Flower Festival

Whitburn Methodist Church

The Whitburn Festival, on the edge of South Shields, has suffered with the weather this weekend - more rain.

I had hoped to catch lots of smiling faces at the Family Fun Day in Cornthwaite Park on Saturday but when I arrived the vans were packed and ready to go, so on Sunday I returned to have a look at the Flower Festival at Whitburn Methodist Church in North Guards. The ladies who made the floral displays had done a great job using their skills to depict life events such as sunshine, rain, harvest etc. and their hospitality was very welcome on a windy afternoon.

I have used a Photoshop template to make this triptych and really I would have liked to show a greater variety of shots, but they say “less is more”.

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Bridging past and present

Jarrow Bridge

Just along the road from South Shields is the ancient monastic church of St. Paul, Jarrow, consecrated in AD685 originally as part of the twin Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey founded by Benedict Biscop. The monastery at Jarrow was supervised by Ceolfrid who brought twenty monks from St. Peter in Monkwearmouth (including the young Bede.)

The Venerable Bede grew up here and made it the cradle of English art and literature, it was from a tiny cell in this monastery that he dictated the writing of his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum . (The ruins of the original monastery still exist next to the church.) St. Paul, with St. Peter in Monkwearmouth are candidates for World Heritage Site status.

The bridge in the foreground was originally built in the 18th. century to provide a foot crossing over the River Don to new industrialised sites on the south side of the Tyne at Jarrow Slake, it was widened in the 19th. century and restored by South Tyneside Council in 1999.

Camera details; Pentax K100D, 28mm lens, 1/90 second, f6.7, iso 200

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Away days - Ripon, North Yorkshire

Ripon Cathedral

South Shields Daily Photo was away for a few days recently as Curly and the family enjoyed a break away from normality. Now it is very rare that I make a post NOT related to South Shields, however, it does say on the front page that I will post a picture from South Shields or the North of England on a daily basis. So this is one of those rare events.

Here we see the nave of Ripon Cathedral, the church was founded in AD 672 by St. Wilfred, who also built Hexham Abbey here in the North-East. This is the fourth building to be erected on the site and the only remaining portion of Wilfred’s original 7th. century basilica is to be found underground in the crypt. The present 12th. century built cathedral was constructed by Archbishop Roger de Pont l’Evêque.

I thought it was too good of a picture to miss out!

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Vespers

St. Paul’s Church, Jarrow (3)

School children re-enact monastic life at St. Paul’s church, Jarrow to experience how life was for The Venerable Bede and his house of monks. This is the oldest church in South Tyneside.

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Triumph

St. Paul’s, Jarrow (2)

Sorry, I failed to find out who was responsible for making this wonderful sculpture of the risen Christ, but it’s all carved from a single tree. It seems to ‘levitate’ above the Nave with no visible wires or supports.

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