Geographical – Journeys of Heart and Mind

Ready for a patio party

Cirencester had an Abbey, St Neots had a Priory; both are long since gone, but both are remembered still. Cirencester has a lovely public park, The Abbey Grounds, St Neots has a public building called The Priory Centre for theatrical and musical performances and all sorts of local events and meetings. Donna and I have very much enjoyed living in both places.

Our old patio

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Image of the day – 202

What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image whenever I can.

Before we moved to Cirencester we lived in a big old detached property in St Neots, Cambridgeshire. We could seat 10 or 11 people around the big table in our dining room, and a similar number on the patio outside. Our friends called it ‘The Party House’. When we first moved in, the house and garden both needed a lot of work; the second photo shows our housewarming party in September 1999, soon after we moved there. The mix of people includes people from work (Unilever), friends from church (Open Door, St Neots), and neighbours.

But Cirencester house prices are far higher than in St Neots so when we moved we bought a much smaller place and extended it, turning the garage into a bedroom and en suite bathroom. We still miss the spaciousness, but we love living in Cirencester. I began my life in this lovely, old, Cotswold town and it seems fitting to complete my life here too.

The local countryside

Quite apart from the town of Cirencester itself, the Cotswold countryside is very special. The towns and villages are all built from the same honey-coloured Oolitic limestone. Although it’s a beautiful colour when it’s freshly quarried or pressure washed, the stone ages to a pleasant neutral grey and becomes mottled as it hosts the growth of white, yellow and black lichens. Many of the buildings have traditional anti-drip ridges above the windows and doors, the roof tiles are frequently of Cotswold stone as well, and gutters, downpipes, doors and window frames are usually painted in a sympathetic, dusky, greyish-pale-green hue as well. These old homes, farmhouses and outbuildings blend gracefully into the countryside. Some of these buildings are rightfully famous, like Bibury’s Arlington Row (pictured above right). It almost looks as if the houses have sprung out of the ground like the nearby trees and hedges!

Historical change

Historically things were very different. If you’d visited the Cotswolds in 1500, the only stone buildings would probably have been ecclesiastical or military: churches, cathedrals and castles would have been built in stone along with city walls, but all the houses and many businesses (shops, pubs, inns and so on) would have been built of heavy wooden frames with wall infill of wattle and daub, a building technique going right back to Neolithic times.

Some of the old houses in Cirencester were originally built this way, rich wool merchants replacing them with stone in Georgian times, and in some cases a stone front was built just outside the old timber frame walls giving the appearance of a stone structure at lower cost. Arlington Row in Bibury was built by a local monastery for wool storage and later divided up for use as weaver’s cottages.

Rivers

Cirencester’s River Churn is part of the headwaters of the Thames. As rivers go it’s very small, rising at Seven Springs just south of Cheltenham, high in the Cotswold hills, running through a wooded, winding valley twelve miles to Cirencester and then joining the Thames at Cricklade after a further ten miles through flatter land. From the confluence with the Thames the Churn is by far the longer of the two rivers, but both names are very old, going back to the Iron Age, and perhaps a good deal earlier. Where they meet, the Thames is wider and deeper than the Churn so would have been thought the main river.

More on St Neots

I began this article with a photo of the patio at our old home in St Neots and I should say some more about that lovely old town before finishing. One of the main features of St Neots is the River Great Ouse, a huge and navigable river by comparison with the little Churn. Both the Thames and the Great Ouse enter the southern part of the North Sea on the east coast of England and at that point both are significant rivers.

Cirencester had an Abbey, St Neots had a Priory; both are long since gone, but both are remembered still. Cirencester has a lovely public park, The Abbey Grounds, St Neots has a public building called The Priory Centre for theatrical and musical performances and all sorts of local events and meetings. Donna and I have very much enjoyed living in both places.

St Neots is a good deal larger than Cirencester and both towns are still growing rapidly in size and population.

Being at home

As I was writing I began to see how important home is. Home can be anywhere on the land surface of this planet called ‘Earth’. But there is something special about home, this is true for all of us. The difference between St Neots and Cirencester is quite minor. English is the most spoken language in both towns. Food and drink are similar in both places, so are the customs and the public holidays and the way life is lived. I could feel at home in either place and I have friends in both places.

But the place where I currently live is special in certain ways. I know Cirencester very well, but St Neots will have changed slightly since we moved ten years ago. For all of us, home is the most familiar place in the world – quite literally.

