Drawings Of Old Heysham
- by Jordan Fadden
- •
- 11 Dec, 2019
- •
Ancient Pilgrim Sites Of Morecambe Bay
Of all of the many places visited by the great Victorian painter JMW Turner on his travels around England and Europe, Heysham in Lancashire appears quite prominently to have captivated the artist in a way that only somewhere like old Heysham can, as we see in his painting the depiction of a verdant idyll with its rolling wooded hill and inspiring view across the bay to the distant blue mountains of Cumberland (Cumbria).
The village of Heysham is approximately thirty-minutes walk from the West End of Morecambe, and geographically its position can be described as being at a very specific point on Morecambe Bay, directly between the "Inner Bay" and "Outer Bay" when you consider, both topographically and visually, that the ancient hill-top chapel overlooks both of these areas. From this vantage point you can survey these two different regions of the bay.
The grade-listed ruined chapel has existed on this site since around the 8th Century and includes the eerie rock-cut graves nearby. From here the outer-bay stretches all the way to Fleetwood on one side and the Isle of Walney on the other, with a busy ferry route passing through its centre from the nearby port, travelling to the Isle of Man along the edge of what the ancients called 'the crooked sea'.
Only at extreme low water is it possible to walk certain parts of the outer-bay on the opposite side of the crooked sea from here at Heysham Head, whereas the inner-bay is uncovered twice daily by the tide and can be walked when the channels are safe to cross. This was also the subject of Turner's work. The tide retreats up to a certain point as you face the Irish sea, and facing inland the same low water reveals an expanse of dark rocks.
This large rocky plateau extends all the way back to Morecambe, and on some maps it goes by the name of 'old man's skear' and is also overlooked by St Peter's church which lies in a hollow close to St Patrick's chapel, both of which date back to Anglo-Saxon times. The church cemetery drops right down to the shore and is enclosed by a high stone wall to protect the land from the waves of the sea.
Together the church and chapel represent the ancient part of Heysham, long before the village began to emerge. From the date stones on some of the cottages you can see that this was in the early 1600's, long before Morecambe emerged to become the seaside town that it is today. Old Heysham remains a quaint and rather quirky place, also featuring an interesting rocky woodland trail inside what was formerly the rector's garden.
Heysham offers a nice coastal walk along its sandstone cliffs and passes by the tiniest of beaches situated not much further from the graves facing the Coniston mountains. And further along is Half-Moon Bay where a new public art sculpture best expresses the contemplative mood, Viking history and geographical placement of Heysham, as two figures sitting on a ship gaze in opposite directions.
Drawings Of Old Heysham
- by Jordan Fadden
- •
- 11 Dec, 2019
- •
Ancient Pilgrim Sites Of Morecambe Bay
Of all of the many places visited by the great Victorian painter JMW Turner on his travels around England and Europe, Heysham in Lancashire appears quite prominently to have captivated the artist in a way that only somewhere like old Heysham can, as we see in his painting the depiction of a verdant idyll with its rolling wooded hill and inspiring view across the bay to the distant blue mountains of Cumberland (Cumbria).
The village of Heysham is approximately thirty-minutes walk from the West End of Morecambe, and geographically its position can be described as being at a very specific point on Morecambe Bay, directly between the "Inner Bay" and "Outer Bay" when you consider, both topographically and visually, that the ancient hill-top chapel overlooks both of these areas. From this vantage point you can survey these two different regions of the bay.
The grade-listed ruined chapel has existed on this site since around the 8th Century and includes the eerie rock-cut graves nearby. From here the outer-bay stretches all the way to Fleetwood on one side and the Isle of Walney on the other, with a busy ferry route passing through its centre from the nearby port, travelling to the Isle of Man along the edge of what the ancients called 'the crooked sea'.
Only at extreme low water is it possible to walk certain parts of the outer-bay on the opposite side of the crooked sea from here at Heysham Head, whereas the inner-bay is uncovered twice daily by the tide and can be walked when the channels are safe to cross. This was also the subject of Turner's work. The tide retreats up to a certain point as you face the Irish sea, and facing inland the same low water reveals an expanse of dark rocks.
This large rocky plateau extends all the way back to Morecambe, and on some maps it goes by the name of 'old man's skear' and is also overlooked by St Peter's church which lies in a hollow close to St Patrick's chapel, both of which date back to Anglo-Saxon times. The church cemetery drops right down to the shore and is enclosed by a high stone wall to protect the land from the waves of the sea.
Together the church and chapel represent the ancient part of Heysham, long before the village began to emerge. From the date stones on some of the cottages you can see that this was in the early 1600's, long before Morecambe emerged to become the seaside town that it is today. Old Heysham remains a quaint and rather quirky place, also featuring an interesting rocky woodland trail inside what was formerly the rector's garden.
