retiredmartin

Ooh, a grumpy statue. Me so topical.

James is home, and we can explore exciting Fen Edge villages in the hour before lunch.

Like Rampton. Our one, not the one with a secure hospital up the A1.

This was never going to be an epic trek, so Mrs RM came too.  I might have promised her beer, or something.

Instead she just got hay fever and more cottages.

The cultural heart of Rampton is down Cuckoo Lane, visible on this rare 1996 Explorer Map.

This is where the main deed in Sebastian Faulks’ Engleby is committed.

I don’t wish to spoil your enjoyment of the great work of Fen Edge fiction, but those are the fields where the body was buried.

Less criminal, but equally exciting acts were committed at Christmas 2018 by your favourite pub ticker.

Proper regular readers will recall the Black Horse as the pub where BRAPA got unusually grumpy due to a misfunctioning door held shut by a fake cider hand pump.

And Simon suddenly exclaimed ““Waistcoat Scampi Family” as they left. It was one of the joys of having my own pet BRAPA to take round the Fens for a few days.

I got a little bit grumpy today as the pub was firmly shut when I turned up with my empty milk bottle hoping for a couple of pints of Side Pocket for a Toad from the barrel.

An hour’s walk with a bottle of water, three menthol sweets and no beer.  It was a hard sell to get Mrs RM to push on to All Saints and the castle moat at Giant’s Hill, which is less exciting than it sounds.

Wiki tells me “Construction of the castle began during The Anarchy circa 1140, but was likely never completed.^[3}”

Anarchy and finalising noble quests never mix.  Ask BRAPA.