Republican* Ramble Round Ramshaw Rocks

* Trans-Atlantic readers should, on no account, attempt to interpret this word in an American context.

The Roaches, Gib Torr and the Ramshaws, Staffordshire Rocks

Where are We, and Why are We Here on this of All Days?

Staffordshire

Staffordshire
Moorlands

I wish Kate and Woss-is-name all the best, I really do, though I don’t actually know them. I am always happy to attend the wedding celebrations of any relative or friend who is kind enough to invite me, but my appetite for watching the televised splicing of a pair of complete strangers is minimal, to say the least.

So I bade a fond farewell to Lynne, royalist, romantic and, for yesterday at least, couch-potato and with the words ‘miserable old git’ ringing in my ears drove to Stone. There, by pre-arranged coincidence, I met Lee, Francis and Brian whose misery and gittishness matched mine. Lee drove us through Longton and Leek to the Peak District where there were no flag waving crowds, no sycophantic television presenters and no silly hats.

I will not claim that every member of the party believes that in a mature democracy the people should be trusted to choose the figurehead of state rather than leaving it to an accident of birth, so maybe ‘Republican Ramble’ is a slight exaggeration, but with royalists sprawled over every television channel not devoted to shopping, I feel justified.

We are fortunate in not only having Cannock Chase, Britain’s smallest Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty within twenty minutes drive, but also having the 500 square miles of the Peak District, our oldest National Park, less than an hour away.

Despite its name the Peak District contains few real peaks – nor is this southern section, The White Peak, particularly white - but the two kilometre long rocky outcrop of the Roaches, with the detached hill of Hen Cloud at one end is a dramatic landmark visible from miles around.

The Roaches, Peak District National Park

From the lay-by outside the Roaches Tea Room – of which more later – we walked up into the gap between Hen Cloud and the Roaches. On the penultimate day of the warmest and driest April on record the sun shone, as we have come to expect, but a strong north east wind with a distinctly bitter edge was enough to induce a few shivers.

Going up

A little higher up there is a view across Hen Cloud.

Hen Cloud from the Roaches

Here the path levels off and runs below the ridge through a stand of larches, like a strangely misplaced Japanese garden. Sheltered from the wind this was a very pleasant stroll.

A strangely misplaced Japanese garden

The Roaches is much frequented by rock climbers. Our two hundred metre climb to the highest point of the ridge may not have require ropes, but it was steep enough to justify my use of poles and to ensure most breath was reserved for walking. A little remained available for moaning about the wind but none was spent speculating about Kate’s dress, what she was thinking or the state of Wills’ nerves.

We were soon up on the top where the wind brought tears to the eye and threatened to blow my hat – and possibly me as well - into the valley below. So why does it look so calm in my photo?

On top of the Roaches, looking calmer than it felt

The walk along the top, past the trig point marking the highest point at 505m and down to Roache End 100m.

On top of the Roaches

Descending at the end of the Roaches we found a dry-stone wall where we could sit out of the wind and drink some coffee. Francis moved away to water another section of the wall. Five minutes later, a wind-swept party crossed the stile and commented on our snug position. They walked on and sat down at the exact spot where Francis had taken his pee. We didn’t like to tell them - they looked so comfy - and what they eye doesn’t see……

From here the usual route is eastwards, towards the well kept beers of the Ship in Danebridge, but for once we went the other way, descending into the valley...

Into the valley

towards Black Brook in the deep valley behind the Roaches.

Francis crosses Black Brook

The path, sometimes rocky, sometimes sandy, descends gently through the heather. Two thirds of the way down and far away to our right I heard my first cuckoo of the spring. Nobody else seemed that convinced. A minute later, much closer and to our left there was no doubt. Hearing a cuckoo is always pleasing but hardly unusual, actually seeing one is rare. It flew, barely thirty metres away, from one tree to the next. Brian, a birder for many years, claimed a ‘lifer’, saying it was his first ever cuckoo. Francis and Brian each raised several hundred pounds worth of binoculars. Lee peered through a pair he bought for £20 at a car boot sale. I just squinted upwards. When a bird sits on the far side of a tree in full leaf, it matters little how much you paid for your binoculars; it was as invisible to Francis’ precision optics as it was to my naked eye.

Lee looks for an invisible cuckoo

We followed the stream to the sound of curlews, usually easier to spot than cuckoos but hiding on this occasion and past Goldsitch house, which was surrounded by a swirl of swallows (we spotted the first of these three weeks ago near Milwich). Francis confidently identified a bird on a telephone wire as being a willow warbler. It was not much to look at, but it made a big noise for a small bird.

Climbing towards Gib Torr we encountered an area of peat bog, though the exceptionally dry April had turned the usual treacherous stickiness into a springy carpet. We heard a red grouse, which strangely likes this sort of territory, and watched it settle on the rocks, clearly visible against the skyline.

Gib Torr Rocks

From Gib Tor Rocks we descended to the minor road and thence to the A53 at The Royal Cottage, a pub that is not actually closed but never seems to be open – even on a royal day such as this. A hundred metres further on the more welcoming Winking Man provided a well-priced sandwich and relatively cheap pint of Black Sheep or Hancocks HB (choices and opinions were divided).

