersed in industrial history on a cold but clear winters day.

Paris - Part 2

Our second full day in Paris was equally as energetic as the first. I lured the kids into walking again by promising them a stop off in the shopping district, but I really only wanted to catch a glimpse of the beautiful dome inside the famous Galleries Lafayette. It was very stunning.

After a quick look around, we headed off up the hill to Montmatre. I know its very touristy, and in places a bit tacky, but it is great fun - however the kids didn't think the climb up was much fun!

I heard several accordion's playing which added to the atmosphere, and the mime artist was funny.

I would have loved to step back in time to see the original artists and Bohemian's when they lived here. I tried to find the Cafe and fruit and veg stall from Amelie, but I failed.

We finally made it to Sacre Couer - simply stunning against the blue sky.

The view down the hill is amazing and the haze made it very atmospheric.

After a look in the Sacre Couer (and a touch of the Virgin Mary's foot!! we just did it because everybody else was doing it - if you know why, please enlighten me!), it was off back down the hill and back to have a look in the Louvre.

My daughter tells me that it would take you 3 full weeks to look around everything in the Louvre, and she should know as she is a bit of an expert on the place. I was puzzled as to how she knew her way around the place so well - she knew exactly where the Mona Lisa was! She told me that she has played on "Playstation 2 Davinci Code" so many times, she even knows the short cuts!! and they say that computer games are not educational!!

We didn't get chance to have an in depth look around, and it was very busy in parts, but I loved what I saw. It would be a great place to explore even without the art.

Ans so concluded our last full day in the city centre. Tomorrow I'm taking you to Versailles which I have to say totally bowled me over.

AuRevoir for now mes amies xxxxxxxx

Sunset, Sunrise

Yesterday was a beautiful day - more like late spring and too nice to "play in", so once I finished work at 3pm, and hubby got home early from a course he was on, we pulled on our walking boots and walked over the fields. We found ourselves at the pub for a quick snifter (Pint of Guiness for him and a glass or Red Wine for the lady) and then shared a beautiful sunset on the way home.

I woke early this morning and poked my nose out of the bathroom window to see if the spring weather was continuing. You can't really tell from the photograph, but the sun was a huge bright orange ball, and had a trailing of cloud across it like when the pirate ship goes back to Neverland in Peter Pan. Moments like this make my day.

The very best sunsets though, are over Clodgy point (St Ives)- as viewed from Porthmeor beach, after a hard days sunbathing, surfing, rock pooling, pasty snacking, sandcastle building etc as I'm sure many of you out there will agree.