And I began to see that the same is true in places that are not places at all. For me, heaven is a familiar ‘place’ too. Of course it’s not a physical place in the way St Neots or Cirencester are. But it’s certainly home for me, where everything is familiar and reliable. Heaven is where my heart is already, Jesus is there, his Spirit lives in me and with me day by day, hour by hour.

‘Home is where your heart is’, we are told. My heart is already in this mysterious non-place which is beyond any normal meaning of the word ‘place’. Thinking in terms of place just helps me relate the extraordinary to the ordinary of everyday life.

Perhaps in this last section I’ve lost many of my readers, but I know some of you understand what I’m trying to say. There is more mystery in this universe than we can grasp with everyday thoughts and ideas. Don’t dismiss these thoughts as the ramblings of a deluded old man, they are not that at all. Here is a hidden truth that we can all lean into; and there’s a treasure here that you do not want to miss. So take my advice – go on digging until you find the treasure. His name and his character are there for all who will look deep and long.

Consider starting by reading the gospels, or my personal story of discovering church, or what church is like when it’s growing as it should.

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Ullswater

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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!

Much time has passed

Destroyed Russian tanks (Wikimedia)

Forward look, ukraine – 6

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A great deal of time has passed since my last post in this series. For a good part of that period, Russia had made slow, steady, but very costly gains. Ukraine has restricted Russian progress to a slow, creeping level. However there have been other, very significant changes during 2026. If you’ve read this article you can jump direct to the list of useful links.

Chain of command

Russia has a very rigid chain of command, and at every level there are extreme pressures to report success rather than failure. Failure is punished, success brings reward or at least fends off punishment. So Putin orders an advance to capture town X, Russian generals command their officers to advance to X, junior officers command two or three soldiers to run to X with a Russian flag, if they fail to make it due to Ukrainian drone activity, two or three more are sent, eventually a photo of Russian soldiers flying a flag at X is returned.

The news of success (often exaggerated on the way) is passed back up the chain of command along with the photographic ‘evidence’, and the maps are changed to show X as captured. The Russian soldiers surrender or die and Putin is shown the ‘success’. And X remains for the time being in Ukrainian hands.

In Ukraine, things are done differently. Plans and objectives are decided by political and military leaders. The results of the planning are sent out in secret to the commanders on the ground. Both the commander and those below them are told what the objectives are but are free to adapt their actions based on what they find during the fight. They can take opportunities where they see them, use a different route or a different method if it’s more likely to succeed. Initiative is rewarded, they can adapt, while the Russian forces cannot.

Operation Vivaldi

Vivaldi has been a successful operation by Ukrainian forces, carefully planned, novel in approach, kept secret before it began, and not announced until objectives had already been reached at every stage. It’s still ongoing but only the military planners know what the next objectives and methods may be. This approach caught Russia totally unprepared and has already resulted in Russian forces retreating and hundreds of square kilometres being recovered by Ukraine.

Ukraine has lost men and equipment too, but on a far smaller scale. Their stubborn resistance along 1200 km of front line has prevented Russian forces from breaking through and although the forward momentum has been in favour of Russian forces it has also been momentum of a very slow, creeping kind. Ukraine has acted entirely within Geneva Convention rules.

On the missile and drone warfare there is a similar difference in approach between the two sides. Russia has targeted residential areas of towns and cities, even hospitals, schools, shopping centres and cultural treasures along with critical infrastructure, especially electricity power stations and local distribution transformers. Again, most of these targets are illegal under international laws and agreements, Russia being a signatory to many of them.

Ukraine has focused on military targets – command and control centres, airfields, naval dockyards and ships, army training camps, troop concentrations, oil production and storage facilities, arms factories, ammunition storage facilities, radar equipment, bridges, railways and roads feeding military traffic to the areas of conflict.

The effects so far

There have been small, creeping movements along the frontline, mostly in Russia’s favour, although the trend has been slower and slower over the past months and now Ukraine is beginning to make small advances as well from time to time, usually by means of well-planned and well-executed actions when good opportunities arise. Vivaldi has greatly increased the pace of advance.

Economic considerations

The Russian economy is showing serious and dangerous strain. The rouble has lost a lot of value against western currencies. Interest rates are high as the central bank has used this as a tool to restrict inflation; but the increased borrowing costs have killed industrial investment. Unemployment is very low and Putin has claimed that as a great success, though the reason for it is that military casualties are excessively high and huge numbers have fled the country.

