#westcountry

[splitcane]

A cane rod on a Westcountry river.

[djohnhopper]

The nakedness of winter. For more photography featuring the natural landscape of Cornwall, just follow the link: https://johnhopperphotography.blogspot.com/

[valiantdust]

I am too angry to sleep so I may as well post about this.

Alexander Darwall is a hedge fund manager who owns 4000 acres of Dartmoor. He has contested the right of the public to camp on his land. And he has won.

This has been portrayed in the media as a loss of the 'right to roam'. This is a stupid way to phrase it. We never had the right to roam. We have never had the right to wander and live on the land. The Romani people and travelling communities whose way of life is criminalised know this - but of course there isn't so much of a mention of the 'right to roam' until white middle class people think their children's dofe expedition might be threatened.

Anyway, I digress. Despite my badly-worded cynicism, this is a loss, and I am furious.

I am local. I have always lived in Devon, between the two moors. My dad knows the westcountry like the back of his hand. He and I could cross the county with our eyes closed. The tors and rivers and moorland raised me as much as he or my mum did.

And still, neither of us would claim Dartmoor as our own. Because it is not our land to claim.

But, as is the insurmountable self-centredness and inconceivably egotistical nature of the rich, Alexander Darwall visits the westcountry a couple times (as all rich people do, to recline in their seaside holiday cottage for the two weeks of the year that the ghost town they've driven all local people out of is actually populated, by other posh pricks, only to fuck off again and leave behind poverty and a decimated housing market), and decides that the local people can't be trusted with such beautiful land, and thinks he deserves to own it. And manage it.

Because of course the local peasants couldn't know anything about conservation. We don't have a connection to this land, oh no, nothing as strong as the connection between a rich man and the estate he can shoot pheasants on.

It makes my blood boil. The evil of it, the condescension. People like Alexander Darwell know nothing about the moor. It's not just about walking on it a few times: when you're local, you know it. You've seen it in all of its forms, all months and all seasons, you've seen it at its most beautiful and most ugly, you've endured its cold to stare at the stars, you know its history and you've followed its standing stones, walked silently and respectfully past its tombs and barrows, you've replanted trees and held the earth in your hands, you've counted the deer bolving, you've built the structures that will rewet the moorland and return its life, you've sampled the soil from the bottom of trenches and carefully replaced every layer to disturb it as little as possible, and you've sweated and ached to see all of these things and give all of this to the moor.

And still, the land is not yours to own! You can do all of this - I have done all of this - and still the land is not yours, and it is not mine.

And you can do none of this, and you should still have a right to access it. That is the point of our conservation efforts.

Conservation is the old men and women who I've planted trees with, the archaeologists I've uncovered my county's history with, my dad and his colleagues working on projects to protect the moor and the climate that is harmed by the loss of carbon-rich peat.

Conservation is not a hedge fund manager privatising the land for profit. It is not the mindless, evil promise of capital, that compels Alexander Darwall to build fences around Dartmoor and lock up his land. His land. I feel sick typing it.

Because ultimately, this was done for profit. There is contempt in it - Darwall has no respect for local people who aren't far-right politicians he can buy - but the main motivation is money. The national park will now give him money, money which should be spent on conservation projects but is now going into an evil millionaire's pocket, and the rich cunts who can't wait to butcher the pheasants and deer that should be existing wild, in naturally-sized populations, will give him money to shoot and hunt on his land and leave the carcasses there to rot.

I am angry. I am so, so angry.

I have every intent to camp on Darwall's land. I will break his locks and tear down his fences, and every local who can should do the same.

Dartmoor is no one's. But if it must belong to someone, it should belong to us, and not to him.

[ultralowoxygen]

Lifeguards by peterphotographic Via Flickr: Olympus OM2n / Zuiko 28mm f3.5 / Fujicolor Superia X-tra 400 This OM2n evidently has an intermittent light leak - I quite like the subtle effect here Tregonhawke, Whitsand Bay, Cornwall, UK

[tonydaddingham]

headcanon: Crowley invented the famous cheese rolling event where someone chucks a wheel of Gloucester down a hill and everybody flings themselves after it and it results in multiple severe injuries.