The pub is named after a formation on the Ramshaw rocks and that was where we headed after lunch. Although close to the A53 we approached the rocks by first following a minor road into the moorland to allow a more gentle ascent from the north east. Having safely negotiated a morning of rocky paths, some of them quite steep and tricky, it was on the flat metalled road that I turned my ankle. It was painful and accompanied by a worryingly loud crunching noise.

I continued, hoping to walk it off. We climbed through the heather and up onto the rocks. The Ramshaw Rocks are as high as the Roaches but stand out less from the surrounding elevated moorland. They are also a gritstone outcrop, but more twisted and weathered than the Roaches and dramatic in their own quiet way. The Winking Man resembles a face with a hole for the eye but passing above it we missed the best view. There was another rock, however, which had a wink that seemed more convincing than a mere hole.

Not really the Winking Man

The descent was steep and difficult, particularly when trying to protect arthritic knees and an increasingly sore ankle. It was slow going, for me at least, and the others had to wait at the bottom – for which I apologise.

Among the Ramshaw Rocks

From here we dropped into a pretty dell behind Hen Cloud, worked our way round to the gap before the Roaches and back down to the road where a Park Ranger had set up some impressive telescopes and cameras in a lay-by. A pair of peregrine falcons is nesting on Hen Cloud for the third successive year and after raising three chicks from five eggs last year it is hoped that they have settled there. Despite his equipment, the ranger had seen neither the peregrines nor the resident kestrel. All he had to show us was jackdaws wheeling across the crag face. Jackdaws are regular visitors to my garden bird feeder, so I was not that excited.

Into the dell behind Hen Cloud

A detour into the Roaches Tea Room was now obligatory. Some had cake while others - well Brian (Hilary please note) - settled for just a cup of tea. We had a pot of Earl Grey, originally blended for the nineteenth century Prime Minister of that name who may have been an aristocrat but was nevertheless a thoroughgoing democrat (Great Reform Act 1832). Lee had a latte, which is not named after the legendary Italian reformer Giuseppe Latte. By the time we moved on, my ankle had stiffened up considerably.

I spent the evening with my elevated leg attached to an ice pack. I woke this morning to see my ankle swollen and a bruise beginning to form. Below the bone is an angry red cross over a blue background against the whiteness of flesh that rarely sees the sun. It may be God’s way of telling me that He picks the head of state round here and I should accept it with due reverence. On the other hand (or rather foot) it might just be a bruise.

The Stone Circle (2): Fulford to Sandon Bank

The Middle Day of a 60Km Circular Walk around the Town of Stone

Leaving Fulford

Staffordshire

Stafford Borough

Fulford is a pleasant village, but we spent more time there than intended. After pulling on our boots Mike, Lee, Francis and I spent some time wandering up and down the road trying to find the footpath. A gap between two houses did lead into the fields but was clearly in the wrong place and not obviously a right of way. After satisfying ourselves there was no other route we were about to set off when a passing paramedic stopped his ambulance and confirmed we were heading in the right direction, which was nice of him – I just hope he wasn’t on his way to an emergency.

Beyond the houses we found an overgrown and dilapidated stile in roughly the right place and crossed the fields to Greensitch Farm. Looking back, we could trace our path through the dewy grass, but the unseasonably warm sunshine suggested the dew would not last long. Finding our way through the farmyard was a challenge, but eventually we struck out southwest on a well-defined bridleway. The official Stone Circles route takes the minor road out of Fulford, linking with the bridleway later. The footpath, though, is clearly marked on the map, if apparently rarely used.

....we could trace our path through the dewy grass...
Fulford

Fulford to Millwich

Despite some mud - horses churn up the surface in even the driest spring - the bridleway was a pleasant path, rising gently to the minor road where we turned west onto a concrete track past New Buildings Farm - not the most resonant of names, nor any longer, the truest.

Undulating fields

Turning south, we spent the rest of the morning in undulating fields with the occasional bosky dell and meandering stream. Francis described this countryside as bland, and to some extent he was right; we climbed no steep hills, descended into no deep ravines and saw no great views unfold before us. On the other hand, it is always pleasing to walk in gentle sunshine through rich pastures lined with trees bursting into leaf. The varied greens were fresh and full of promise, the blackthorns were covered in snowy-white blossom, and the stinging nettles - and this is important when you are wearing shorts – had hardly raised their heads above the ground.

Blackthorn covered in snowy-white blossom

Not so long ago the sight of a buzzard was worthy of comment, now it is commonplace to see a pair circling overhead or being chased off by an anxious crow (or possibly rook). We sat in a field to drink our coffee and watched a chaffinch perching on the fence and two blue tits checking out a hole in a gnarled oak as a potential nest site. Further on, the clear and unmistakable song of a chiffchaff (well, it was clear and unmistakable once I had asked Francis what it was) filled the valley.

Coffee with added birdsong

After 5 km of field paths we reached Milwich, a pleasant village though its name presents a pronunciation problem. Francis lives in Baswich, pronounced ‘Baz-itch’. Nearby Colwich, on the other hand, is always ‘Coll-witch’. Milwich looks like a word where the ‘w’ is asking to be pronounced, but Mike’s local knowledge assured us ‘Mill-itch’ is correct. Consistency was never the strong point of English spelling.

Milwich to Weston

However it is pronounced, Milwich features a pub, which is still open, and an old and characterful school building. A sparrow hawk flew down the street just above ground level and perched on a garden fence.

