Fifty Years Together (1) Chasing Memories Around Wharfedale

Back to Where it all Started

Heading North

North Yorkshire

Fifty years of marriage requires a celebration, but as we set out to do just that, only I knew where we were going. This has become the traditional format of our anniversary jaunts, though neither of us can remember how it started. Lynne took the wheel (eyesight problems make it unwise for me to drive) and I directed her north up the M6, and 80 miles later north-east onto the M65. From the end of the M65 at Colne (of ‘fond’ memory to some) we travelled cross-country to Skipton, Gateway to the Yorkshire Dales.

The Traditional County of Yorkshire
Skipton and Kettlewell are marked, Hubberholme is just north of Kettlewell and Hetton is north of Skipton inside the National Park

Below is how we looked 50 years ago today. What we look like now will be revealed (more than once), as this post wears on.

Wedding Day, 26th of July 1975

Skipton

We paused in Skipton for coffee and then took a short walk through the busy Saturday market to the gates of the castle and posed for the day’s first photo opportunity.

Outside Skipton Castle (hardly changed, have we)

Over the gate is the word 'Desormais' (Henceforth) the slightly two-edged motto of the Clifford family who owned the castle from 1310 until after the Civil War.

We did not enter the castle, but we did in 2020 and it features in a post called Skipton, Grassington and Kettlewell. We did, however, drop in to the adjacent parish church as we had never been there before.

Around 1300 a stone church was built on the site of a 12th-century wooden chapel. It has undergone many alterations since, sometimes because of damage (in 1645 from the Civil War and in 1925 from lightening) and sometimes because later generations thought they could do better, and sometimes they could.

The most eye-catching parts of the church are the rood screen, which bears the date 1553...

Tudor Rood screen, Skipton Parish Church

... and, looking through the screen, the reredos. Designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott in 1870, it is set off by stained-glass window of about the same vintage.

The reredos and the east window, Skipton Parish Church

Kettlewell

From Skipton we  entered the Yorkshire Dales National Park and found the B6160, the ‘main’ road that runs the length of Upper Wharfedale, …

Along the B6160 into Upper Wharfedale

… and followed it to Kettlewell. Fifty years ago we spent our honeymoon here, and apart from more and more dwellings being tarted up as second homes/holiday cottages it has changed little. Today the village has under 300 permanent residents.

Kettlewell had three pubs in 1975 and, remarkably, still has three pubs today. We stayed at one of them, the Blue Bell Inn, which has had its ups and downs over the years, but currently seems to be doing well.

Our honeymoon hotel
The paint is fresh, otherwise nothing has changed since 1975

Here is Lynne nursing a glass of Guinness Zero outside the Blue Bell as we waited for our lunch.

Lynne waiting for lunch outside the Blue Bell, Kettlewell

Despite many attempts over the years, I have yet to capture the charm of the village in a photograph. Here, though, is a photo from my 2020 post Aysgarth and Kettlewell showing the bridge over Kettlewell Beck at the top of the village. We played Pooh Sticks here in 1975, in 2020 and again today (and a few months ago played at the original Pooh Sticks Bridge in Ashdown Forest – we hope to go professional soon.)

Pooh sticks bridge over Kettlewell Beck in 2020

Hubberholme

Just as we did five years ago, we drove northwards up the dale through Starbotton to Buckden where we turned left towards Langstrothdale, following the tiniest of roads to the hamlet of Hubberholme, the smallest, pleasantest place in the world, according to novelist JB Priestly.

The compact Norman Church of Saint Michael and All Angels at Hubberholme was sturdily built to survive almost 1,000 years of Yorkshire weather. We came here in 1975 on the first full day of our marriage on a visit suggested by my best man Chris Noble, sadly no longer with us. He sent us to find the carvings of Robert Thompson (1876 – 1955), known as the ‘Mouseman of Kilburn.’ On returning in 2020 we found the church locked (the baleful curse of Covid) so we came again, on perhaps a more significant day.

The Church of St Michael and All Angels, Hubberholme, photo taken in 2020

Early in his furniture making career Thompson started signing his work by carving mice into it, and the rodents can be found on the oak pews and the choir stalls at Hubberholme.

I wandered round, searching for mice and found nothing. Lynne left the back of the church, where she had been reading about JB Priestley, whose ashes are in the churchyard, and joined me in the search. For a while she was equally unsuccessful, and then she spotted one, and then having seen one, she saw another, and another. She had found quite a few before I found my first, looking without seeing has always been among my special skills. We found lots eventually, but I doubt we them found all.

A Robert Thompson mouse, Hubberholme (they all look the same wherever they are!)

The company Robert Thompson founded: ‘Robert Thompson's Craftsman - the Mousemen of Kilburn’ is still going strong ‘creating the antiques of tomorrow’ from English oak – and ensuring they all carry at least one mouse.

The Angel at Hetton

Having gathered sufficient rodents, we headed back down the Dale, following the B6160 to Cracoe before turning west to Hetton. The village is on the edge of the national park and only 5 miles north of Skipton.

