Martin's Mag.

We spent a week on the Northumberland coast. Although we’ve passed through many times, to and from Scotland, I’m sorry to say that we have never really explored the area, which is both interesting and very attractive. And the people are so friendly. We stayed in a cottage in Amble, a working fishing town and good central base, and visited towns and villages between there and Berwick upon Tweed, just a few miles from the Scottish border. Favourites were Warkworth, a couple of miles north of Amble, Alnmouth, Alnwick, Seahouses, Berwick upon Tweed itself (fascinating town defences and barracks) and, of course, the “Holy Island” of Lindisfarne which is a tourist attraction but, in January, not too busy.

Around Amble and walking up the Coquet river to Warkworth:

Lindisfarne island:

Berwick upon Tweed:

Alnmouth, Craster, Seahouses, Bamburgh, Alnwick.

Click on any of the above blocks of pictures for captions. Hold mobile phones horizontally.

Bristol-based charity and creative collective Artspace Lifespace have teamed up with artistic non-profit We Are From Dust to host their second pop-up sculpture trail at Ashton Court Estate.

Impressive rocky coast at the mouth of the River Ogmore in the Vale of Glamorgan, and further up the river at the village and castle of Ogmore.

From the four (and seven-ninths!) of us on Christmas Day.

Much more interesting than it sounds, this exhibition, now in its tenth anniversary year, was open for the very first time outside London at The Royal Photographic Society, The Paintworks, Bristol.

Fifty or sixty Santa Clauses (or whatever the plural of Santa is – oh, of course, there isn’t one!) riding around Bristol’s Durdham Downs.

Not a frequent tourist destination, Avonmouth has been, since WWII, a huge, sprawling industrial estate, closely linked with with the docks, which were initially built two hundred years ago to overcome the problems with lager ships getting up the Avon to Bristol’s harbour. We were prompted to visit because Rob and Sophie have been “livening up” Avonmouth railway station with their brand of public mural art.

While we were there we had a wander round. Lots of previously very grand architecture, reflecting its Victorian past.

It was a wild and windy morning up on Walton Common in the aftermath of Storm Arwen. Here looking across the Bristol Channel to Wales.

Sal spotted this scarlet waxcap, Hygrocybe coccinea (thanks Wikipedia), on our morning dog-walk around the Lake Grounds.

And a couple of days later, in Ashton Court, we saw lots of these well-named Hygrocybe splendidissima.

18th and 19th-century park, in a Cotswold valley, with five lakes. We had lunch by the recently-restored boat house, now containing a bat roost.