Fountains Abbey

The day was beautiful, sunny but not too humid and on arrival at Fountains Abbey we discovered that it was a 'medieval' weekend.A Medieval camp had been set up on the Abbey Green with all sorts of local skills (medieval times) being demonstrated.  Keith was very interested in the weaponry and was shown how a cross bow was made, the different types and uses of bolts (or quarrels) and much to his delight was allowed to handle one.   There were people spinning, weaving, making chain mail as well as brewing barley beer (none to test though).  In the middle was the camp fire over which several people were slaving away making the camps evening meal.  It looked very appetising and we asked if we could join in but health and safety rules don't allow for visitors.  Pity.   Later in the afternoon there was dancing.  At this point I tried to insert a video I'd taken of the dancing but Blogger was taking so long I thought it might have crashed and cancelled it.  I'm posting photos instead.

Fountains Abbey is at the bottom of a valley and all you can see from the top is the top of the Abbey tower.

The walk down is fairly steep but when you come to see was small but really exciting and I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Pity though that photos weren't allowed.  The Focus group had all previously taken photos, drawings etc of the abbey to use as the source for their work.  It was surprising how different people approach the same subject.  The exhibition was entitled "Focus on Fountains" and many of the pieces were based on the abbey's arche.   I hope to use my photos to do something creative later.