Milwich's old school

From here we reversed the route we had taken in the Baswich to Swynnerton walk until Coton Mill Farm. On Mill Lane, the first swallow of summer sat on a telephone wire, enjoying the sun but maybe wondering if he had arrived a tad too early.

Later we breasted a low rise and crossed a stile into a field of sheep, each ewe accompanied by one or, more often, two lambs, still at the age when they stay close by their mothers. From this elevated position, and amid much baa-ing, we were able to gain the mandatory glimpse of Rugeley power station, its cooling towers just poking above the distant hump of Cannock Chase.

The mandatory (if distant) view of Rugeley Power Station

After Gayton we left the official route, which precedes directly to Salt via the Sandon Estate and diverted through the village of Weston in search of lunch.

We approached the A51 intending to take a field path to what we assumed would be an underpass. Seeing no obvious exit from the field we walked towards the A51 and then took a slip road beside it – presumably an earlier incarnation of the main road itself. We soon realised we were walking into a cul-de-sac, the only underpass being already full of the main West Coast Railway line. As we turned the landowner chugged up beside us on a sort of motorised bedstead, turned off the ignition with a screwdriver and engaged us in conversation.

He did not mind there being a footpath across his land, he said, but wondered where it went. He had a point as it clearly went nowhere. He then wondered why the council had sent two men to spend a day putting a stile next to his gate, which he never closed. He furthered wondered why they had planted the post for a finger sign right next to the railway’s nine foot iron fence. He seemed to think we should have answers for these questions, but we could offer little but sympathy and a suggestion that he write to the County Footpaths Officer. To ensure he had his story right he explained it all to us again, and then once more to be certain. We tried to leave as he started the fourth run through, it was half past one, lunch was still twenty minutes away across the A51 and the beer was calling, but we heard him out again, just to be polite.

It had been a long morning by the time we reached Weston. We sat in the sun outside the Saracen's Head and enjoyed a sandwich and a couple of pints of ‘Dog Father Ale’, an excellent beer though the name must have looked better in the planning meeting than it does on a beer pump.

Weston to Salt

Our afternoon walk was a mere 3 kilometres as the crow flies, but our non-corvine navigation turned it into 5. We started with a zig up the Trent and Mersey canal and followed it with a zag through Salt and south towards Hopton Heath. Just after leaving the canal we re-crossed the Trent. I remarked on how much it looked like the Danube at this point, but nobody took me seriously.

Along the Trent & Mersey Canal

Salt, Hopton Heath and Sandonw Bank

From the canal, we were again briefly on the official route. We walked through Salt and up the steepish slope to the woods overlooking Hopton where the Parliamentarian rearguard stood at the battle of Hopton Heath.

Looking back towards Salt

Leaving the official route again to avoid repeating last autumn’s walk over the battlefield and past the somewhat underwhelming monument, we zigged northeast, making a long, gentle descent to the minor road. A swift climb up Sandon Bank took us to the Seven Stars Pub where Francis’ car was parked. The building looked as sad as only a derelict pub can look.

Francis was unimpressed by the morning’s walk, but I enjoyed strolling over lush fields under a cloudless sky. The afternoon section, though brief, had been more varied and involved more contours - and had been completed under the same warm sun. We encountered one path which should have been signed but wasn’t and one that was signed but should not have been – and took an ear-bashing for our trouble. Otherwise the footpaths were well signed and the stiles in good repair, as they usually are in Staffordshire.

It would be nice to think that Part 3, scheduled for May 21st , would attract the same benign conditions. Unfortunately, when it comes to weather, all the planning in the world guarantees nothing.

The Stone Circle

Part 1: Swynnerton to Fulford
Part 2: Fulford to Sandon Bank
Part 3: Sandon Bank to Swynnerton

The Stone Circle (1): Swynnerton to Fulford

The First of Three Sections of a 60Km Circular Walk around the Town of Stone

Staffordshire

Stafford Borough

Over a thousand stone circles survive in Britain and Ireland from the Neolithic and early Bronze Ages. This post is about none of them.

This Stone Circle is a 60 km circular walk centred on the Staffordshire town of Stone. We are indebted to Stone Ramblers, who designed and way-marked the Stone Circles Challenge, though Francis has planned occasional variations from their route to arrive at an appropriate pub at lunchtime or pass through an area of particular interest. Unintentional variations may crop up later, but navigation in Part 1 presented few problems.

Alison, Francis, Brian, David and Mike preparing to set off, Swynnerton

Swynnerton to Tittensor via Beech

Despite my protestations and offers of help, Lynne insisted on cooking us all bacon and eggs, then we donned our boots and set off towards Beech. From the upper lane out of the village (sometimes known as Stabb Lane, for reasons lost in the mists of time) it becomes clear how exposed Swynnerton is, with no higher ground to provide protection from the prevailing westerlies. Unsurprisingly, we endure a dank and chilly microclimate. On a bright day the views are extensive with the Wrekin, 20 miles distant, in the fore ground, and the Long Mynd, and even the Berwyns 50 miles away in mid-Wales clearly visible. So why does my photograph show Alison, Francis and Brian looking at Swynnerton’s Millennium Topograph rather than the view itself? Because on a clear day you can see all these wonders - on Saturday we could just make out a blurry lump in the mist where the Wrekin ought to be.

