Category: Cirencester

Castle Street

The fine, Palladian facade on the right is currently Lloyds Bank, but was once the private town house of a wealthy merchant.

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Image 119 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.

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Castle Street is one of the busy streets in the town centre of Cirencester; it has a good mix of coffee shops, restaurants, clothes shops and so forth. Leading west from the Market Place, it becomes the old main road to Tetbury and Stroud, and eventually to Bristol and Bath. The fine, Palladian facade on the right is currently Lloyds Bank, but was once the private town house of a wealthy merchant.

There’s no castle in Cirencester today, but there was a Norman castle here many years ago (though little is known about it). Some sources suggest that it stood where Cirencester House is today, hidden behind the wall and famous yew hedge on nearby Park Street. But it may have been a little further east on adjacent ground bounded today by Castle Street, Park Street, Black Jack Street and the Market Place.

The castle (if that is not too grand a term) was constructed of timber and probably surrounded by a moat. It may have lasted just 35 years before being destroyed by King Stephen, or it might have been rebuilt in stone and lasted rather longer. Evidence is in short supply.

When: 26th October 2023
Where: Castle Street, Cirencester

See also:

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Cirencester

For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:

A417 roadworks, Advent Market, Bishops Walk, Baunton, Canal 1, 2, Castle Street, Christmas lights 1, 2, Church 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Churn flood, Countryside, Fallen tree, Fleece, Gasworks, Gloucester Street, Hare 1, 2, Hospital, Market Place 1, Phoenix Fest, Riverside Walk, Stone plaque, Stratton Meadow, Tank traps, View, Wonky 1, 2, Yellow Iris

Themed image collections

The links below will take you to the first post in each collection

Cirencester, Favourites, Irish holiday 2024, Roman villa

Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!

Light from street, Moon and planet

The Moon hangs in the sky to the right of the house, and it’s 390 million km away, so light takes 1.3 seconds or so to make that trip.

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Image 118 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.

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This photo is of the northern end of Gloucester Street, seen from the eastern side of the River Churn, close to Abbey Way Services.

You’ll notice several sources of light. Light travels at a little over 1 billion km/h, 1.079 billion if you want to be a little more precise. Like anything in motion at a steady speed, you can express distances in terms of travel time. If I fly a helicopter in a straight line to London at 100 km/h and it takes me an hour, then the distance to London must have been 100 km. If it takes only 30 minutes, then the distance was 50 km. You get the idea.

The streetlight, the house and the car are all around 20 m away (or 0.020 km), and doing the arithmetic shows that light would take around 80 billionths of a sec to make that trip.

The Moon hangs in the sky to the right of the house, and it’s 390 million km away, so light takes 1.3 seconds or so to arrive from the Moon.

The planet Venus is visible near the top of the photo, and as I write Venus is about 111 million km away, a distance that light covers in just over 6 minutes.

For comparison, our nearest neighbouring star, Proxima Centauri, is so far away, that its light takes 4¼ years to reach us. Space is BIG!

When: 2nd January 2025
Where: Gloucester Street, Cirencester

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Cirencester

For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:

A417 roadworks, Advent Market, Bishops Walk, Baunton, Canal 1, 2, Castle Street, Christmas lights 1, 2, Church 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Churn flood, Countryside, Fallen tree, Fleece, Gasworks, Gloucester Street, Hare 1, 2, Hospital, Market Place 1, Phoenix Fest, Riverside Walk, Stone plaque, Stratton Meadow, Tank traps, View, Wonky 1, 2, Yellow Iris

Themed image collections

The links below will take you to the first post in each collection

Cirencester, Favourites, Irish holiday 2024, Roman villa

Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!

Reflecting on Christmas lights

A simple reflection can turn a nuisance to be avoided into something beautiful to be captured in a photo!

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Image 117 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.

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Christmas has come and gone; I’m posting this on New Year’s Day but the lights are still shining on Christmas trees in homes and in Cirencester Market Place and in the roads that lead in and out of the Market Place as well.

This is Cricklade Street, running south from the centre of the town, and after some heavy rain this morning and overnight, the reflected lights add to the scene making it even better.

When we think of puddles we focus on their innate properties – wet, probably dirty, inconvenient (step over them or get your shoes damp) a source of splashes from carelessly driven cars, perhaps suggesting a blocked road drain or, worse, a developing flood.

