Nottingham Off The Beaten Path

One of the best known pubs in Nottingham is Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalum, generally regarded as the oldest pub in England.
Established in the 12th Century, the inner walls of the Trip ( as its known ) are carved out of the sandstone under the csatle. It also serves anything from the traditional fine ales in a pub to good ' pub grub ' and is a experience like nothing else !

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The 100 bus goes outside the city to Southwell. The journey takes about 20+ minutes.
This quaint small town has a gorgeous Norman minster, Byron connections, a pub where Charles the First spent his last night of freedom before his capture by the roundheads, a National Trust Victorian workhouse and even a racecourse!
I always pop into the traditional sweetshop before taking the bus back.
Bus stop is in King Street.
Southwell has a folk music festival in early June.

It is held annually, please check the website for dates. It is held in the Sherwood Forest, and alot more people than i expected attended! There were jousting tornaments in a Robin Hood style, archery for all ages, craft stalls, people dressed up as characters, and much more! Was a great day out if you can get into the spirit of it. We did :)

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Drive or get the bus(N.o 7) to Woodborough village in July or August. Follow a public footpath(marked on the ordnance survey map) starting on the corner of a t-junction near the Woodborough Hall Hotel in the direction of Calverton and several fields later you can catch the scent wafting from behind a hedge. You come to a huge field with rainbow rows of every of variety of rose. On a hot day it's intoxicating!
I have a painting of the scene by a local artist.

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a few days before christmas, we went for a walk. a longish walk. following the nottingham canal through the city centre, past lots of narrow-boats, past joggers, homeless guitarists through to the industrial parts of beeston. no more people. just a canal and factories on each side. with ever-lowering sun. and mist. and cold. and leafless trees. then back to life at the beeston loch. where the river trent meets the canal. and makes marshy boggy wetlands with billabongs.

and so we found the attenborough nature reserve. cheek by jowl with industrial heartland of the midlands. birds and otters sandwiched between the radcliffe power station and a railway track. somehow beautiful all the same. this is life. all mixed up together. welcome to the midlands.

the picture is of the sun setting over one of the billabongs with the smoke from radcliffe power station in the background. i call it a billabong because i don't know what else to call it. i will have to ask an english person. it's too small for a lake. too big for an oversized pond. a top-ender from the NT can only think in terms of billabongs!

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Nottingham's caves are unusual in that they are not natural, limestone caves, but man-made sandstone ones. Most of them have been hacked out of Castle Rock, under Nottingham Castle. At different times in history, they have been used as storerooms, dwellings, air-raid shelters, bars and museums.

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Green's Windmill in Sneinton, was built by one of Nottingham's greatest sons, George Green (1793-1841): a brilliant mathematician and scientist. The son of a miller- baker, he entered Cambridge University at the age of 40. He went on to write his famous "An Essay on the Applications of Mathematical Analysis to the Theories of Electricity and Magnetism". Green's Therem and Green's Functions are still used today.

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Nottingham Canal opened in 1796. Originally, it extended 15 miles from Langley Mill to the River Trent in Nottingham. Nowadays only a 2.5 mile stretch remains in central Nottingham, from Lenton chain to the Trent. You can pay to travel on canal barges, or walk for free along the canal tow paths.