Looking at the topograph, not the view, Swynnerton Millennium Topograph

The path to Beech starts as a green lane between fields still bare in early March, though the hedgerow broom was beginning to flower. A flock of fieldfares wheeled beside us; according to Francis they should have already left for their summer residences in Scandinavia, but they had clearly not read the textbook. A pair of buzzards quartered the same field watching for small careless mammals. As the path dipped into the woods a flash of colour signalled the first of several jays we would see in the day.

Beech is small, even for a hamlet. We turned east down a metalled lane to approach the M6 bridge. Mike questioned if it was the right motorway crossing. ‘Shouldn’t we have gone through Beach first?’ he asked. It really is that memorable.

The M6 Staffordshire

We crossed the M6. I post the picture above merely to put it alongside that of another road also designated as the M6 in its national classification. This M6 is the main road connecting Gyumri and Vanadzor, the largest towns in northern Armenia. And we complain about potholes.

The M6, Gyumri to Vanadzor, Armenia

We emerged on Winghouse Lane outside Tittensor by a large private duck pond. I have driven past it many times, but never stopped to look. Brian and Francis excitedly identified teals, pintails, tufted ducks and mandarins. When Francis spotted a smew joy was unconfined. Smew sounds like an ailment in a Victorian novel (Aunt Glegg, being severely discomfited by as nasty a case of the Smew as ever…), but is, apparently, a particularly handsome duck. I spotted none of my favourites, confit, Beijing and à l’orange.

Tittensor, Barlaston and on to Downs Bank

Reaching Tittensor via a more natural but less well-populated lake, we enjoyed an unnecessarily long meander through the houses to locate and cross the A34. Beyond the village we descended to a footbridge over the River Trent. It is hard to believe this insignificant stream becomes one of England’s largest rivers. Mike said he once canoed the Trent from above here to past Stafford. On a warm day with the high banks restricting visibility, he said it reminded him of the Dordogne. I closed my eyes and squinted; I flooded the area with mental sunshine, but eventually had to admit that Mike has a better imagination than me – either that or he is delusional.

The Trent (or is the Dordogne?) near Tittensor

Across the water meadows we reached Barlaston and paused for coffee by the Trent and Mersey canal. The local mallards were doing what mallards do, which in spring is gang rape. I am sure no cultured smew on a duckpond would ever do such a thing.

The Trent & Mersey Canal, Barlaston

Modern lines of communication, like the M6, power in and out of the Trent Valley at their pleasure, but the eighteenth century canal and the nineteenth century railway run side by side along the valley bottom. Walking a kilometre up the canal towpath took us from Barlaston Station to Wedgwood Station where we crossed the canal bridge and then the railway. The Wedgwood factory moved from Etruria to its current, somewhat improbable, parkland setting in 1940 and Wedgwood station was opened the same year. There are fewer workers now and those that remain never come to work by rail as no trains stop at either Wedgwood or Barlaston – though oddly neither station is officially closed.

Having zigged up the canal, we zagged back across the fields past Barlaston Hall. The Hall was built in 1786 as a manor house and was later home to the Wedgwood Memorial College. The College moved out when the building was seriously damaged by mining subsidence. After threats of demolition, the house was sold in 1981 to SAVE British Heritage for £1. Now restored it is again a private residence.

Barlaston Hall

Given the eccentricity of our route and the village’s elongated S-shape, we should not have been surprised that two kilometres after passing Barlaston station we found ourselves re-entering Barlaston. A quick stroll round the boundary at the cricket club took us out into the fields again where we deviated from the Stone Circles route, turning south towards Downs Banks.

Downs Bank, Oulton and up to Moddershall

We reached Downs Bank only after wading through a kilometre of country odours, first pig effluent then silage. The 67-hectare glacial valley was donated to the National Trust in 1950 by John Joule of Stone’s long defunct but still missed Joule's Brewery. A pleasing piece of countryside, it functions officially as a nature reserve, and unofficially as a dog-walking facility.

From the end of the valley we climbed to the village of Oulton with its collection of attractive brick buildings - Oulton Grange, Oulton Hall and Oulton Abbey - all hiding behind equally attractive but not so photogenic brick walls.

After a couple of pints of Timothy Taylor’s ‘Landlord’ and a bite to eat at the Wheatsheaf we descended to the Stone/Meir Road, and climbed up the other side toward Moddershall. It was a stiff climb, the last part under the watchful eye of a young but sizeable bull who allowed us to proceed unmolested once he realised that we were not interested in any of his ladies.

Mike and Brian climb towards Moddershall

Past Idlerocks, Over Stallington Heath and on to Fulford

By the Boar Inn we entered the Idlerocks defile. There is nothing obviously indolent about the local geology, but the path at the valley bottom is narrow and the drainage ditch deep. Foot watching seemed important, but we did not miss the deer on the skyline observing our passing.

A Deer watching us from the skyline, Idlerocks

At the top of the defile the valley opens out and a moment’s map consultation was called for before proceeding up to Stallington Heath.

