Stone Bridges

See It On a Postcard's Thursday Postcard Hunt is crossing bridges and today mine are sturdy stone ones

Culbone Lodge Pottery, Exmoor

This inherited card has a fine postmark which  shows me it was posted on the 29th May 1985, all that is missing is a stamp!  The people who had not affixed a stamp were my aunt and uncle who were enjoying a walking holiday in Exmoor and possibly the reason they chose this card is because the inscription on the back describes the many paths that can be taken to Culbone Lodge. The sandstone building was constructed in the late 19th century in an arts and crafts style, the adjoining bridge crosses over a sunken roadway.  

The card's inscription also says the picture shows the pottery, house and garden display of pots with Waistel and Joan Cooper and their tame ducks. These names meant nothing to me but discovered Waistel Cooper was a renowned potter. Even better I discovered the Culborne newsletter article "Secluded Culborne" which has a paragraph about them - "Two of Culbone’s best known inhabitants were Joan and Waistel Cooper. Joan, an American, with a Doctorate in Psychology married Waisel a potter in 1957 and they lived in a cottage in Culbone by a stream. Joan practised and taught Yoga for West Somerset Community Education. She was also a Lay Reader. She died on June 2nd 1982 and was buried in the little church’s cemetery. The whole area was packed for her funeral and a little dog sat by the edge of her grave during the service. Waistel, born in 1921 in Ayr, was instrumental in the introduction of modernism into ceramics and was a major figure of the studio pottery scene. He set up in Culbone on his return from a commission in Iceland and worked in his studio there for 25years. Following Joan’s death he moved to Penzance in Cornwall and remarried. He died in 2003. His work commanded very high prices"

Travelling north to the England's most northerly town, although not in the period when it was part of Scotland. The last time it changed hands it was in 1482 and despite the border change today the football and rugby teams play in the Scottish leagues.  

Top  - the 'Old Bridge' which replaced a wooden one in the 17th Century when I suppose it was just called Berwick Bridge // Royal Tweed Bridge or the 'New Bridge' built in the 1920s but as it is built of concrete it is an interloper in this post

Bottom - The Royal Border Bridge and as I am a fan of railway viaducts here are more pictures of Robert Stephenson's bridge

Watendlath Bridge in Winter

One of the many packhorse bridges in the English Lake District crosses the stream in the little hamlet of Watendlath. I remember people ice skating on the nearby tarn but we rarely get those sort of winters anymore. The bridge is from the 18th Century but

Coniston Foxhounds on Sweden Bridge, Ambleside

Sweden Bridge is 17th Century packhorse bridge but  isn't Swedish as the name comes from the Middle English word 'swidden'/Old Norse 'svithinn'.  I see there are two lakeland terriers that have joined the hounds in this bridge photo-shoot.  Foxhunting in the Lake District was done on foot (not a horse in sight), but in the present time after a long battle foxhunting with dogs is banned in Britain.  The hounds have never gone away for a popular countryside pastime for a couple of centuries in the Lakes is Hound Trailing. The dogs race a scented trail over the fells.