Shafts like art

Unless you know that Biddulph is an old coal mining area, you'll probably not guess that these three structures are ventilation shafts. The dangerous gases that build up in the old works down below can be released safely through them into the atmosphere.
The low brick walls around them give them a kind of arty feeling, and their arrangement even has echoes of standing stones.

'Unseen' trough stirs thoughts

This stone trough on a road near Biddulph Grange goes largely 'unseen'. By that I mean that many people will pass it, and think nothing of it.
But one of the great things about having a camera with you is that because you are actively looking for photos, you will 'see' things and be drawn to them.

Then the questions come in.   For example: how old?, why was it put there?, who cares for it?, what identity does it have?, is it significant to somebody? what role does it have now? And so on... Interest is stirred.
And so a whole world of imagination and/or stories can open up before one.

Mad March sunshine

The Biddulph town garden was just one of the places to bask in the present unseasonable sunshine. It certainly seems crazy to have a run of days with temperatures in the mid-twenties in, er, March!
It doesn't feel like England at all - we should be miserable and buffeted by sharp winds at this time of year...
Mad March indeed.

Memorial to a slaughter

War memorials very often take the form of a statue of a ‘Tommy Atkins’ soldier from the First World war, just like this one in the centre of Biddulph (in north Staffordshire). 

The slaughter of the 1914-18 conflict is highlighted by the fact that double the amount of names are recorded for the First World War on this monument as for the Second.

Hurst Towers

‘Hurst Towers’, as this well-known building is known, is a rather impressive private house in the countryside outside Biddulph, standing on the road near Biddulph Grange.

The tower-top does function as a room itself, I believe.  So, if you want splendid isolation, that would be a place to get it I suppose.