A moment's map consultation

Stallington Heath greeted us with a large padlocked gate labelled ‘Danger – do not enter’. Next to it was an open gate and a ‘public footpath’ sign. We followed the footpath through deciduous woodland, the floor carpeted with last season’s leaves. What was ‘dangerous’ about the larger parallel track was not obvious, unless the inhabitants of Fulford have taken to mining the approaches to their village. Our path became narrower and muddier and we found eventually ourselves pushing past rhododendrons just coming into bud.

Stallington Heath

Reaching a minor road, we strode into Fulford where Brian’s car had previously been parked.

It was a pleasant day’s walk with perhaps a little more tarmac and housing estates than the ideal, but warm enough for early March and, most importantly, dry (almost) all day. We walked some 18 km, though finishing less than 12 kilometres from where we started. That is the first third of the Stone Circle completed. Part 2 will be on the 9th of April.

The Stone Circle

Part 1: Swynnerton to Fulford
Part 2: Fulford to Sandon Bank
Part 3: Sandon Bank to Swynnerton

On the Current Troubles: Libya

The Great SPLAJ – the ‘Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya’ is a very different country from Egypt. It is twice the size but has one eighth as many people, and the presence of oil has ensured that those people are, on average, four or five times wealthier their Egyptian cousins. The Egyptians are almost all Arabs, while the Libyans are a much intermarried mix of Arabs and Berbers - along with a few Tuaregs and minority groups.

The Waterfront, Tripoli

We visited Libya in 2006, flying to Tripoli and on to Benghazi before driving back to Tripoli along the coast, then south to the oasis town of Ghadames. Ghadames is 300 km south of Tripoli; another 1000 km of desert lie beyond. Most of Libya is uninhabited and uninhabitable, with the vast majority of Libyans living in cities along the coastal strip.

Cyrene

Our trip concentrated not on politics but on the remarkable remains of the Greek cities near Benghazi, - Ptolomais, Apollonia and Cyrene - on the Roman remains near Tripoli - Leptis Magna and Sabratha – the Berber towns of the Jebel Nafousa and the oasis of Ghadames. But politics can never be completely ignored.

Migrant workers await employement while the Colonel looks away, Derj

Libya’s relative wealth drags in migrant workers, few of them legal. In 2010, on the Egyptian coastal road through Mersa Matrouh and on to Alexandria, we saw many packed minibuses, their height doubled by a precarious stack of newly acquired household goods, bringing Egyptian workers home from Libya. In Zliten, a distinctly edgy town 200 km east of Tripoli, we sat discreetly on a park bench beside a roundabout and watched a hundred or more migrant workers, mainly from south of the Sahara, squatting on the pavement, the tools of their trade before them. Occasionally a Honda pick-up would drive round the circle, blowing its horn. Men ran towards the truck, a lucky few would be selected and taken away for a few hours much needed work. Libya has no minimum wage and these were desperate men willing to work for almost nothing; unemployment among Libyans is high.

Looking up the Colonel's nose, Al-Kabir Hotel, Tripoli

Unlike Hosni Mubarak, Colonel Gaddafi set out to generate a personality cult. He intended to make his little green book as ubiquitous in Libya as Mao’s little red book once was in China. He failed, but every Libyan city has its quota of banners bearing his image draped down the sides of buildings. His stance is invariably ramrod straight with his head held back and his nostril flared, reminiscent of Mussolini (Libya was ruled by Italy from 1911 to 1943). No doubt, he believes the pose exemplifies nobility and power, I merely wonder why he wants me to look up his nose.

Gaddafi is unstable and erratic, which is perhaps why his personality cult never took off. The people fear him, with good reason, but we saw plenty of evidence that they do not respect him. When we started joking about the images of Gaddafi, 'A' (our much travelled Berber guide whose experiences included a spell cooking pizzas on Tyneside) was quick to join in. T-shirts bearing the colonel’s image are widely available, but I never saw anybody wearing one. When I bought one the stallholder was well aware that the purchase was made in a spirit of irony rather than awe, and made no effort to hide his contempt for Gaddafi. One floor of the otherwise excellent Jamahiriya Museum in Tripoli is dedicated to Gaddafi memorabilia; his green book translated into many languages (and unread in most), his 1957 Volkswagen, and more photos than even his mother could bear to look at. M, who showed us round Tripoli, sneered as he told us about it. When we got there, the gallery was closed. The museum official charged with conveying that information seemed embarrassed that it existed at all.

The Berber town of Kabaw in the Jebel Nafousa

The Libyan people are largely good-natured and philosophical. They have never had much say in who their rulers are, so they merely shrug their shoulders and get on with it. Many laugh at Gaddafi behind his back, but opposition is neither easy nor safe, so they have tended to work round the problem; that was until last week.

Hosni Mubarak was a bureaucrat whose regime became old and sclerotic, Muammar al-Gaddafi is much more of a classical tyrant. He will fight back harder than Mubarak, and with fewer scruples but, as we have already seen, he cannot rely on personal loyalty. It is time for the Libyan people to consign this monster to the dustbin of history. As A might say, Haway the Berbers.

Lynne at the mudbrick fortified granary of Qasr al-Haj

Cairo Before the Revolution (which might as well have never hapened)

Explanatory Note

This post was written during the 'Arab Spring' about a visit in August the previous year (before I started blogging). Nobody yet knew that the revolution would remove President Mubarak and there would be free and fair elections and a new regime. And that would be where the good news stopped.

