I know it’s not long since I did a heron but they are good looking creatures with an agreeable habit of staying still for the camera. And this one isn’t the usual stamping ground in Hebden Bridge, but rather Stalybridge, the water being that of the River Tame.
I know I’ve mentioned this before but the station buffet and bar at Stalybridge really is one of the best there is: it’s worth breaking a journey there just to visit it. And here’s the bloke in charge. Clare was mildly peeved there was no lunch to be had today but other than that it kept up its reputation.
Stalybridge railway station’s buffet bar is perfectly preserved in its early 20th-century state, with no sense of tweeness or fakery: it is also provides the best beer for miles around. As a result of both these things it is locally, and perhaps even nationally, famous. You will not find a better pub at a railway station anywhere else that I know of.
Which means you can experience the best of Stalybridge without ever leaving platform 4 of its station, because it’s not really a place one wants to get to know better. Trust me.
On 2nd June my aunt, Anne Morecroft, my father’s sister, died of heart failure — may she rest in peace. Today was her funeral, first at Dukinfield crematorium in Tameside, Manchester, and then the wake afterwards at Stalybridge Methodist church where I took this picture of my other aunt and uncle, Celia and Philip Hall (my mother’s younger brother). That’s the thing about funerals isn’t it: while regretting the reason these events start to become the only time you see your extended family. Should it be that way? Probably not, but I doubt I am the only person for whom it is true. Best wishes to them all, and families everywhere.
Being 42 