We live 98 miles from Cleethorpes, a seaside town on the East Coast of North East Lincolnshire, looking out across The North Sea. We went there from Tuesday to Friday this week to visit my daughter Alicia and her husband Steve, who downsized to the town from Atherstone in Warwickshire in 2019, just as the Covid lockdown began.
Alicia wanted to live by the seaside from when she was little and she made it at 51, since when she has been ‘living the dream’. She was 56 this week - hence our visit - and last year, at exactly the same time, we went to Cleethorpes not just her birthday, but a wedding as well. Alicia and Steve, decided to get married and I had the honour of walking Alicia ‘down the aisle’, although in her case it was ‘up to the Registrar’.
We went back to the same hotel, which I have described as ‘Home from home, with staff.’ The ambiance is close to perfect. The food is great (including poached eggs for breakfast, something I am too lazy to do at home, except for Saturday lunch) and from the lounge, where I can sit and write, we get a view of the sea and buses go by every few minutes. The tide goes out a very long way, and it came in at the wrong times during our short stay, so the best I got was a walk along a sandy beach, collecting the odd shell and small smooth black pieces of coal.
Cleethorpes and the neighbouring port of Grimsby merge seamlessly together, as they they have done since the second-half of the 19th century. I like them both. Before leaving for home on Friday we went to a small collection of fishmongers by Grimsby Docks to buy fish for us and a neighbour. Yesterday (Saturday) we have grilled mackerel for lunch accompanied by purple sprouting broccoli. There is some dogfish (also called Huss) in the freezer for next weekend. Herrings, once cheap and plentiful, have disappeared from fishmongers all over England, even in Grimsby. The reason is simple. The English now like the fish as good as ready for the plate. God forbid that they should have to gut and fillet their own fish, nor will we pay as much as Europeans for Herrings (and shellfish), so it gets fished by E.U. boats using U.K. licenses and taken straight to E.U. ports. So much for Brexit and leaving the E.U. (for the record Susan and me voted to stay in Europe).
My quote of the week (Tuesday in Cleethorpes).
‘If you give me a minute I’ll get you a girl’ said the hotel receptionist.
For a brief moment I wanted to say. ‘No thankyou. At my age I prefer grandmothers.’
What I really wanted (and had asked for) was a pot of Earl Grey tea for two, with milk for Susan and a jug of hot water for me, as I drink my tea weak and black.
I fell out of bed in the middle of the night
We are used to sleeping on a firm bed, me on the right, Susan on the left. It all goes back to the first night we shared a bed, one side of which was against a wall and Susan thought she might need to use the toilet. I have had the right side of all the beds we have shared since then.
The hotel bed was soft, but once I had changed the pillows provided for a cotton cushion and placed the pillowcase over it, I was away. I like cold bedrooms and beds, especially my pillow. Then I woke up lying on the floor, half my body wrapped in the duvet and Susan’s voice saying ‘Are you alright Darling?’ to which I replied ‘I’ve fallen out of bed’, not that I remember this. Susan told me that I climbed back into bed and went straight to sleep. Well, that I was my big adventure for the past week. Falling out of bed.
If I have an image of Cleethorpes in my head this is it…
People who don’t know the town are very down on it, not impressed by the fact that its visitors tend to come from working class towns like Doncaster, a train-ride away, yet what do we have here? A national newspaper carrying a photograph of a ‘Black Lives Matter’ demonstration on Cleethorpes beach. Perhaps The Observer’s Picture Editor was least expecting such a photograph from such a place, hence his decision to publish it.
Two churches, two places…
The top photo is of the Methodist Church near our hotel in Cleethorpes. Brutal looking, perhaps capturing the true image of religion, whereas 39 miles away, across the Humber estuary, is Beverley Minster, a very large parish church occupying a building which, somehow, managed to avoid demolition by Henry VIII. Susan and I spent close on two hours exploring the Minster, which has very few tombs. I find myself taking very few photographs on such occasions as I am too engrossed in looking, so here are four postcards I bought before we left the Minster. I am a Humanist, but I do believe buildings such as Beverley Minster are worth preserving.
It was a good day out, following centuries later in the footsteps of the pilgrims who went to visit the tomb of St. John of Beverley. I will do a separate post about the Minster in the next day or two.
I have been baking today and will be again tomorrow morning before family arrive for lunch, so it will probably be Tuesday before I post an essay from nearly 100 years ago about St. John of Beverley.
I am not one for motorways/freeways. I like slower, less crowded roads, even if it means I travel a little further and the journey takes a little longer. I suspect I am still here because I try to live life slowly, stopping to look at cherry blossom on a tree. So it was from our hotel lounge window in Cleethorpes. Watching the world pass by.
Well, I’ve made it through another week and that has to be good.
GUESS WHAT BOOK THIS BOOKMARK IS IN?
Take care. Stay safe.
O L O Bunny🐰
©ROBERT HOWARD