Sea Sunday

After breakfast we walked up to St Decuman's church for the Bible Sunday Parish Eucharist. This week it was a retired locum priest who celebrated, arriving just as we reached the church after our brisk uphill walk. He was fully vested after celebrating at another church. Instead of the organ, our hymn singing was accompanied by piano and violin, played by older members of the congregation. Everyone sang heartily. There were two dozen present, including another retired priest and his wife. She read the Epistle with great care and thoughtfulness, he assisted the celebrant by holding the chalice for dipping the host during the distribution of Communion.

We had bacon sandwiches for a light lunch as Clare and Ann were due to go swimming at three. I went for a walk and got some good photos from the promontory behind the east cliff of the last train of the day for Bishops Lydeard, passing through the cutting after the station. As I returned, the sun reached the horizon and I got some pleasing photos of the port. 

After the quick installation of a minor Windows 10 update, I found that internet speed had picked up again allowing photos to upload and not stall with the line dropping. Could an epidemic of forced Windows updates be a contributory factor in catastrophic network slowdowns, especially if several users were being updated at roughly the same time?

There was an ecumenical Sea Sunday service at the Methodist Church by the station at six tonight. I had thought of going, but lost track of time when I was taking pictures. The sea came into focus later on when we watched a documentary on BBC Four about the making of a play called 'Salt', written by a black Brummie about the impact of the experience of slavery on continuing racism and black identity. 

Artist Selina Thompson retraced the sea journeys made by enslaved Africans on the transatlantic slave trade triangle, travelling on a cargo ship, reflecting on the absolute power over the centuries of a ship's master benefiting from sustaining human trafficking. Much of her essay centred on the question 'Where are you from' depending on context and working at several levels in terms of personal identity. It highlighted the extent that western society's wealth and culture rests on foundations of violent exploitation. I found it most thoughtful and deeply challenging. 

Sunday walks

After some early mist, we had a gloriously sunny and  mild day, enabling us to sit outdoors to eat and read while the sun was up. After breakfast we walked up the lane that runs up the side of the Washford Valley, overlooking the old industrial site where the paper mill and a melanine ware factory once operated to reach St Decuman's Church for the Parish Eucharist. The benefice has recently become vacant and it was the archdeacon of Taunton who was the visiting celebrant, making contact with church officers charged with making a parish profile for the job description. 

At St German's this morning, the archdeacon of Llandaff is visiting and preaching for the first time in the parish vacancy. What a coincidence! There were over thirty of us for the service, in which we were given Communion by intinction in our pews. Well, that's a first for us!

After the service we went down the lane nest to the church to visit St Decuman's Well. It's set in a nicely cultivated hillside garden, with a roof covering a wooden entrance gate - a lovely touch. St Decuman was born and bred on the banks of Milford Haven waters in the late sixth century and migrated to Somerset, it is said, on a raft with a milking cow for company and sustenance. He established a hermitage on the hillside above Watchet and practiced a Gospel healing ministry until he was murdered by a notorious local villain in 706AD. In those days the realm of Celtic chieftains embraced both sides of the Bristol Channel.

We walked back and sat in the garden reading until it was time for lunch. I'm taking advantage of having uncluttered time to finish reading 'Winter in Madrid' in Spanish. It's slow going, but worthwhile.

After lunch I walked to Washford along the footpath which now occupies the trackbed of the old mineral railway line from iron ore mines up in the Brendon Hills down to Watchet Harbour. It's a five mile round trip. Twice I got an opportunity to photograph passing steam trains, but wasn't all that successful. I should have used burst shots to benefit from my trackside viewpoint of such a huge moving object.

I arrived at the cottage in time to accompany Clare to her daily swim, twenty minutes today, double yesterday. My walking mileage is up again to nearly nine miles today. I didn't think I'd ever get this fit. My right ankle is not giving me as much trouble as it did before, for which I am most grateful. I went out again before supper to photograph the harbour at high tide, and climbed up on to the east side cliff top for a gloriou sfull sunset view. The almost full moon was sitting on the horizon in the Quantocks as it reached to top. A truly marvellous moment.

I spent much of the evening uploading photos rather slowly. The internet is adequate, but not for half a dozen devices at a time. A large dose of patience was required before I could see the results of my day's shooting.

The writing's on the harbour wall

Our holiday cottage is in a back street three hundred down the hill from the West Somerset heritage steam railway line. It's like being transported back sixty years to hear the train whistle blow as it enters or leaves Watchet station, and then the perennial chuff-chuff sound as it makes builds up a head of steam to climb up the gradient on the side of Cleeve hill overlooking the sea. We heard but didn't see any trains yesterday, but today were in the vicinity of the station at the right time, first at noon to see a big diesel locomotive pulling a mix of half a dozen different style carriages towards Minehead, and then to see the last train of the day, being hauled by a big steam locomotive to Bishop's Lydeard. 

The sound of old style carriage doors being shut with a satisfying clunk also took me back to my Grammar school days, when I travelled to Lewis School Pengam by steam train for everal years, until these were scrapped in favour of smelly new diesel railcars. It was marvellous when the trains were in the station to gaze through the windows of carriages some of which had corridors alongside their compartments, others of which didn't, or had open plan seating. A rolling exhibition of post war carriage design, fascinating to recall, having lived through that era.

I walked after breakfast to the port and photographed the west side which we'd only seen last night in the dark. The tide was still far out. On return in the afternoon the harbour was beginning to fill with water and the smaller boats starting float again. There was something different about the east side port wall, which I had not noticed yesterday afternoon - an inscription painted neatly in letters large enough to read across the marina. It's a quote from Coleridge's Ryme of the Ancient Mariner, who wrote this poem when living locally.

I overheard a conversation remarking on the fact that it had appeared since this morning. Later, when I looked at yesterday's photos I could confirm that it was true. A remarkable coincidence that we should be here now.

We walked up a long wooded lane parallel to the coast road, hearing the occasional sound of a pheasant croaking in the undergrowth, and at one stage a bird flew up and over us into a field which it ran across for cover. Quite a surprise. The path emerged on to the road where I suspected it would, just opposite the gate of Watchet's fine 13-15th century Parish church dedicated to St Decuman. He was a seventh century Celt who sailed over from Pembrokeshire and was martyred here. There's a holy well nearby bearing his name but we couldn't find it. The church and churchyard are beautiful and in excellent condition. Much to our delight we found the building was open. We'll be back there for tomorrows ten thirty service. 

We went out for supper this evening at a small restaurant called 'The Cat's Whisker' just a few minutes walk from our cottage. We had a selection of half a dozen delicious tapas dishes to share between us, and ethos of the small room in which we sat was decidedly Spanish with a nice looking classical guitar on a shelf about our table and the music of Buena Vista Social Club playing quietly in the background while we ate. It was an enjoyable experience, and I think we'll be taking Ann there when she comes next week.

As I relaxed full this afternoon, I started to feel terribly weary, but didn't sleep for long. By the end of the day I found that I'd walked thirteen kilometres, a quarter more than normal, and feeling no worse for wear. Early bed in any case tonight.