Tuesday 1 March 2011

Hooton Pagnell Revisited

Ive lived around these parts all my life, but only discovered the lovely little village of Hooton Pagnell just before Christmas. I'd heard of it, and knew where it was, but just never visited it. My last visit was only fleeting, so I knew I would have to go back for a further visit.

With the sky looking like this on Sunday, I knew if we went for a walk, we wouldn't want to stray far from the car.
The village - like Wentworth - is an estate village with many of the houses still owned by the Estate owner who lives in the big house - and the big house is very big, beautiful but also sadly "out of bounds". This is his gatehouse.


A tantalising look up towards the house.

I think the hall is Elizabethan - its very beautiful. I would love a look around.

I think its amazing that it is still lived in. Rapunzel could let down her hair from this window.




The houses and cottages are all very pretty - its more like a Cotswold village


The surrounding area's and fields would have looked very different up until the 1980's as the area around here was heavily mined for coal, but none of the coal heaps are left - they have all been flattened.


There isn't much in the village, but the pub - The Hostel - seems to double as a village hall too.






We drove home through the pretty villages of Frickley and Clayton. Ive never been to these either!!! so will be back for more exploring as I must find out what happens at Teapot Corner!

13 comments:

LOVE STITCHING RED said...

Hi Diane, your comment made me laugh so much! Also saw the heart you made. Well done! I do hope your friend loved it. Will email. When are you coming down ?

x

Carol said...

You were just down the road from me!
Lovely village. Another one not far away is Hickleton. Carol xx

The Curious Cat said...

What a gorgeous little place...so much of the UK yet to see and explore...but you prove time and again that you are pretty well located with all these things on your doorstep! xxx

potterjotter said...

Hi - being from nearby Doncaster, I have visited this place years ago, but your pics make me want to go exploring the area again next time I'm visiting family in the area.

Mister D said...

I bet they are all little ex pit villages around there, in fact I think Brassed off was filmed in that area.

Ray+Joan said...

What a beautiful village Diane got to catch up with the rest of your blog.

Rosie said...

Gosh, I must have missed this one - I wondered about the 'More' images in your second post about Hooton Pagnell - it looks a lovely village. Love the mellow stone of all the villages and the street names are super - like the sound of teapot corner:)

David Richardson said...

I moved to Hooton Pagnell in 1964, when I was 8 years old. We were the first family allowed into the village, since the Lord of the manor realised that there were hardly any children left!

In those days you could definitely call the village 'traditional'! There were gravestones from the 1700s in the churchyard with the same names on them as some of my friends at school. On the other hand, people really tried hard to open up to us outsiders (my mum had three more children in quick succession after we moved there, and our family was almost overwhelmed by the help everyone gave us!).

The village school had just over 40 children in my day and was just across the road from our house (1 Snickett Cottages) was our address. The junior school had a row of desks for each 'standard', and the teacher was the fearsome Mrs Waller (who looked like Hattie Jacques). She found us city kids (we'd come from Sheffield) a bit of a challenge at first …

The village priest, Father Wilson, was another fearsome character. If you weren't seen in the church on a Sunday, you had to stand up in front of the whole school on Monday morning to account for why not (a good way to turn people off Christianity!). He once phoned the vicar of the church nearest to where my Gran lived in Sheffield to check that I'd been there one Sunday when I stayed over with her.

The third member of the 'squirearchy' (the Lord, the Priest and the Doctor) was Doctor Helmsley, a sane and sensible person who could have come straight out of a TV series!

Harvest time was great for us kids too. We'd all decamp to the cornfields for the day, building forts out of the bales of hay, eating our picnic food and occasionally being allowed to 'drive' the tractors (they actually had fixed throttles and only just rolled along, but we didn't know that!).

There were a lot of high days and holidays too, such as Mischief Night (4th November) when we kids would try to smear glue on door handles and chuck fireworks down people's chimneys (easier to do in a hilly village like Hooton). Every Christmas Lord and Lady Warde-Norbury would come down to the village school with a present for each child, and every summer the kids would all be invited up to the Hall for a garden party (usually with a conjurer).

… we moved away when I was 12 - down to London. Quite a contrast. It was a great time of life to live in a village, though.

Jill Ballard said...

I used to live in a place called Pott Row.... but I really want to live on Teapot Corner, and then I could call my house Cupcake Cottage, and I could wear my Cath Kidston apron and swan around the kitchen ..... I've gone to far haven't I?
Love Jill

Bill Royle said...

No-one seems to have mentioned that tunes were played on the church bells, not just peals. I spent my first 19 years in Goldthorpe, but often passed through Hooton Pagnell on bike rides.

Lee said...

I lovely area which I know well; I'm originally from Thurnscoe.

Also nearby, as Carol has mentioned, is Hickleton; but other villages situated along this section of the Yorkshire Limestone Ridge are Barnburgh, High Melton and Sprotbrough...all well worth a visit.

Anonymous said...

If I remember correctly the Church Bells play a hymn tune on the hour,

Unknown said...

Great comments , I film herein a regular basis , Its just lovely .Ricky from just 15 mins away from Hooten pagnell