COOPER'S HILL MY BELOVED 💕 (my father is from gloucestershire and the attending of/participating in the cooper's hill cheese roll is frankly a rite of westcountry passage. kinda. depends on if you count gloucs as westcountry)

now look, completely agree - and i could see crowley absolutely doing that to be a nuisance, as is his right. but for me? that's aziraphale choosing to celebrate whit monday with a boujee lil picnic. but alas! he accidentally dropped a heavy-ass round of double gloucester cheese (he rather overestimated how much he'd need and instead brought the whole cow) and it rolled off down the hill. now, of course, he'd never do anything so uncouth as to run/tumble after it himself, but some passing locals very gallantly leaped after it to return it to the nice, comely angel wringing his hands over his lost lunch. when the brave, brave warrior who managed to catch it first returned it to him, he instead gifted it as a token of his gratitude, and carried on his merry way. purely accidental that this should henceforth become a tradition/festival.

the fact that it has since resulted in multiple injuries is absolutely not his fault, of course, but crowley found out about it all a century or so later and laughed so much it nearly made him sick.

tar barrels, however? in ottery st mary? now that is one of crowley's:

[aagciii]

A friend just sent this to me. One of the coolest posters I have ever seen... Show the Westcountry Baseball League & the Exeter Spitfires Baseball Club some love & give them a like...

[dotsayers]

watching the sister boniface christmas special with great joy

[mimble-sparklepudding]

I heard that Mimble puts the cream on his scone before the jam!

He certainly does. Doing otherwise is a filthy Nymian habit unbecoming of a Gentleman.

(Scone politics is a serious business, at least on the better side of the Tamar)

[skylordhorus]

new shirt!!

[tonydaddingham]

*deep inhale* i will defend brother francis until my last breath, he just wants to make friends with the lil bugs and teach you about love and respect, hes the best blue peter presenter they never had

i will not support brother francis slander on my page. he's a special little guy

[lesbiansforboromir]

Tom Bombadil was just as superfluous and unnecessary as I expected but I have to say the accent was just a little worse than I predicted and physically hurt me a lot more than I anticipated, he really couldnt hit those 'a's right.

And more seriously, his whole conciet for being there was JUST as aggravatingly-put as I expected. 'This all used to be green, now it is just a desert' Tom says as he gestures at a perfectly flourishing desert ecosystem with hundreds of plant species in every single shot, as if that's some tragedy.

The racist elements of the Stranger's plotline are not only getting worse but are bleeding into other aspects of the show. The only non-english accents we hear are from evil moth cultists worshipping a dark wizard and skull-mask wearing lepers(?) who just hit people for no good reason. The Stoors have lived in Rhun for centuries apparently, why do they have westcountry accents? It's absolutely bizarre!

And now we've seen the barrow wights, who apparently were laid to rest by some long gone civilisation, and they are in... Keffiyahs? RoP I would be delighted for you to place an arabic-inspired culture in the middle of Eriador, but that is not what you have done you have just orientalised these evil ghosts.

In general there is just no effort whatsoever to actually explain human society in middle earth currently, the only people we've seen are all just brown tinted hollywood peasent-core. In comparison to the costuming for elves and Numenoreans it's kind of dire, and Pelargir is apparently just a tiny collection of huts in the middle of ruined Numenorean architecture. Like... ow, firstly, that's the city from my blorbos, but more to the point if all human 'cities' are currently so 'primitive' then where the HELL was that ship Sauron took with the refugees drydocked?? That was like a pirate-golden-age schooner or something, how the hell was it maintained? Who sails it? Who built it, it's not a numenorean design- WHAT is going on with men in middle earth right now!! I am disappointed and frustrated!

I did like the big worm though. Couldn't get enough of that big mud bobbit worm.

[idontknowreallywhy]

Estera - Ch 11 - Run

(Previous… Prologue - Stars are Only Visible in Darkness, Estera - 1 - Colour, 2 - Dinosaur, 3 - Shoes, 4 - Thunderbird, 5 - Lesson, 6 - Safe, 7 - Gull, 8 - Deliver, 9 - Coffee, 10 - Flight)

(Sofasurf’s Recrudescence which is the foundation for all of this)

What’s happened to Scotty? Has Virg broken the door or just his shoulder? Has John eaten his own arm in despair? Has EOS accidentally overthrown the government of a medium sized country in her anxiety?

None of these questions will be answered here, as I leave the Tracys within the tender loving care of @sofasurf and her alligators and we quickly check in with somebody else…

✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

One of the best things about Bez was his relentless enthusiasm about something as simple as her unlocking the front door. She smiled as he treated her to an impromptu drool bath and gradually nudged him down the hallway so she could put down her bags.

