According to a recent article in The Times, which quoted a survey conducted by Travelodge hotel group, almost 5m southerners have never travelled north of the Watford Gap – and the cultural barrier, often known as the North-South divide, has become an equal deterrent in the opposite direction.

© David Sillitoe/ The Guardian

 

The North-South divide is not an exact line, but one that can involve many stereotypes, presumptions and other impressions of the surrounding region relative to other regions. The Times article quotes that almost three-fifths of northerners in the survey described southerners as “snobs” while half surveyed associated London and the home counties with “wide boys” and City brokers in “pinstripe suits”. For southerners, the north is a desolate landscape of derelict mining villages and fish and chip shops, and is dismissed by three-fifths as “bleak” and “unsophisticated”.

The existence of the North-South divide is often contested, although the Watford Gap service station is unofficially known by residents of London and southeast England as the point where the north-south divide occurs.

According to wikipedia, it has recently become more popular to use the phrase “north of Watford“, referring to the larger town. The reason for this change is probably due to the signs at Staples Corner, where the M1 begins, reading simply ‘M1, Watford, The North’ thus potentially implying that Watford is the last place in the South.

In his book The English, Jeremy Paxman proposed that the north might be defined as anywhere above a line drawn from the Severn to the Trent. Whereas Stewart Maconie, in his book Pies and Prejudice, suggests the north begins at Crewe station, beyond which point “the geology becomes harder, the accents flatter and the climate wilder. And the surface of the M6 turns from tarmac to cobbles.”

Having driven past Watford Gap, the Severn-Trent line and finally passing Crewe train station on Friday, we must officially now be in ‘The North’. 

 

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Continuing my weekly dispatch in The Times, week 7 was taken in Peatling Magna, Leicestershire.

Peatling Magna, Leicestershire, July 7th 2008

During a weekend break away a husband indulges his favourite pastime, angling, as his wife looks on. Behind them is All Saint’s Parish Church, which dominates the skyline of the Leicestershire village of Peatling Magna.

 

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Here’s a quick update on our route. Having started the month of July in Bedfordshire, we have since traveled through Northamptonshire and Warwickshire, dipping into the southern part of Leicestershire. Rather than continuing north to Nottinghamshire, as originally planned, we cut through Staffordshire into Shropshire. We’re now in Cheshire and we’ll be heading north into Lancashire next week. 

 

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On leaving our small campsite on a farm in Northumbria last week we came across a rather bizarre scene. There was a car parked on the side of the road with one door ajar and the keys left dangling in the boot lock. A pile of personal photographs and letters were lying on the ground by the open door and on the back seat were several bin bags full of clothes. There was nobody in the car and nobody to be seen in the vicinity. 

 

We alerted the owner of the farm as we departed. I can’t help wondering what the sequence of events were, that led to this strange finding and what the outcome was (it’s like the start of a movie script or crime novel).  

 

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So far during our journey St. George is definitely winning the popularity stakes. However, entering Cheshire yesterday, the reverse seems to be true. The citizens of this leafy (and wealthy) county are flying the Union Jack with pride, especially in the village of Audlem where the flag appeared to be flying outside every other house.

 

It’s even flying above my head as I write this post from our campsite outside Nether Alderley. (Please no wisecracks about my ability at parking! It was the only pitch left on the site).

 

The same cannot be said for Cheshire residents David and Ellen Stephenson who have flown a St. George’s flag at their home in Rochester Crescent, Crewe for more than eight years. The couple were featured on page 2 of yesterday’s Crewe Chronicle under the headline “National Pride? You’ll need to get permission for that…”

 

As Chronicle journalist Antonia Merola writes, “A patriotic Crewe couple have been told have have to apply for advertising consent to continue flying an England flag in their back garden.

In April the couple were sold an unofficial St. George’s flag with ‘England’ written across it and decided to put it up. 

The couple have now received a letter from Crewe & Nantwich Borough Council planning chiefs stating someone had queried whether their flag was breaking council rules. The letter advise them that, under the Town & Country Advertising Regulations 2007, flags are under the definition of ‘advertisement’ and because it was not the official national flag, they would require advertising consent.

David, 59, said: ‘We have been here 23 years and love coming back from holiday and seeing our flag flying as we drive up the road. What is the world coming to if you can’t have some price in your own nation?’

The couple have returned to flying an official St. George’s flag.”

 

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The most impressive vista of the journey so far has to be this view from Cross Dyke looking out over the Longmynd in Shropshire (Longmynd is ‘Long Mountain’ in Welsh).

