www.beardchops.com
Pretty much zero planning got us to this place, I’d had it in mind to visit here for a long while after Dawn told me about it. Next up I’ll give a little history about the place courtesy of Wikipedia (thus rendering it most likely false);
After attempting 2 other places today and being presented with a building site and a large expanse of rubble we decided to head to this wonderful building. The odd sign here and there showed us what some of the rooms had previously been used for and the odd part was damaged by the infamous fire (which didn’t actually seem to have destroyed much in my eyes).
Lungs full of asbestos but happy as pigs in shit, goes to show that there actually is something worth seeing in Belper besides awesome deals on tasty meat!
A few weeks back, on a random drive out (let’s see what’s down here) we happened to see a bunch of old cooling towers appearing over the horizon. Upon closer inspection we noticed that what would have once been buildings next to the towers were now rubble so we decided to have a nosey.
A little bit of history about the place (stolen from Wikipedia)…
In the 1950s, two coal-fired power stations were built on a site off Twyford Road, between Willington and Findern. The stations were privatised and sold to National Power in the early 1990s and eventually closed in the mid-1990s. Although most of the stations were demolished at the turn of the millennium, the five cooling towers continue to dominate the skyline of the local area. The site[9] is earmarked for a large residential development, pending the results of a public inquiry. The construction plans have been met with local opposition, perhaps due to the site’s proximity to the River Trent’s flood plain.
In the mid-1990s a pair of peregrine falcons nested in one of the site’s huge cooling towers. Unlike many bird of prey breeding sites, this was widely publicised because of its impregnable location.
All in all, a very nice afternoon’s exploration, the resulting pictures are here…
Whilst I entered this gig with possibly too much expectation for my usual self I can’t deny being at least a little disappointed. The music was good, the sound quality was good, the band however didn’t seem with it, Robb talked at great length in between tracks, barely played his guitar and seemed to be struggling with the words to some degree.
Over the Christmas period me and Jen visited the Zoo at Shaldon in Devon just prior to visiting my favourite pub on earth.
So Jen gets me a top hat for my birthday, I can’t stop wearing it. So far I’ve worn it in the pub, at the work’s do, in the van, in the sea at midnight. I think I’m going to have some serious fun with this hat. I already have the rabbit :)>
Took these this morning because it was just stunning to be amongst