Most demonstrators were (I think) hoping for a new liberal, secular Egypt, but that view made little impression at the ballot-box and they got Mohamed Morsi, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi never stood a chance, the levers of power remained in the hands of the military and the Americans wanted another 'strong man' they could deal with. He was deposed in July 2013 in a military coup. General Abdel Fatah el-Sisi became president and regularised his position with the usual fraudulent election. The Revolution was over; everything had changed, and nothing had changed.

Return to Cairo - First Impressions

We spent a week in Cairo last July. It was hot, dusty and crowded, but there was no sign of a revolution. Not since 1980 have we spent more than a day or two in the city, so we saw many changes, some expected, others more surprising.

The 6th of October Bridge

The Cairo of 2010 is a much tidier and neater city. It has far to go before it gleams like Seattle or Guilin, and you still need to watch your feet to avoid falling into holes or tripping over protruding cables, but at least it no longer resembles a building site after a typhoon. The traffic is calmer too, though a first time visitor might find that hard to believe. The standard of driving has improved little, but modern road systems impose their own discipline, and the donkey carts that roamed the streets following a set of rules entirely of their own, have (almost) all gone. You no longer see the foul-smelling heavy green rubbish carts, pulled by tired horses and driven by boys as tired as their horses and malodorous as their cargo. I do not know how modern Cairo deals with its waste, but I hope the sons and daughters of these rubbish boys are now at school, where they ought to be. Dress has changed, too. In 1980, my memory claims that only a minority of woman wore headscarves and there were no veiled faces. Now headscarves are almost universal, while veils are not uncommon. Men, on the other hand, have overwhelmingly taken to western dress, while thirty years ago about a quarter wore Arab costume.

Our room in the Ramses Hilton faced the Nile, but the other side of the building overlooks the 6th of October flyover and the bus station beneath. Although the main action in the last few weeks has been in Tahrir Square, two blocks south, we have seen many television pictures of crowds milling, or charging, under the flyover, and of tanks creating barriers from overturned vehicles. Never have rooms on the ‘wrong’ side of this hotel been so popular.

Ours was an unusual visit to Cairo as we made no attempt to visit the pyramids. We saw them in 2009 and 1980 (and in 1965, in my case) so this time we looked at some of Cairo’s less ancient – though still old - monuments. We could not, though, resist the lure of the Egyptian museum, just beyond the bus station, and prominent in recent TV pictures. The collection is disorganised but magnificent. Building work has started on a new the museum and after the move I hope it will still be magnificent but better organised.

The Cairo Citadel

Cairo’s citadel sits on a rocky outcrop some 3 km southwest of Tahrir Square. The fortified complex was begun by Salah al-Din (Saladin) in the twelfth century, though its crowning glory, the Mohammed Ali Mosque, was built between 1824 and 1848.

The Mohammed Ali Mosque, Cairo Citadel

The huge interior was filled with tourists, not all appropriately dressed, and has become a secular space.

Inside the Mohammed Ali Mosque, Cairo Citadel

The nearby medieval mosque of Sultan al-Nasir....

Mosque of Sultan al-Nasir, Cairo citadel

....still feels like a religious building and features a magnificent gold and marble mihrab.

The Mihrab and Minbar in the Sultan al-Nasir Mosque,Cairo Citadel

From outside the mosque there is a fine view over Cairo to the pyramids beyond - at least there was on a clear day in 1980, last August the pyramids had disappeared into a smoggy haze, but the view looking down was still good.

Looking down from the citadel at the Sultan Hassan and Al Rifa'i mosques, Cairo

After coffee, where the waiter attempted to pass off an obsolete 25 piastre note (worth 3p) as a 25 Egyptian Pound note (worth £3, if there was such a thing) we inspected the police museum. We saw the cells where the British had once incarcerated Anwar Sadat, and a model of the ‘battle’ of Ismailiya Police Station in 1952, in which Lynne’s father played a small role as a national service squaddie.

The Prison Cells, Police Museum, Cairo Citadel

The Ibn Tulun Mosque

We spent more time haggling over the fare to the Ibn Tulun mosque than we did in the taxi. Built in the ninth and tenth centuries, this massive mosque has an unusual spiral staircase around the outside of its stumpy minaret. The huge central courtyard, open to the sky, is impressive in its simplicity, and also in its quietness – we had the place to ourselves. (For more about the Ibn Tulun Mosque, click here).

Minaret, Ibn Tulun Mosque, Cairo

The Gayer-Anderson House

Built against the outer wall of the mosque, the Gayer-Anderson House is actually two old houses knocked together by Major Gayer-Anderson, a retired British soldier who lived there from 1935 to 1942. He filled the houses with antiques, including several ornate harem screens, and with a little imagination you can convince yourself you are really in seventeenth century Cairo. The roof terrace, which served as a set in the Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me, affords a fine view of the Mohammed Ali mosque.

The Citadel from the Gayer-Anderson Roof Terrace

Cairo's Coptic Quarter

Cairo’s metro is cheap, clean and efficient. The lines were designed to link Cairenes with their places of work and are generally of less use to those heading for tourist sites, but four stops south from Tahrir Square is Mari Girgis (St George’s), the gateway to Cairo’s Coptic quarter.