Strategy and outcomes

During Summer and autumn of 2026 Ukraine has developed new military equipment including more advanced drones and missiles, the FP9 missile carries a moderately powerful warhead so is very hard to shoot down once it’s been launched, it can hit targets up to 300 km or so and hits targets within a minute or two of launch. Using these home-developed tools Ukraine has systematically degraded Russian air defences, fuel supplies, ammunition dumps, communications. All of this has made it easier for Ukraine to strike Russian targets more and more frequently and accurately.

Military production

Russia is still producing new drones, missiles, ammunition, aircraft, tanks and other armoured vehicles, but at a slower rate than the losses inflicted by Ukraine. Stocks of all these essential items have therefore dwindled away and now appear to be in short supply.

Ukraine has also ramped up production of military hardware and consumables and is now in a position to continue fighting even if supplies from the West diminish. Furthermore, Ukraine has continued to develop improved versions of missiles and drones of all kinds.

Innovation

Russia has made progress with drone development, and has makes use of FPV drones controlled via optic cable since this cannot be blocked by radio jamming.

However, Ukrainian production and use of advanced drones outstrips Russian developments. They’re using AI drones that can navigate accurately by machine vision or terrain following so are not dependent on constant control by a human operator. Recently, Ukrainian sea drones have been fitted with both machine guns and ground to air missiles and have downed helicopters sent to destroy them. This is a major new technological achievement.

One surprise in Operation Vivaldi was that Ukraine used heavy cargo drones to transport amphibious drones to areas behind the Russian forces, these were basically tracked land drones modified to be able to cross swamps, rivers and ditches. They came up unexpectedly behind Russian forces and attacked them from the rear enabling Ukrainian forces to take positions more quickly and easily. This was so effective that Ukraine could bring armoured vehicles and tanks into action. In this way Ukraine crossed the Zherebets River and expanded their control into areas considered safe by Russian forces.

And the future?

The balance has been shifting in Ukraine’s favour in so many ways, and the best predictions suggest the Russian economy will collapse, most likely slowly, then suddenly. It’s impossible to know precisely when ‘suddenly’ will come, but it will be devastating when it does and may now be very close. Economic collapse will likely mean military defeat and political upheavals as well.

Russian strategy

Russia continues its effort to kill civilians and destroy civilian infastrucure. They are using glide bombs, jet drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles, all hard to destroy or stop. Ukraine is adapting, but civilian losses have increased recently in the face of attacks on high rise apartments, shopping centres, railways, schools and hospitals. All such attacks are illegal in international law of course, but Russia seems not to care. The world must make them care, and surely will do.

In conclusion

Russia thought they could topple the Ukrainian Government within perhaps 10 days. But they failed. It will be a terribly hard winter in both countries, but Russia should remember that it lies further north than Ukraine. Kyiv may face temperatures as low as -20 C, but Moscow could well be -25 to -27 C. If I had to make a prediction it would be that Ukraine will win this war eventually but it’s impossible to judge how much longer it will take. Putin will fall from power, he may be murdered by his own people, military, angry oligarchs, or a popular uprising. If he survives he might end up at the International Court at The Hague. It will be a deservedly ignominious end. Ukraine will rebuild and become prosperous, regaining her currently lost territories in the east. Russia fall apart into a variety of constituent nations. It will be hard to predict it could be as soon as tomorrow or it might take a couple more years.

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A stunning ceiling

We went to see Worcester’s famous cathedral. There was a service underway so we couldn’t visit the nave, but today’s photo shows a section of ceiling between the choir and the altar retaining stunningly beautiful medieval-style painted decoration.

A stunning ceiling

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Image of the day – 201

What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image whenever I can.

We visited Worcester recently, we wanted to visit the birthplace of the famous composer, Edward Elgar, in a nearby village, but afterwards we drove to the old city, parked the car, and went to see the famous cathedral. There was a service underway so we couldn’t visit the nave, but today’s photo shows a section of ceiling between the choir and the altar retaining stunningly beautiful medieval-style painted decoration. The stone vaulting was built in the 14th century and the decoration restored in Victorian times.