Yet a simple reflection can turn a nuisance to be avoided into something beautiful to be captured in a photo! And this is what we are supposed to be like if we claim to follow Jesus. I might sometimes be seen as a nuisance to others, I may get in the way, I confess to having some bad habits. Don’t we all? I’m not always careful, not always gentle, not always kind.

But if following Jesus means attempting to become more like him, or allowing him to change me, then I should be like the dirty, inconvenient puddle. In other words I should be changed by reflecting his nature. Nothing beyond that is necessary! If, when you look at me, you instead see something of Jesus reflected in me – my work is done and it’s over to you to respond however you choose. You are not responding to me, you are responding to a perception of Jesus’ nature and character.

When: 1st January 2025
Where: Cricklade Street, Cirencester

< Previous | Index | Next >

Cirencester

For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:

A417 roadworks, Advent Market, Bishops Walk, Baunton, Canal 1, 2, Castle Street, Christmas lights 1, 2, Church 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Churn flood, Countryside, Fallen tree, Fleece, Gasworks, Gloucester Street, Hare 1, 2, Hospital, Market Place 1, Phoenix Fest, Riverside Walk, Stone plaque, Stratton Meadow, Tank traps, View, Wonky 1, 2, Yellow Iris

Themed image collections

The links below will take you to the first post in each collection

Cirencester, Favourites, Irish holiday 2024, Roman villa

Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!

A Cotswold scene

Travelling north and west from Cirencester takes you through steadily rising hills peaking at 330 metres or so, and dissected by water-cut valleys until you reach the Cotswold scarp.

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Image 116 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.

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This farmland just on the edge of Cirencester is a classic Cotswold scene. There is higher land in the background with scattered trees, and in the foreground you can see rich pasture good for cattle or horses.

The flat, pasture land is part of the River Churn flood plain, while the low hills beyond are outcrops of oolitic limestone, the rock that forms the backbone of the Cotswold hills. Travelling north and west from Cirencester takes you through steadily rising hills peaking at 330 metres or so, and dissected by water-cut valleys until you reach the Cotswold scarp that drops back almost to sea-level within a short distance. Beyond that is the wide, flat vale of the River Severn, and beyond that again, Wales with its hills and mountains. In medieval times Cirencester was known in Welsh as Caer Ceri. If the Saxons had not settled quite so far west, Cirencester might have signs saying ‘Croeso y Gaerceri’, and the Severn would have been Hafren.

When: 26th October 2023
Where: Gloucester Road, leaving Cirencester

< Previous | Index | Next >

Cirencester

For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:

A417 roadworks, Advent Market, Bishops Walk, Baunton, Canal 1, 2, Castle Street, Christmas lights 1, 2, Church 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Churn flood, Countryside, Fallen tree, Fleece, Gasworks, Gloucester Street, Hare 1, 2, Hospital, Market Place 1, Phoenix Fest, Riverside Walk, Stone plaque, Stratton Meadow, Tank traps, View, Wonky 1, 2, Yellow Iris

Themed image collections

The links below will take you to the first post in each collection

Cirencester, Favourites, Irish holiday 2024, Roman villa

Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!

Low cloud at Christmas

The Christmas lights had been switched on at the beginning of December and then we had low cloud.

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Image 112 – What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every day or so.

Enlarge

This was a magical moment that just asked to be captured. The Christmas lights had been switched on at the beginning of December and then we had low cloud. The top of the church tower was partly obscured, but other buildings in the town were not tall enough to be affected.

I took several shots, and this one seemed the best of them. So here it is for all to see. Happy Christmas and a wonderful New Year of grace and peace as we head into 2025.

See also:

< Previous | Index | Next >

Cirencester

For convenience, here’s a list of all the Cirencester area images:

A417 roadworks, Advent Market, Bishops Walk, Baunton, Canal 1, 2, Castle Street, Christmas lights 1, 2, Church 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Churn flood, Countryside, Fallen tree, Fleece, Gasworks, Gloucester Street, Hare 1, 2, Hospital, Market Place 1, Phoenix Fest, Riverside Walk, Stone plaque, Stratton Meadow, Tank traps, View, Wonky 1, 2, Yellow Iris

Themed image collections

The links below will take you to the first post in each collection

Cirencester, Favourites, Irish holiday 2024, Roman villa

Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!