Mari Girgis

Some 10% of Egypt’s population are Coptic Christians. Pope Shenouda III* has led the church since 1971 and overseen a revival while keeping good relations with the country’s Islamic leaders. The bomb that killed twenty-one worshippers in an Alexandrian church on New Year’s Eve showed that extremists do exist, but the vast majority of Egyptians, Christian and Muslim, favour peaceful coexistence.

St George's Church in Cairo's Coptic Quarter

In 1980 the Coptic quarter was a warren of narrow streets and high walls, with hidden entrances into ornate churches. Now the visitor is greeted by the extensive grounds of the Coptic Museum and the remains of the Roman castle. The excellent museum covers the long history of the Copts in Egypt, while more literally covering the ground that was home to many thousands of Copts for several hundreds of years.

The Coptic Quarter, Cairo

A small area of narrow streets remain and there you can visit the church in whose undercroft the Holy Family stayed after the flight to Egypt. The Nile now runs 300m away, but used to wash the walls of the castle and, by a happy coincidence, the very spot where the original Moses basket was plucked from the bulrushes lies just behind the church of the Holy Family. You may believe all this, if you wish.

Where Moses was found in the bullrushes (allegedly)

It is sad to see the whole quarter becoming museumised, but it was inevitable. The Copts have chosen to move out of their medieval ghetto - and who can blame them?

Eating in Cairo - Dining with the Expats and Egyptian Middle Classes

Central Cairo offers few eating options, but nobody visits Egypt for the cuisine. Ignoring the overpriced international food at the major hotels, we followed the Rough Guide’s recommendations.

The dimly-lit Estoril, down an equally dingy alley, provided good food at modest prices. The other customers seemed to be expatriate Europeans, while at the brighter Felfela just north of Tahrir Square there was a more mixed crowd of younger middle class Egyptians and foreigners. I can recommend the stuffed vine leaves, spiced meatballs and several variations on the theme of pigeon.

The nearby haven of peace that is the Café Riche serves an older clientele. The future president, Gamal Nasser, plotted the overthrow of King Farouk here in 1952, while last weekend Robert Fisk, the Independent’s Middle East correspondent, retreated to the café from the mayhem outside. Lynne and I used it more than once as a refuge from the midday sun. A waiter in a long blue robe would produce a satisfying bowl of lentil soup and a cold beer, and serve them with a smile.

Sharia Talaat Harb near the Café Riche. Cairo

Eating in Cairo - Kushari and Fuul

All these places serve alcohol but, as Cairo is largely an Islamic city, they are the exception rather than the rule. The restaurants used by most Egyptians are cheap, often crowded, but can be good. At Gad, on 26th of July Street, we walked through the busy take-away and up the stairs to the packed restaurant. I had a long wait for my chilli dusted Alexandrian style liver. It was excellent, but Lynne had finished her fish before I could take my first forkful.

Abou Tarek, which claims to be Cairo’s best kushari restaurant, is also crowded and you expect to share a table. Kushari is a mixture of noodles, lentils and rice topped with caramelised onions. Served with a spicy tomato sauce, the combination of sweetness and carbohydrates makes it the ultimate Egyptian comfort food.

Kushari and fuul are two dishes which should be eaten by every visitor to Egypt, but are often missed. Fuul beans are similar to dried broad beans. Boiled until they start disintegrating they are the breakfast of choice for all Egyptians, whatever their status. Fuul is also popular in Sudan, where for many poorer people it is not just breakfast but lunch and dinner too. In the morning it is eaten with a hard boiled egg or fermented cheese. I like fuul best lightly crushed, mixed with raw onion and cheese and sprinkled with sesame oil and chilli, though perhaps not at breakfast.

Egyptian coffee is always a delight

Words Written Without the Benefit if Hindsight

Hot and noisy, with the continuous blare of car horns, Cairo seemed frenetic but not rebellious, though Egypt is, obviously, a police state. Travelling outside the city involves negotiating regular police roadblocks. Every crossroads has an armed guard with at least one man kneeling behind a heavy metal shield. Parts of Alexandria seem to have more policemen than ordinary citizens. The government is not particularly corrupt, by the standards of its continent, but low-level corruption is endemic. Repression is felt most by the politically aware and Egyptian democracy is not about getting out the vote but controlling the count. With healthy economic growth discontent was muted, but Egypt is not immune to the world’s problems, and people have started to notice what they are missing.

Mubarak will go, he is after all, 82, but that may not happen before September. Egypt may contrive an orderly transition to democracy, or the army may impose their man in the usual fraudulent election.

Harem Screens, Coutyard of the Gayer-Anderson House, Cairo

It is not up to foreigners, or their governments, to tell the Egyptian people what to do, but we should be quietly cheerleading for democracy. The Americans, having bankrolled Mubarak for years, are wavering, reluctant to see the back of a man who brought stability and a pro-American foreign policy. They seem worried by the thought of democracy and in particular by the Muslim Brotherhood; it must be the name, everything the Brotherhood have said over the last few weeks has been a model of moderation. Some American commentators even appear to judge the merit of any potential new government on how good it will be for Israel, not on how good it will be for Egypt.

To support another son-of-a-bitch just because he is ‘our son-of-a-bitch’ would be deeply hypocritical and morally wrong. I think it would also be politically shortsighted.

I hope that when this is over Egypt will emerge with a robust liberal democracy, it is what the people deserve. Whether or not that happens only time will tell. [Yeah, it told.]