 

 

 

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Continuing my weekly dispatch in The Times, week 6 was taken at the Royal Show, Stoneleigh.

Stoneleigh, Warwickshire, July 3rd 2008

Participants take part in a Wellie Wanging contest at the 159th Royal Show in Stoneleigh Park, Warwickshire. The contest was organised to help raise funds for the Farm Crisis Network charity. Wellie Wanging is believed to originated in Yorkshire and competitors are required to hurl a Wellington boot as far as possible within boundary lines.

 

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Where exactly is the middle of England? Many guess the answer is Meriden, near Coventry, where an ancient monument marks the “traditional centre of England”. In fact, the geographic centre of England is in a paddock at Lindley Hall Farm, outside the village of Fenny Drayton, owned by Margaret Farmer (aged 86). We paid a brief visit to the farm this week.

 

The nation’s chief mapping agency, the Ordnance Survey, has calculated the exact centre of England at grid reference SP 35373.66 96143.05 (a point just a couple of hundred metres from Mrs Farmer’s house).

When the BBC visited Mr and Mrs Farmer in 2002 (Mr Farmer has since deceased) the couple said they were “surprised” to learn their farm was special. Mrs Farmer said: “We like it here because it is nice and peaceful and it is good land.” The farm has been in the family for 41 years. It was formerly a dairy farm, but all its animals were destroyed following the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. It is now being farmed for sheep, cattle, wheat, oats and barley.

Commenting on the suggestion they should build tearooms and possibly American tourists would come out, Mrs Farmer said “I think we are a bit old for all that”. How refreshing!

However, citizens of Coventry are obviously proud of their status as being the closest city to the centre of England. As proved by this music fan I came across at this weekend’s Godiva Festival, which read: “Coventry- North of London, South of Manchester, Heart of England.”

 

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Today sees one of the finest events in the annual English sporting calendar taking place. And no it’s not the semi-finals at Wimbledon, the Henley Regatta or the practice run of the British Grand Prix at Silverston, but rather the highly competitive, highly sophisticated Oxted Pram Race. Having been a regular at the pram race in my teens, I’m extremely disappointed not to be able to document it for this project but our tight schedule demands that we are here in Coventry.

The annual Oxted Pram Race takes place on the Friday evening before the Oxted Carnival. Participating in the event is quite simple: pay an entry fee and ask family and friends to sponsor you to run the two thirds of a mile from Oxted train station to The Bell in Old Oxted High Street.  The only catch is that you have to push the pram wearing fancy dress and stop at each of the seven licensed premises on the way, where you have to down a drink as fast as you can.  There are prizes as well as penalties for how well you do.

Eric and Elsie Hallson started the pram race in 1977 after visiting friends in Clacton and attending a pram race there.  Eric quickly realized that the proximity of the pubs in Oxted this would be well suited to this type of event.

I’d be interested in any information on the origins of Pram Racing. A quick trawl of the internet provides very few clues, although it does bring up several other pram race listings around the country.

I did recently come across a picture of the Clutton village pram race from 1978 in the Looking Back pages of the Somerset Guardian.

 

This photograph was captioned ‘Rock-A-Bye-Baby: Contestants in the Clutton Pram Race get into the spirit’ and was dated May 5, 1978. Here is an extract from the accompanying article:

“On a grey, drizzly day, the colourful spectacle as almost 30 prams with runners and occupants lined up at the start, brought quite a few smiles to the faces of the holiday drivers held up in traffic queues on the A37. Landlady Molly Robinson, of the Warwick Arms, had hardly blown the whistle when the teams, complete with decorated prams, had their first massive pile-up just yards from the starting line. Best dressed on the day was the Clutton Methodist Sunday School with its flying doctor outfits.”

 

Mad Maldon Mud Race, Maldon, Essex, December 31st 2007

These mildly eccentric English pastimes seem to be enjoying a revival in recent years.  It could also be noted that pubs and the consumption of alcohol play a prominent role in them.  Is this in itself peculiarly English?  In fact, the Mad Maldon mud race, which I photographed in December, began as a result of a drunken conversation in the local pub, where one man challenged another to run across the mud flats and has since metamorphosised over the years into an annual race where a couple of hundred people get down and dirty squelching across the mud before celebrating in the pub afterwards.

 

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After a brief pit-stop in Northampton, we’re roadworthy again. Thanks to the mechanics at Marquis Motorhomes for fixing our leak in super quick time.

 

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