We drove straight past The Angel at our first attempt; its signage is so very discreet. Describing itself as a restaurant with rooms it relies very little, if at all, on passing trade, serving neither ordinary food, nor charging ordinary prices. This was the destination for on our special day, and I had booked months in advance.

The Angel at Hetton

Our room was over the road, in what were once the stables.

Our room in the stable

It was comfortable, large, light and airy if a little over-designed. The lighting looked eccentric, though it worked well when we figured out the switches, which were as discreetly signed as the Angel itself.

A mildly eccentric lighting system?

The bathroom sinks (one each) resembled hollowed-out ceramic tree trunks, while the bath was perfectly designed for a ‘brides in the bath murder’ - but 50 years too late for us. On the other hand, the shower was a shining light in a bathroom of over-designed oddities. It was spacious, the controls were easy to understand and operate, the temperature was easy to set and never varied, the maximum flow was pleasingly torrential, and I could run the sprinkler and the hand shower simultaneously. The best indoor shower ever. My best outdoor shower was at the Xandari Pearl, Marari Beach, Kerala.

At the appropriate time, showered and more formally dressed, we made our way back over the road for dinner. The review of our gastronomic adventure has a post all to itself.

Addendum

02-Sept-2025

Fifty Years Together (3)

Wedding anniversaries are important to the couple involved, celebrations are often more private and involve less present giving than birthdays or Christmas. This rather special year however we received one spectacular present. It came from my sister Erica – seen here visiting Piglet in Ashdown Forest (aka the Hundred Aker Wood).

Erica visits piglet

I am a practising wine buff, and Erica goes to great lengths to find interesting wines for birthdays and Christmases, but for this anniversary she excelled herself. She gave us a bottle of Château Mouton-Baron-Philippe, from Pauillac in the Haut Médoc region of Bordeaux. In 1855 the great and the good of the Bordeaux wine world examined their châteaux for consistency and quality and gave 60 of them the right to call themselves Cru Classé. Ch Mouton-Baronne-Philippe was among them, though then called Ch Mouton d’Armailhacq (and since 1989, Ch d’Armailhac). These 60 were the pinnacle of red wine making in the Haut Médoc, thus the pinnacle in Bordeaux - and thus in the whole world (according to the Bordelais). The people of Burgundy would have argued loudly in 1855 and today other regions (Tuscany, Napa Valley, Barossa Valley and more) might reasonably claim joint pinnacle status, but the 60 from 1855 - all still producing fine wine – remain at the tip of their pinnacle.

Chateau Mouton Baron Philippe

But this is not just a bottle from a top chateau, it was from the 1975 vintage. ‘75 was a good year in Bordeaux and was also the year we were married. We already had arrangements for our wedding anniversary, so decided to hold this over for our birthday celebrations, mine today, and Lynne’s at the weekend when we will be away. These celebrations also involve the number 75.

Vintage 1975

50-year-old claret is a beautiful thing and needs careful treatment. It would have thrown a heavy sediment, mostly adhering to the back of the bottle opposite the label, but it had been disrupted by a 4-hour car journey. Standard advice is to place the bottle in a vertical position some 72 hours before serving but because of the car journey I left it a couple of days longer. The wine was shoulder-high in the bottle, which is normal for its age.

Next came the challenge of extracting a fifty-year-old cork. I removed the capsule and inserted my corkscrew carefully into the extremely soft cork. With a smooth and very gentle pull I had the top half outside the bottle neck before it broke, which was a little better than I had expected. Had I owned a ‘butler’s friend’ the rest would be easy, but not being so blessed, I reinserted the corkscrew into the lower half of the cork. It would be frighteningly easy now to pull out the corkscrew leaving a hole and showering cork dust into the wine. Holding my breath, I pulled very gently and to my relief (and surprise) the lower half came out intact. All I had to do now was to decant the wine off the sediment, a largely successful operation.

The decanted wine

Then give it a gentle swirl…

Give it a gentle swirl

…and a sniff…

A thoughtful sniff

And drink it accompanied by a duck leg.

And what does a fifty-year-old claret taste like?

According to the textbooks, the tannins and fruit flavours should have faded and been replaced by a subtle, savoury complexity. Our bottle though retained noticeable tannin; 1975 was a year of particularly tannic wines in Bordeaux, so that seemed appropriate.

The following was culled from the notes I found on-line for this particular wine and vintage, and reasonably represent what we saw, sniffed and drank.

Colour: Tawny with a wide rim; heavy sediment

Nose: Little fruit but notes of cedar, leather, tobacco leaf, dried currant, graphite, forest floor, mushroom/truffle, maybe even soy sauce and a whiff of cigar box (classic Pauillac). Wine-writers play word association games, but it feels largely right, though I doubt I have ever handled a cigar box, never mind sniffed one.

Palate: Fruit almost gone, but faint dried blackcurrant or prune. The alcohol is well integrated; the wine has become lighter with age and the acidity more pronounced. The finish is long with savoury notes.

We have had the good fortune to taste a few such Cru Classé wines over the years, but never one of this age. It was an experience I enjoyed from start to finish – even the perilous cork extraction. We are both very grateful to Erica for giving us such a fine finish to our extended Golden Wedding celebrations and a memorable start to our birthday revels.