Another year older.
As humans we are ever surprised by the passing of time, always taken aback when a year comes and goes, its as if we are for ever stalked by the months fleeting by and then when New Years arrive we beckon in another world and the cycle starts again.
I for one have noticed the time going by, my diagnosis of cancer provided a reminder that life is finite, no one can live for ever and we must make the most of what is given.
This year 2024, I turn 43, another year older than my mother had always stated in angry tones that I would never make when younger, I have an odd relationship with my birthday these day, 4 years ago I turned 40 and I was unable to enjoy it due to illness, for ever suffering with headaches a few days post 40 and I was diagnosed with cancer.
This year is very different, I am now facing a fuller and longer life than I was 6 months ago, the cancer thanks to a new treatment has gradually been reduced to nothing.
This year is about me, about living and experiencing the world, feeling that I have been unable to so far. Gone were the usual discussion on where we would go, giving Mrs. Beard no option or say I took control and booked the famous Jamacia Inn, lonely sitting atop Bodmin moor once home to passing travelers, smuggles and general nefarious sorts.
We set forth from our home at around 9am, a quick stop along before leaving town to get the all to essential car snacks and we were heading out along the m5 towards our first stop off location. It never ceases to amaze me how people seem to loose all sense of reasoning whilst driving, their little chips which in ordinary life provide them with a list of commands and instructions to follow, but when driving it becomes faulty and people loose the ability to drive with any sense at all, I still laugh that the DVLA refused to give me my driving license stating ‘you no longer meet the safe driving criteria’.
Still we plod on, soon turning off the M5, following along the M40 and M42 respectively and then coming off onto the A429 and through idyllic Cotswold style villages resplendent with thatched roofs, these made for ideal for selling ‘England’ abroad to tourist, with the many wide open and flat fields it is not hard to see why when the Romans and later Saxons made much of this area their home.
We eventually pulled up the a large layby, large lorries and cars passed by at some speed which seemed at odds to the peace and tranquility of what lay beyond the hedge.
On our 3.5hr road trip we decided a brief stop over was needed and opted for the well known Rollright stones just outside of Long Compton, the stones today consist of around 70 odd stones, odd as the local legends tells that you can never quite count the same number twice and this certainly provided true and both myself and Mrs. Beard counted differing numbers.
This little selection of ancient stones is around 2500 years old, as with all stones circles or monuments there is little known about why the were constructed, some ceremonial, some worship and some inline to celebrate the passing of the seasons, the stones are made of oolithic limestone which itself is a very unique geological stone, consisting of limestone weathered down and then re-constituted by the passage of time into almost concrete like stones. The weathering of rain, ice and frost creating worm eroded rustic rocks which only add to the already strange and mystic nature of the stones.
Originally some 105 stones were thought too stand at this spot, removed over time and usually around the birth of the puritan movement in where forces of the church concocted stories that these were the work of the devil and needed to removed and destroyed.
A short walk along a safe even path lays the whispering knights, once a place of burial for who ever was thought most important within the local area, now a wrought and twisted selection of rocks standing proud and behind a safe iron fence to try and protect their fragile structure, we wandered around, Mrs. Beard utilizing her dowsing rods in search of anything mystical. We retraced our steps, bracing the early morning breeze blowing in through the valley.
We waited at the busy roads at some times horrifying speeds and sensing a lull we quickly crossed and towards the King stone, this particular stone stands alone from the others, but holds a significant point none the less, excavations showed evidence that this area may have been important as a burial place, with other burial mounds, cairns and even early graves.
The Stones take their names from a legend about a king and his army who were marching over the Cotswolds when they met a witch who challenged the king saying, “Seven long strides shalt thou take and if Long Compton thou canst see, King of England thou shalt be”. On his seventh stride a mound rose up obscuring the view, and the witch turned them all to stone: the king became the King Stone; his army the King’s Men; and his knights the Whispering Knights (plotting treachery). The witch became an elder tree, supposedly still in the hedge: if it is cut the spell is broken the Stones will come back to life.
Once back inside the warm confines of the car, we set about stop number 2, much needed lunch and tea break and like most well respected middle class folk we enjoy a most excellent service station and non is more finer than Gloucester services. We arrived parked and made our way inside settling on a rather tasty Shawarma and salad, todays visit consisted of mainly people who looked as if they had been living presently in Ikea replete with all the necessities of the hipster lifestyle, still we enjoyed our drink and food before purchasing a drink and some brief snacks for the 3hrs that lay ahead.
A long boring and uninspiring motorway journey lay ahead of us, passing Bristol, the famous long suspension bridge over the channel before to long we were driving over the rugged and unforgiving beauty of the Bodmin moor, either side lay a dotting of farms and stark moors. The modern addition of the dual carriage way which carries one over the moors, seems in stark contracts to the thousands of years of human history and story telling which flanked its side, the weather presented as a heavy drizzle as we inched closer to the Jamaica Inn, sitting atop the old coaching road which served as the meeting points between important roads of the area, the weather only seemed to add to it mystery.
We waited a short time before our weekend companions arrived and settled on heading out to Tintagel to seek out the all important fish and chips by the sea, light began fading early as it does in winter time, the often one car wide lanes seemed to offer a more enclosed and sometimes spooky driving experience. We stopped in Tintagel and part took of our evening meal, before heading back to our accommodation the night had now drawn in and the mist had descended to no more than 10ft of visibility the same roads now reduced to a rather hair raising thrilling drive home.
Along the way we stopped at an old air field, once home to the RAF and built in 1942, it also quite interestingly held 3 formula one races in the 1950s, no however it became the setting for the start of a B flick horror movie, the darkness seemed smothering alongside the quite considerable mist. We got out of the car and I turned the lights off, the party of 4 became nothing but shadows which once separated became almost indiscernible to the darkness which now surrounded them, screams of delights and laughter filled the small space.
Once back at the Inn, we did the only thing which sensible and set about sampling the various Rums on offer of which there was some 20, bed time came and we bid good night to our friends hoping that the various spirits that inhabited the Inn.