*Shenouda III died in March 2012 at the age of 88. He was succeeded by Tawadros II, the 118th man to hold the office which stretches back in an unbroken line to (allegedly) the apostle Mark in the year 33.

A Shark in the Red Sea - my brush with mortality

Last month a German tourist was killed snorkelling off one of Egypt’s Red Sea resorts. Nothing that follows is intended to make light of that terrible event.

I should also apologise to those who have heard me tell this story in a school assembly or on one of several other stages. I would justify my repetition merely by claiming that it is a good story – and a true one, to boot.

  

In the course of this blog I have occasionally had a bitch about the tourist industry. I’ve done it here, here and here. Nothing winds me up more than the ‘all-inclusive resort’. There is something intrinsically wrong about resorts designed to minimise holidaymakers’ contact with the host country. I understand people wanting a rest and a complete break while on vacation, but to visit somebody else’s country and to treat the local people, language and customs as an ignorable inconvenience seems to me downright rude.

I am thus no great fan of the resorts the Egyptians have built on their Red Sea coast, but my complaint is not that it has been developed – opening up some of the world’s best diving is, surely, a plus - but how it has been developed.

We visited Hurghada in August 1990, taking a day trip from Luxor and driving across the Eastern desert. There was then just one major hotel, but the building was about to start in earnest, sites were marked off and ready for the bulldozers.

The nearest thing to a diving centre was a beach hut where a man rented out snorkelling equipment. Having enjoyed my lunch and the ensuing nap I wandered down there and hired a snorkel and a face mask. He wanted me to have flippers, too, but they were an extra 75p. There are times when I am astounded by the perversity of my own meanness, I find £500 easier to spend that £5, and as for 75p, well its good money and I didn’t really need the flippers, did I?

The coral reef starts barely twenty metres from the shore in water that is swimming-pool warm and no more than shoulder deep. Hanging face down in the water above the reef I was amazed by the huge variety of shapes, textures and hues in the coral. I looked down, like god surveying his creation, and watched the inhabitants, as varied and brightly coloured as the coral, going about their fishy business. Then I moved on, effortlessly gliding over a small shoal of sliver grey fish the length of my forearm but almost completely translucent. I hovered over another patch, watched that for a while and moved on again.

After an hour or so I realised I was developing a problem. Being sometimes above water level and sometimes below, my back had felt cool, but the August sun is ferocious and I slowly realised it had been exposed to powerful rays for longer than was good for it.

I set off in the direction of the shore, glancing back under me as I turned. What I saw froze my blood. There, in the deeper water beyond the coral was a menacing shape. It was a huge shape, it was a dark shape; it was, without a doubt, a shark.

Suppressing my panic, I struck out for the shore. After ten adrenalin powered strokes I risked another glance downwards and backwards, hoping to see a bored shark gliding gracefully off into the deep water. But it was still there, no nearer I noticed with relief, but no further away either.

I was swimming as quickly as I could, but trying hard not to splash, as splashing, I seemed to remember, would make me look like an injured fish and attract the shark.

The shark was still keeping station. I had nearly reached the edge of the reef and would soon be over the sand. The water would become shallower, but that brought no comfort - I was sure I had read about sharks attacking in less than a metre of water.

By the time I was over the sand, the shark had reached the reef. Safety was not far away but I knew that, however fast I swam, the shark could close the gap with one powerful flick of his tail.

I swam on, ignoring the tiredness in my arms and legs. If only I had hired the flippers I would be safe by now. One half of my brain panicked, while the other half ticked on coolly, even mundanely. Having reviewed my reading on the subject of shark attacks the cool half turned its attention to my meanness and considered the irony of dying for the sake of 75 pence. It was not, I thought, my whole life that was destined to flash before my eyes as the jaws closed, but a vision of 75 pence of loose change.

Another ten strokes and my chest would bump into the beach, surely then I would be safe. I risked one last look back. I could see the shark had now crossed the reef and was rippling over the sand, and I could see something else, too. The dark shape from which I had been swimming with barely suppressed panic was not a shark at all - it was my own shadow on the bottom of the sea.

I was momentarily stunned by a feeling of relief, then I started laughing. I am quite good at laughing at my own stupidity, even if I would rather others did not do it. I pulled myself together, walked up the beach as though nothing had happened and covered my reddening back with a towel

I am fortunate that the most frightening thing I have ever encountered (so far, anyway) turned out to be no more than my own shadow. That event confirmed something I had long suspected; if you ignore the imaginary fears, the real world is actually a surprisingly friendly and reassuring place.


PS The more I read that last line the more sanctimonious it becomes - but I can't quite bring myself to delete it.

March 2009 - A further thought. There is a well known (and possibly even true) factoid that more people are killed each year by falling coconuts than by sharks. I was recently relaxing outside our chalet (for want of a beter word) at Philip Kutty's Farm, on an island in the extraordinarily beautiful backwaters of Kerala. A ripe coconut launched itself from an adjacent tree and hit the ground less than two metres from where I sat. The earth, or at least Philip Kutty's Island, shook. Had Isaac Newton been from Kerala rather than Lincolnshire he would have invented the bomb shelter, not gravity. I was in more real danger from the coconut than from an imaginary shark - but it was all over before I knew it was happening, which made it a lot less frightening.