The Squeee

So, we finally made it to North Lees Hall outside Hathersage in north Derbyshire. ( Previous post about this day is here , by the way.) We drove up to the house, parked on the side of the field where other people were parked, tried to get an overturned sign to stay up in the wind (it wouldn't), and walked up to the old house. First impressions, aside from fangirly glee of being somewhere where Charlotte Brontë had been and been so inspired by, was that the house itself is rather on the small side, but wow, the views of the Derbyshire hills from there are extraordinary! How's this for a view? The reason behind going to North Lees Hall in the first place is of course that it's one of the buildings that inspired Charlotte Brontë to write about Thornfield in Jane Eyre . In fact, the description of Thornfield Hall does ring true with North Lees (which also, as it happens, was the ancestral home of the Eyre family), with a tower and turrets and the surroundings, nestled...

Earlier in the year, I posted about Wollaton Hall and mentioned there's another hall further south which has been modelled on it. They filmed bits of the new Batman movies there and said they should use Wollaton Hall as a filming location. My wish has been granted! Probably the fanciest council house in Nottingham Starting on Monday, rumour has it Hollywood are coming to town! It's the worst kept secret in Nottingham right now: Wollaton Hall is to be Wayne Manor in the next Batman movie: The Dark Knight Rises (due out in 2012). There have been casting calls in town for an "unnamed project" and all, apparently. (Why didn't I know this beforehand so I could've given it a go?!) Nottingham has taken a step up from Magicians , shot at the Theatre Royal in the city. Holy heart of England, Batman! If I hear anything more I'll let you know. Also: I wrote this on my Kindle, so apologies for spelling being worse than normal. Will edit and add links and p...

Part 4: South Wingfield The final stop on the journey before heading home was to be Wingfield Manor in South Wingfield. It's a bit further south than all the other places we'd been to during the day, so would make a good stop on the way back home to Nottingham. Getting to South Wingfield wasn't a problem. There were roadsigns. We could even see the ruins from the road. How to get to Wingfield Manor, however, was another matter. There were no roadsigns at all. We couldn't find a place to stop to take pictures either, so had to go in a big circle back and see if we could find a place the second time around. The first time, when we had reached the post code for the hall according to the website, all we saw was a road saying that wasn't a public road to the manor so sod off. It was a lot clearer than the Hathersage "satnav users, this is a private road, y'all, just so you know" to say the least. I looked with timorous joy towards a stately house: I...

It's always fun to go places where they've filmed things, especially if it's something you're really into. For instance, I think I'd die and go to fangirl heaven if I were to go to Minyip in Australia (the town of Coopers Crossing in The Flying Doctors ). Australia is a bit far to travel, but Derbyshire isn't, it's just next door. :) "the most complete and most interesting house of [its] period" Growing up, every summer, we used to go on family holidays in the caravan and travel around Sweden and go to museums, old houses, glass-blowing places and a number of other things. It wasn't just swimming and eating ice cream, no, we got to do Boring Cultural Things. At the time, I wasn't perhaps not very appreciative of it, as I never had any stories in class that quite measured up with my classmates who went to Crete or the Canary Islands for their holidays. What had I done? Gone gallavanting up a boring mountain up north somewhere and seen so...