“You’ll never guess who I met today, Niebieski… the Commander of International Rescue! … Yes, he did seem nice… No, he didn’t have any treats…Yes it’s possible to be nice and not have treats, you daft creature… You don’t believe me do you?”

Extracting herself she reached up and fetched one of his favourite chews from the top cupboard.

“Give me a minute to get changed, Bez, then we’ll go for a run, ok?”

Receiving only chomping noises by way of reply, she left him to it and went to sort herself out. Grabbing her phone to check the time, it unlocked on the new contact screen and she smiled. He’d given her his personal number, just in case, but had been endearingly awkward as he’d asked her to save it under a pseudonym. Something to do with his brother John, someone called Kyra and security protocols, he was sorry it was such a weird thing to ask. She didn’t mind, she knew exactly what to name to save the number under.

She tapped the word ‘Blue’ and sent a quick message as he’d asked, given he’d not had his own with him.

“Was good to meet you today. Here is my number. I hope you’re doing ok? Estera”

Right. Job done. Next on the list: exercise.

✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

The wind was bitter as the sun slipped below the horizon and stained the clouds behind which it had been skulking most of the afternoon.

The plus side was it meant nobody else was out this far. They’d have the less well known Jacob’s Ladder beach to themselves while the rest of the dog walkers did a quick circuit of the main seafront. Bez, well insulated from the frigid air, lolloped excitedly down the steep path ahead and she ambled behind, limbs trembling slightly in the aftermath of their clifftop run. The exertion had helped focus her mind, as it always did, while she was actually running. But as soon as she allowed her heart rate to slow, the swirling thoughts returned.

The tide was right out, and it seemed every sea bird in the Westcountry had gathered to scour the shoreline for treats, their figures dark against the reddening sky and their fading shadows reaching many times their height across the sand towards her.

As expected, there were no other dogs on the beach - she unclipped the leash and let Bez hare towards the ocean, driving the gulls into the air in a squawking cloud, the combined sound of their wings like a drum roll in the distance. Usually his unbridled joy would be catching, but today she felt kind of detached, as if she was watching him frolic in a poor quality recording on a broken screen.

The shadows lengthened further.

Suddenly unable to contain all of the Everything building up inside, she let out a yelp and ran across the top of the beach towards the sunset. For a given value of running anyway. The pebbles sucked her legs downwards with every step, her feet slipping and twisting on the uneven surface. The wind whipped across the bay and blasted into her face, hair streaming and coat billowing behind her like a sail. Despite forcing her last scraps of pent up energy into her muscles she made barely any progress and eventually stumbled forwards, landing with a crunch amongst the stones.

She pushed herself on to her knees and paused, dizzy but aware of Bez sprinting back towards her, droplets of seawater flying from his fur.

Then he was there, shoving his soaking wet face into hers, blending the salt of the sea with the salt of her shame.

She’d left him.

The initial delight that he’d survived, that he hadn’t been stabbed to death in the square as she’d imagined was overshadowed by what she now knew his attempt to rescue her had cost him. The stories of the nearby camp were rife in the town. The open secret of the mass grave to the east of it. The horrors inside. Some said it was simple torture. Others had heard from someone who knew someone who had heard tell of twisted medical experiments. People said that when the wind was right, you could hear the desperate screams on the road, over a mile away. Nobody knew the truth of it because nobody came out.

People didn’t survive the camp.

And then there were the dogs. The constant barking as they patrolled the town, barely under the control of the thugs who held the leash. There were dogs at the camp too, she knew that. She recalled watching, helpless, from her window as her neighbour was dragged from his house by the snarling beasts. If he’d even made it to the camp alive, it wouldn’t have been long for him.

People didn’t survive the camp.

Somehow Scott had. She couldn’t quite believe it. It clearly hadn’t left him unscathed though. She covered her face and tried to picture the twinkle in his eyes as he had teased her about the toy in her pocket. The eyes of somebody who was alive and knew laughter. But she couldn’t find them. Instead she saw his wide, frightened eyes watching unknown horrors unfold behind her, in a reality only he could see.

She clenched her fists and yelled her apology to the sky, before pulling her knees to her head and wrapping her arms around her legs as she sobbed. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Bez, damp yet radiating warmth, lay against her back and waited.

