Look out kid, it's something you did. God knows when but you're doing it again.

[hirez]

I've gone on before about the old Severn ferry at Aust. Today I finally got around to visiting the site and taking a few photos.

I'm not entirely sure why I'm fascinated with the landscape between motorways. It seems like there's this great patch of the county I call home which is purposely hard to get to. When you do find your way in, you discover roads that just stop, red 'phone kiosks gone pink and peeling with age and weather, petrol pumps still marked in gallons, yellow-and-black signage, warning notices from the CEGB... I kept expecting to see things take on that strange kind of Eastman/Fuji oversaturated tinge, or Emma Peel belting by on the way to save one of the nuclear power-stations.

So... Here we see the second bridge looking curved and far away in the manner of something having its picture took by a chap who can't work a camera to save his life. Meanwhile, the bit of paving where Bob Dylan stood in 1966 is looking apropriately overgrown. To the right is what's left of the ticket office: The gent's bogs. You probably can't make out the turnstile due to camera-related excusework above. Though the paved apron and (wooden, festering quietly) pier are fenced off, if you walk toward the first Severn bridge you can find a patch of fence that's 'fallen down' thus allowing access for the intrepid toilet explorer. Since I'm not as intrepid as some, you'll have to take my word for it that the pier is in a parlous state. The 'old' bridge, however, is looking as splendid as ever.

Oh, and... My entry for the 'Pylon of the month' website is this fine edifice.

[ Don't believe me about Bob Dylan? Evidence.]

Comments

[hirez.livejournal.com]

Ta.

It's the ephemera like that that's important. The missing roads and the way things peter out rather than stopping where they meet the water. Almost as if the landscape isn't finished and fades out into charcoal sketchwork and the edge of the canvas.

[ Shrug ]

Or I'm justifying a need to get out of the house and look closely at things, rather than observing from the motorway.

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

I first read 'Pylon of the month' as Python of the month, and my mind thought you were randomly talking about Monty Python. It took me several long seconds of staring at the picture you linked to before the penny dropped...

[sheepthief.livejournal.com]

It's wrapped around one of the legs, about half way up. "It's nestin', innit".

Looks like an interesting place - I like these forgotten spots.

[ex-halja931.livejournal.com]

This is the type of thing that I would do if I had a better camera.

If we ever are to visit you two I will gladly tromp out in muddy fields and festering old buildings with you--have Wellies, will travel. (We can leave Pat and Chris to their own devices!) ;)

[hirez.livejournal.com]

It's the sort of thing I've been saying I ought to do for years.

Time's moving on, the sun's out, I can't take pictures to save my life and the camera's borrowed from jarkman anyway.

There's a case to be made to the effect that I'm just waving my arms about (as it were) and yelling 'Look! I have a life!' ... Even if it involves visiting things that part of my notional peer-group considers 'That blokey-spannery thing you do with your weird mates...'

But fuck them, frankly.

Anyway. Yes. Turn up and welcome. Bring stout walking boots.

Pylon of the month

[wehmuth.livejournal.com]

So why do you like this particular pylon? You didn't even state the type of pylon it is!

Re: Pylon of the month

[hirez.livejournal.com]

It's one of the pair that span the Severn just south of the 'old' bridge. There are squatter and stouter pylons further inland to take more of the strain. I'll be taking more pictures next time I'm in the area.

[aoakley.livejournal.com]

In other ferry-related and much happier news, the Severn Ferry just up the road from my parent's house at Hampton Loade (http://www.hloade.free-online.co.uk/village.html) has been saved by a grant from the Countryside Agency and Ironbridge Gorge (http://www.ironbridge.org.uk/news_stories.asp?Item=24).

It is quite a strange thing, you ring a doorbell on a stump on the one side of the river and this old lady stumbles out of her cottage on the other side. The ferry is permanently attached to a thick cable (which also carries the bell signal) running at 90 degrees to the river flow, so the ferry can't go downstream. The old lady simply points the rudder one way or t'other and the river flow does all the work moving it from bank to bank. There's a picture of the ferry half-way down here (http://www.svr-visitor.org.uk/Hampton.htm).

There used to be quite a number of these ferries in Worcestershire and Shropshire. They fell out of use after the war when river trade stopped and the countryside depopulated. The cables stayed around until the late 1980's when the locals started daring their drunk mates to clamber across catburglar stylee, resulting in several drownings. I did see someone climb across the cable at Arley a few months before it was taken down.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

Like the Dylan pic

Should re-stage it. Got any cheekbones left ? You can still do a passable John Cooper Clarke


Mind you, if you look under the really rotten bit of the pier, you'll probably find Richey Manic.

[hirez.livejournal.com]

Should re-stage it. Got any cheekbones left ?

Absolutely. Nearly.