Beautiful buildings

Up until Henry VIII’s split from the Catholic Church, some of the most beautiful buildings in Britain were the old monasteries and abbeys, all of them Catholic and most of them destroyed and/or sold off to Henry’s associates and friends. A few centuries later Oliver Cromwell’s men caused further loss and damage, pulling down statues and rood screens, whitewashing painted masonry, and more.

Here are a few of the ruined treasures I’ve seen with my own eyes and wished I might have seen before their destruction took place: Cirencester Abbey, Fountains Abbey, Malmesbury Abbey, Tintern Abbey, Whitby Abbey. See some of these and many more at English Heritage.

But here in Worcester Cathedral some of that splendour is still to be seen, and the ceiling is just a part of it. We can make good guesses about some of the losses from documents, drawings and paintings created by people who had seen some these places before they were destroyed. Past structures can be partially imagined as well, reconstructed in our minds from fragmentary records glued together by informed thinking.

This can be extended to the deeper past as well, we can imagine Roman Cirencester (or Corinium as it was known during that era), and know small parts of it quite well based on excavated remains and reconstructions.

And in our own day?

What parts of our own early 2000s architecture and artworks will be lost before future generations have an opportunity to admire and enjoy them? We do have one advantage over past times, and that’s our ability to photograph and video structures and artworks before they are lost. This was emphasised for me when Donna and I visited the Lowther Estate during our recent family holiday in the Lake District. We drove east from our holiday house in Windermere to visit this very grand old palace, built in 1806 to replace Lowther Hall which had suffered a fire and was in a poor state of repair.

The days of grand, old houses were passing and Lowther Castle was no exception. The grounds were used for tank training during World War 2 and the beautiful and extensive gardens decayed and were later used to grow spruce for timber. The roof of the building was removed along with many of the internal walls. The two photos below show part of the interior more than 100 years ago and as it appears today.

These images represent similar parts of the building. I can’t claim they’re correctly matched, but they are close. The top photo was taken before the roof was removed and the interior structures demolished.

Click the photos to expand them.

The lower photo shows the area as it is today. These images allow us to compare two instants in time, one before the destruction and one afterwards. In a sense we can see what has changed. Technology moves on, the first image lacks colour. For more recent changes we can compare colours, movement, sound and more. So the further back in time we go, the less full and accurate the information tends to be.

There’s one more detail worth mentioning. If you expand the first photo and look at the upper right, you’ll see a statue, probably of William Lowther, 1st Earl of Lonsdale (1757–1844), the man who had the present castle built between 1806 and 1814. He’s depicted as a knight in chain mail with a large sword. A small piece of that statue survives and today stands incongruously in the gardens outside the ruined building. This is one of the few details of the interior still visible to visitors today.

It seems extraordinary today that such an amazing building would be deliberately destroyed, but death duties often made it impossible for stately homes to continue in occupation and that was the case with Lowther Castle. So many lovely old houses were demolished for the same reason during the early 20th century. It’s one of the tragedies of that period of British history.

But there’s much to celebrate, too. The National Trust and English Heritage were set up to save, restore and conserve what remains; and without them we would have lost so, so much more. Let’s remember, too, that we each live our own lives and there are so many ways we can care for the people and places we value. Surely our place in this world, individually and together, is to do as much good and as little harm as possible in every aspect of our daily lives. So enjoy today to the utmost, care for the people you meet and the places you go, focus on justice, peace and beauty and you won’t go far wrong.

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The Lake District

Caring on the water

Image of the day – 26

An old castle made new

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Climate emergency!

If you’ve made it to this point, then ‘Thank you for watching and thinking it over’, and thank you also for anything you can do, however small, to reduce your impact on our climate in the days and years ahead. Many small impacts can add up to something really significant.

Climate emergency!

ad hoc post – 7

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The UK Government commissioned a video nine months ago to launch their response to what is now seen as a full blown climate emergency. It’s a good video; it includes presentations by people who are experts in their fields; it’s informative; and it’s very hard-hitting. It’s not widely available except through a series of local meetings throughout the UK where it’s being used very effectively to get people thinking and responding in useful ways at the local community level.

Click the video below to watch the Earth turn on its axis. Your home is here, can you spot it as it rolls by? This planet is home to every single one of us.

The UK Government video is available, however, on YouTube, published there by GB News.

Whether you live in the UK or not, I suggest you watch this video in full. (Note that the useful content ends at 2 hrs 41 mins into the video. There are plenty of natural breaks between speakers so you can watch it in sections if you find that more convenient.)