Heysham offers a nice coastal walk along its sandstone cliffs and passes by the tiniest of beaches situated not much further from the graves facing the Coniston mountains. And further along is Half-Moon Bay where a new public art sculpture best expresses the contemplative mood, Viking history and geographical placement of Heysham, as two figures sitting on a ship gaze in opposite directions.
This blog post contains a selection of photographs which I made in the middle of February 2025 on a visit to Madeira – a Portuguese island in the Atlantic just north of the Canaries. It's known for having a warm and pleasant climate all year round, even in Winter, and also for having some of the best hiking trails in the world. It's also known by many people as the vertical island
due to its incredibly steep mountains which rise from the ocean. Madeira is a green and lush island with some very impressive coastal cliffs.
This is a selection of photographs from a visit to the African country of Morocco in late December 2024 and January 2025. Notes on images will be found at the end of this page. Places visited include the cities of Agadir, Marrakech, Ouarzazate and Essaouira, as well as a trip through the High Atlas Mountains to Ait Benhaddou, Fint Oasis and the Atlantic coastal region in Southern Morocco.
As we move from Winter into Spring time, one place I ventured into for the first time last week was the dramatic moorland region around the North Yorkshire villages of Clapham and Austwick. As you make your ascent on the steep tracks, incredible panoramic views open up across the Forest of Bowland to the south. And as you ascend farther into the Dales you encounter all kinds of interesting boulders, crags, and screes. The distinctive dry stone walls and many field barns confirm that you are well inside the National Park, with streams gushing from the hills and limestone pavement dominating the views of the famous Yorkshire three-peaks once you arrive on high ground.
The smartphone offers an alternative way of drawing and seeing. Even when you're not one for spending very much time looking at little screens, and swiping and tapping and scrolling, the smartphone can still be a useful device if you happen to be without your usual materials. And of course a tablet would be the next step if you was really inclined to using a digital means of sketching, especially if your focus is going to be on landscapes. As small as the touchscreen is, it responds to subtle movements made by the finger or thumb. No app was used here, just the basic photo editor which allows you to make marks over the top. The phone I used was a Samsung Galaxy S8 Edge. Very small compared to most.
Thank you for the memories to those whom I met on my journey to the famous lagoon, - in particular Florentina and Theodora who invited me to Padua to show me the sights of this nearby town at night. Tina was a most knowledgeable guide, whilst Dora kept us amused with her hilarious accent. Also, best wishes to Kalina and Milena. I very much look forward to revisiting Venezia in the future. Even though the days are only short, and the weather still quite cold and unpredictable, the light in January is still dazzling as you can see.
It felt more like the depths of Winter, rather than the start, during my five-day's of hiking across high land at the end of November. The North Pennines is a vast area, featuring the highest paved roads in the country. And the weather can be more changeable than anywhere else; atop Great Dun Fell there's a radar and weather station specifically for studying the clouds, because here you get the highest amount of precipitation.
The following selection of images represents some of my recent travel photography on a visit to the southernmost Greek island of Crete in late September to mid-October 2023. When viewing these pictures, imagine if you can the sound of bells jingling as mountain goats pass across the mountainsides and roads, the loud noise of crickets, the smell of salt air from the Mediterranean and Libyan sea, and of the chatter of the Cretan folk with their warm hospitality as they prepare their wonderful cuisine rich in olive oil and complemented by their drink offerings of raki and retsina.
This is a visual diary in photographs from a few days of hiking and mountain climbing in the English Lake District last weekend. I covered quite a lot of ground from the high mountain of Helvellyn in the East across to the more Westerly mountain of Haystacks before descending in to the Buttermere Valley. It was very lively down by the shores of Lake Buttermere as an annual paragliding event was taking place, with people dropping from aeroplanes and flying off most of the surrounding high peaks before trying to land as close to the target in one of the fields. Some of the participants descended in somersaults leaving colourful trails of smoke behind them.
It is possible to cycle all the way around the Lake District National Park in a day without stopping, and yet despite the modest scale and altitude of these mountains compared to the world's greatest mountain ranges it can still feel extraordinarily remote and wild when you're hiking in the district, with mountain terrain which is just as challenging and impressive as any other. The quality of light and how dramatically the light and shadows shift across the fells here is second to none. This is because it's like a miniature version of any other rugged mountain region. And late last week I hiked across some of the highest peaks including Bow Fell, Scafell Pike, Kirk Fell and Pillar, following a route from Great Langdale to Wasdale and finally on to Borrowdale via Green Gable and Gillercomb.