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[AO3]

Chapter 12…

[djohnhopper]

Welcome to Spring... officially. Though it's unofficially been going on for a while now. Personal photography featuring the natural world of Cornwall: https://johnhopperphotography.blogspot.com/

[atorturedpoet1989]

I hate that the likelihood that it was agreed to is probably because all these rich twats know each other and revolve in the same circles like I bet the judge making the decision was probably bribed because they know each other and it makes me so sick that we have to petition to the government of our country to allow us to walk freely on land some people don’t have access to the green countryside and those that do are grateful for it and to have it potentially taken away is devastating and shockingly bad

I am too angry to sleep so I may as well post about this.

Alexander Darwall is a hedge fund manager who owns 4000 acres of Dartmoor. He has contested the right of the public to camp on his land. And he has won.

This has been portrayed in the media as a loss of the 'right to roam'. This is a stupid way to phrase it. We never had the right to roam. We have never had the right to wander and live on the land. The Romani people and travelling communities whose way of life is criminalised know this - but of course there isn't so much of a mention of the 'right to roam' until white middle class people think their children's dofe expedition might be threatened.

Anyway, I digress. Despite my badly-worded cynicism, this is a loss, and I am furious.

I am local. I have always lived in Devon, between the two moors. My dad knows the westcountry like the back of his hand. He and I could cross the county with our eyes closed. The tors and rivers and moorland raised me as much as he or my mum did.

And still, neither of us would claim Dartmoor as our own. Because it is not our land to claim.

But, as is the insurmountable self-centredness and inconceivably egotistical nature of the rich, Alexander Darwall visits the westcountry a couple times (as all rich people do, to recline in their seaside holiday cottage for the two weeks of the year that the ghost town they've driven all local people out of is actually populated, by other posh pricks, only to fuck off again and leave behind poverty and a decimated housing market), and decides that the local people can't be trusted with such beautiful land, and thinks he deserves to own it. And manage it.

Because of course the local peasants couldn't know anything about conservation. We don't have a connection to this land, oh no, nothing as strong as the connection between a rich man and the estate he can shoot pheasants on.

It makes my blood boil. The evil of it, the condescension. People like Alexander Darwell know nothing about the moor. It's not just about walking on it a few times: when you're local, you know it. You've seen it in all of its forms, all months and all seasons, you've seen it at its most beautiful and most ugly, you've endured its cold to stare at the stars, you know its history and you've followed its standing stones, walked silently and respectfully past its tombs and barrows, you've replanted trees and held the earth in your hands, you've counted the deer bolving, you've built the structures that will rewet the moorland and return its life, you've sampled the soil from the bottom of trenches and carefully replaced every layer to disturb it as little as possible, and you've sweated and ached to see all of these things and give all of this to the moor.

And still, the land is not yours to own! You can do all of this - I have done all of this - and still the land is not yours, and it is not mine.

And you can do none of this, and you should still have a right to access it. That is the point of our conservation efforts.

Conservation is the old men and women who I've planted trees with, the archaeologists I've uncovered my county's history with, my dad and his colleagues working on projects to protect the moor and the climate that is harmed by the loss of carbon-rich peat.

Conservation is not a hedge fund manager privatising the land for profit. It is not the mindless, evil promise of capital, that compels Alexander Darwall to build fences around Dartmoor and lock up his land. His land. I feel sick typing it.

Because ultimately, this was done for profit. There is contempt in it - Darwall has no respect for local people who aren't far-right politicians he can buy - but the main motivation is money. The national park will now give him money, money which should be spent on conservation projects but is now going into an evil millionaire's pocket, and the rich cunts who can't wait to butcher the pheasants and deer that should be existing wild, in naturally-sized populations, will give him money to shoot and hunt on his land and leave the carcasses there to rot.

I am angry. I am so, so angry.

I have every intent to camp on Darwall's land. I will break his locks and tear down his fences, and every local who can should do the same.

Dartmoor is no one's. But if it must belong to someone, it should belong to us, and not to him.

[ultralowoxygen]

Unemployed Lifeguard by peterphotographic Via Flickr: Olympus OM2n / Zuiko 28mm f3.5 / Fujicolor Superia X-tra 400 Tregonhawke, Whitsand Bay, Cornwall, UK

[tonydaddingham]

[bringing back unhinged asks culture] do you think nanny ashtoreth and brother francis ever touched each other bodies

i wouldn't like to speculate what occurred between that strict but naughty nanny and her rollin' in the hay westcountry stud, but i know it'd make one hell of a porno