If you live in the UK, I also suggest you attend one of the many local meetings currently available, discuss what you have seen with others at the meeting, and try to get other local friends and family to join you. If you can’t find a meeting, you can always organise one yourself. as you watch, jot down anything that strikes you as particularly important or significant.

Finally, go through anything you wrote down and consider how it will affect you, your friends, your family, and your community. Is there anyone else you should share this with? Could you watch the video again with friends, family or neighbours and talk it over together? Also (and just as importantly) think about ways of reducing your individual impact on the climate.

If you’ve made it to this point, then ‘Thank you for watching and thinking it over’, and thank you also for anything you may do, however small, to reduce your impact on our climate in the days and years ahead. Many small impacts can add up to something really significant. That, after all, is how we got into this mess in the first place. It may also play a significant part in getting us out of the dangers we now face.

I have one last thing to say, and this is primarily for anyone involved in church in any shape or form; but please don’t let that stop you reading it. Jesus was prophetic and that’s a gift with two characteristics. On the one hand it forges links between people here on the planet we call Earth and the Father we think of as living in heaven. But also the prophetic gift involves bringing people together here on Earth, forging links between opposing sides, rebuilding trust and a willingness to work together, mending broken fences. Prophetic people are always demanding justice and aiming to reforge broken links. A sort of conciliation service. If we ever needed a conciliation service we need one now.

So if you are involved in any form of church, now is the time to recognise your prophetic gift (whether strong or weak) and use it to call as loudly as possible for everyone to work together to save this planet at last from the danger we have put it in. There is no time to lose. We need to bridge the gulf between those who would profit in the short term with no concern about next year or the decades and centuries ahead, and those who would do without in the here and now to secure a long term future for children, grandchildren and great-great- grandchildren.

Prophetic voices would give vision to the former, and hope to the latter. Indeed, there are many prophetic voices in the government film you just watched. It would be a serious mistake to think that church has a monopoly on gifts like this.

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Climate change ideas

Mentioned in News

It’s a great place to stay up-to-date on all sorts of important topics. Furthermore, you need a university degree as the bare minimum if you want to write articles for the website. This results in a high standard of writing.

The Conversation

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On the web – 2

I’ve started reading The Conversation, not every item but whenever I spot something that catches my attention. This happened back on 8th April when I added a news item based on a post from ‘The Conversation’. This time I’d like to write about the website itself, not just an item that I read and liked.

The web as intended

I mentioned this in the news item. Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of the World-Wide-Web, made his original intentions very clear in his recent book, ‘This is for Everyone’. The web, especially recently, has significantly tampered with and damaged what he had hoped to create. If you read the book you’ll see what he means and how he intends to fix things and is already working to do so.

The Conversation is a website that already conforms rather well to Berners-Lees’s intentions. For one thing it’s completely free to use, like Wikipedia, the Internet Archive, and my own site which you’re reading now. Everything here is free to read, use, copy, and re-use. Check my copyright page for more details.

‘The Conversation’ presents world news and updates and articles on research and development; so it’s a great place to stay up-to-date on all sorts of important topics. Furthermore, you need a university degree as the bare minimum if you want to write articles for the website. This results in a high standard of writing and articles you should be able to trust. There are different versions for different nations and regions, every Conversation page has a drop down list near the top where you can select the version you want to view.

That’s all I wanted to say about ‘The Conversation’. If you subscribe for notifications and read whatever grabs your attention, you’ll stand a good chance of being better informed than ever before and enjoying the process as well. Happy reading!

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https://jhm.scilla.org.uk/2026/04/01/current-roundup

Another great post

Category: Geographical

Ready for a patio party

Image of the day – 202

The local countryside

Historical change

Rivers

More on St Neots

Being at home

See also:

You might also like:

Useful? Interesting?

Much time has passed

Forward look, ukraine – 6

Chain of command

Operation Vivaldi

The effects so far

Economic considerations

Strategy and outcomes

Military production

Innovation

And the future?

In conclusion

See also:

Useful? Interesting?

A stunning ceiling

Image of the day – 201

Beautiful buildings

And in our own day?

See also:

You might also like:

Useful? Interesting?

Mentioned in News

On the web – 2

The web as intended

See also:

You might also like:

Useful? Interesting?