Where was I? 08 March 2009
nog
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/where_was_i/
The winners will stay for three nights, on a B&B basis, in Le Méridien
Montparnasse, in the heart of the Left Bank, near Saint-Germain-des-Prés.
The hotel is home to two elegant restaurants, Montparnasse ’25 and
Restaurant Justine, and is close to Montparnasse station, a hub for the
Paris Métro, allowing for quick and easy access to many other areas in the
city. For more details, visit lemeridien-montparnasse.com or call 00 33 1
44 36 44 36. The prize also includes return travel in Leisure Select class
from London St Pancras, Ebbsfleet or Ashford with Eurostar. Travelling at
speeds of up to 186mph, you can sit back and relax with a three-course meal
and wine served at your seat. Return tickets start at £59 in standard class
or £139 in Leisure Select. For more information or to book, visit
eurostar.com or call 0870 518 6186. The prize must be taken before June 30,
2009, excluding public holidays, and is subject to availability.
Read the article below and answer the questions at the end of the text.
Clues to the answers can be found within the text:
Although only 50 or so road miles separate the places I wish to visit,
there’s a lot of them — too many to shoehorn into one day. So, what to do,
I muse as I pore over my map in a town — home to a castle erected in AD1090
and rebuilt during the 14th century. “Jump in the car and see how far you
get,” seems to be the answer. So I do.
Mother Nature, I declare, will take centre stage today — although barely
five miles have I driven before I stop in a second town; I wish to take a
photograph of a 127-mile canal that here reaches its most northern point.
The map guides me to the precise spot. I also notice a hamlet, 3½ miles
northwest. Not where a battle was fought in August 1388, surely? No. It
just sounds like it.
Motoring northwest, then north, I enter a national park (established 1954)
and soon cross the course of a national trail (highest point: 2,947ft). The
road is narrow, occasionally steep, and pretty much follows the trail’s
route towards a world of treacherous pavements and mind-blowing potholes.
Eventually, some seven miles north-northwest of the canal, I desert the
jalopy, wrap up and set off to explore.
Shivering in the bitter wind, I am reminded that glaciation has been at
work here: witness the 150-acre lake two miles north, dammed by a moraine;
or the cove less than a mile north, across whose 300ft cliffs once
thundered, it is believed, a waterfall of Brobdingnagian proportions. It is
something equally spectacular that has drawn me, although first I must find
the queen of the fairies. Thus I scramble a mile east, to a waterfall named
after her. Although, perhaps, she lived in a cave here, there is no sign of
the little people today. My disappointment, however, is soon tempered, for
as I follow the footpath north, I am confronted by a natural feature of
breath-snatching proportions. Is it the 300ft-deep ravine or adjacent
cliffs that impress me the most? Well, this much I do know: there are more
similarly epical features to be seen around here, though not today. For
now, all I can do is gaze skywards to the circling crows and absorb the
dizzying magnificence of the surrounding panorama.
The questions (with tentative answers):
1 What is the name of the hamlet? <- Otterburn [1]
2 What is the name of the breath-snatching natural feature? <- Gordale Scar
[2]
[1] http://tinyurl.com/dym9lg - Cargrave is the northern-most point on the
Leeds-Liverpool Canal.
[2] http://www.malhamdale.com/gordalescar.htm
LAST WEEK
The answers to last week’s competition are Lympstone Commando and Exeter.
The winner is Duncan Masson, of Dundee, who wins a luxurious long weekend
in Valletta, Malta, as a guest of Air Malta (airmalta.com) and the Hotel
Phoenicia (www.phoeniciamalta.com).
--
Pied Piper
Jane Willis
>breath-snatching proportions
Please enter me into the draw for breath snatching proportions.
Jane
- -
remove PICKLE to reply
The Competition Grape Vine for postal comp news
read about it at www.compersgrapevine.co.uk
nog
> On Sun, 8 Mar 2009 09:04:19 +0000, nog <m...@privacy.net> wrote:
>
>>breath-snatching proportions
>
> Please enter me into the draw for breath snatching proportions.
There's so much opportunity for innuendo here, it would be indecent to
continue ...
--
Pied Piper
charybdis
Please enter me to continue
--
Mary S
nog
<blush>
--
Pied Piper
Roger
"nog" <m...@privacy.net> wrote in message
news:8eerqx038o8h.s...@40tude.net...
Brian Smith
Nog wrote:
> Subject: Where was I? 08 March 2009
> From: nog <m...@privacy.net>
>
Well done....completely forgot about it last night...