Post by deiniol on Oct 28, 2010 20:13:33 GMT -1
For most of my life, I've lived in Bournemouth, on the south coast. Historically, the bulk of the town is built on the southernmost extremity of the Dorset heathlands: wild, uninhabited and largely disused for agriculture. Obviously, the town is dominated by its proximity to the sea: the beaches and the sea are essentially the whole reason for the town's existence. I, however, have never really felt much connection with the sea. I don't find it particularly relaxing to look at or walk beside, nor do I feel much in the way of sheer elemental power from it. Even when I worked right on the beach, the sea was always something of a "non-entity" to me. My understanding of the landscape rather has always been predicated on my relationship with the town's waterways.
The area of the town I grew up in is on its northern edge, where the original heath meets the valley of the River Stour and where the urban landscape gives way to the rural. I lived only five minutes walk from the river, and spent a great deal of time along its banks as a child and a teenager (weirdly, using "its" there feels wrong to me: the river has become so highly personified in my personal mythos. I habitually refer to the river as "she".) The Stour is Dorset's longest river, and by the time it hits north Bournemouth it waters a broad, fertile floodplain which has seen human habitation since the early Bronze Age. In contrast to central Dorset, the Stour valley has always had a mixture of pastoral and agricultural uses: milk and corn, corn and milk. The local trees have been "managed" in the form of plantations and coppices since at least the Roman period. The impression I formed as a child of the spirit of this valley has always been one of a fairly domesticated, nurturing one, which is fairly understandable from the area's history as well.
The other main waterway in Bournemouth is the eponymous Bourne Stream, a narrow stream which rises in the north-west of the town on a remnant of the original heathland and flows through the centre to reach the sea just south of the town square. In its lower reaches the Bourne runs through a series of manicured pleasure gardens, culverted and in a straightened, paved channel. It flows into the sea by means of an outflow pipe: there's no natural estuary. Even as a small child, I always felt this to be a little heartbreaking. I suppose it's also contributed to my mental image of central Bournemouth having a great deal of suppressed rage underneath the staid, genteel exterior. I currently live only a few minutes away from the Bourne Stream, but still prefer to make the hour's journey on foot to the River Stour I knew as a child when I'm feeling in need of comfort. The Stour has always been a source of comfort to me, while the Bourne Stream almost feels like it needs placation and apologies rather than veneration.
Aside from the rivers, the other most significant feature of the local landscape to me is Hengistbury Head, an Iron Age hillfort on the headland which protects Christchurch Harbour (into which the Stour and the Avon flow). Before the Roman occupation of Britain, Hengistbury Head was the major trading centre of the Durotriges, connected as it was to the interior by the rivers Avon and Stour. The Romans preferred Moriconium in Poole Harbour, however, as it had better links to their network of roads, and Hengistbury Head was fairly swiftly abandoned. The headland is one of the most beautiful places in the Bournemouth-Poole-Christchurch conurbation. It's wild and almost entirely undeveloped, virtually unused since the Durotriges left. Not sure if it's just my overactive imagination, but the spirit of place here has always seemed to me to be like a solitary, forgotten watchman, guarding the eastern flank of Durotrigian territory until they come back home. In spite of the surrounding urban sprawl, Hengistbury Head always seems a very lonely place to me.
The area of the town I grew up in is on its northern edge, where the original heath meets the valley of the River Stour and where the urban landscape gives way to the rural. I lived only five minutes walk from the river, and spent a great deal of time along its banks as a child and a teenager (weirdly, using "its" there feels wrong to me: the river has become so highly personified in my personal mythos. I habitually refer to the river as "she".) The Stour is Dorset's longest river, and by the time it hits north Bournemouth it waters a broad, fertile floodplain which has seen human habitation since the early Bronze Age. In contrast to central Dorset, the Stour valley has always had a mixture of pastoral and agricultural uses: milk and corn, corn and milk. The local trees have been "managed" in the form of plantations and coppices since at least the Roman period. The impression I formed as a child of the spirit of this valley has always been one of a fairly domesticated, nurturing one, which is fairly understandable from the area's history as well.
The other main waterway in Bournemouth is the eponymous Bourne Stream, a narrow stream which rises in the north-west of the town on a remnant of the original heathland and flows through the centre to reach the sea just south of the town square. In its lower reaches the Bourne runs through a series of manicured pleasure gardens, culverted and in a straightened, paved channel. It flows into the sea by means of an outflow pipe: there's no natural estuary. Even as a small child, I always felt this to be a little heartbreaking. I suppose it's also contributed to my mental image of central Bournemouth having a great deal of suppressed rage underneath the staid, genteel exterior. I currently live only a few minutes away from the Bourne Stream, but still prefer to make the hour's journey on foot to the River Stour I knew as a child when I'm feeling in need of comfort. The Stour has always been a source of comfort to me, while the Bourne Stream almost feels like it needs placation and apologies rather than veneration.
Aside from the rivers, the other most significant feature of the local landscape to me is Hengistbury Head, an Iron Age hillfort on the headland which protects Christchurch Harbour (into which the Stour and the Avon flow). Before the Roman occupation of Britain, Hengistbury Head was the major trading centre of the Durotriges, connected as it was to the interior by the rivers Avon and Stour. The Romans preferred Moriconium in Poole Harbour, however, as it had better links to their network of roads, and Hengistbury Head was fairly swiftly abandoned. The headland is one of the most beautiful places in the Bournemouth-Poole-Christchurch conurbation. It's wild and almost entirely undeveloped, virtually unused since the Durotriges left. Not sure if it's just my overactive imagination, but the spirit of place here has always seemed to me to be like a solitary, forgotten watchman, guarding the eastern flank of Durotrigian territory until they come back home. In spite of the surrounding urban sprawl, Hengistbury Head always seems a very lonely place to me.