I KNOW HOW HE FELT (29/11/11)

Yesterday after the Tom Foolery with an unrobed Farther Christmas I carried on to Chirk Castle. It was shut. I didn’t bother with too many pictures as the light was awful. If you would like to have a good look then SCRIPTOR SENEX FROM RAMBLES FROM MY CHAIR was here earlier in the year and took lots of photographs of it. Inside and out there are more HERE. 

This fine edifice was completed in 1295. It looks as if it was extended and mucked about with up to Victorian times. It is impressive and commands wonderful views. I wouldn’t mind a good look round.

  The topiary is some of the best I’ve ever seen…….these are all Yew. There is a lot of maintenance here even taking into consideration that Yew is slow growing.

I must confess it really isn’t my favourite sort of place. I can appreciate it but it leaves me wishing it had grown old with a bit more dignity.

I set off down the hill towards the Castle Mill. I noticed it on the map and thought it may prove interesting. It didn’t and isn’t.

     It appears the path is closed but it mattered not as I’d already wandered it when I found this sign.

This is The Great Oak of the Gate of the Dead. It stands at the point where Offa's Dyke crosses the river Ceiriog.

In 1165 Henry II decided he had had it up to his eyes with the Welsh. They were being real pests, nipping over the border stealing cows and pigs and hens and other folks wives and daughters. Generally making a nuisance of themselves.

He gathered together a great army and set off from just down the road at Oswestry. His intention was to give them a good seeing to. Unfortunately the Ceiriog valley was full of impenetrable forest. He commandeered two thousand lumberjacks to clear a way for his Pikemen, Cavalry and everything else that goes along with great armies.

The Welsh were having none of it and led by Owain Gwynedd, harassed the vanguard of Henry’s army from the cover of the forest. It all came to a head just here and the battle of Crogen was fought on this very spot. Henry and his army took a real pasting and though he suffered heavy losses he did manage to breach Offa’s Dyke and continue into Wales.

It then started raining. What with the weather raining on him and the Welsh archers taking pot shots from behind every other tree he became a little disenchanted. He called it a day and went home to France.  

I know just how he felt. It’s cold, windy and wet.

The Welsh remained independent for another one hundred and twenty years.

As I’ve yet to be shot at by archers and can tolerate the weather, assuming they will have me I’m stopping a few more days.

Have fun.