Kingsand and Cawsand are twin villages in southeast Cornwall, England, United Kingdom.The villages are situated on the Rame Peninsula and in the parish of Maker-with-Rame.Until boundary changes in 1844 Kingsand was in Devon; Cawsand, however, was always in Cornwall. On the old county boundary between the two villages there is still a house called Devon Corn, which has the marker on the front of the house. The villages are popular with tourists but retain their traditional character.The villages are well known for their smuggling and fishing past. Although the known smuggling tunnels have been sealed up, there are still old fish cellars and boat stores to be seen along the coast.One notable former resident was John Pollard RN. He was a midshipman in the Navy who served under Nelson and is the man credited with being "Nelson's avenger", since it was he who shot the French sailor who killed the Admiral. Nelson himself has also been said to have visited the village and dined at The Ship Inn. Other notable residents have included Tabitha Ransome and also Ann Davison who was to become the first woman to sail the Atlantic single handed in 1953 and departing from Mashfords boatyard.There are three main beaches in the villages, which are separated by areas of rocks with interesting rockpools. Kingsand Beach is a mixture of sand and shingle which is located along The Cleave. Girt Beach is mainly shingle, but with some sand and can be found along Market Street. Cawsand Beach is mainly sand and is found along The Bound. A swimming beach known as Sandways lies a short walk out of the village across the rocks towards Fort Picklecombe.The water quality has improved over recent years thanks to extensive sewerage works and so all beaches are safe for swimming.

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Derbyshire is a county in the East Midlands of England. A substantial portion of the Peak District National Park lies within Derbyshire. The southern extremity of the Pennine range of hills extends into the north of the county. The county contains part of the National Forest, and borders on Greater Manchester to the northwest, West Yorkshire to the north, South Yorkshire to the northeast, Nottinghamshire to the east, Leicestershire to the southeast, Staffordshire to the west and southwest and Cheshire also to the west. In 2003 the Ordnance Survey placed Church Flatts farm, near Coton in the Elms, as the furthest point from the sea in Great Britain.

The city of Derby is now a unitary authority area, but remains part of the ceremonial county of Derbyshire. The non-metropolitan county contains 30 towns with between 10,000 and 100,000 inhabitants. There is a large amount of sparsely populated agricultural upland: 75% of the population live in 25% of the area.

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Prior Park is a Palladian house, designed by John Wood, the Elder in the 1730s and 1740s for Ralph Allen, on a hill overlooking Bath, Somerset, England. It has been designated as a Grade I listed building.The house was built to demonstrate the properties of Bath Stone as a building material. The design followed work by Andrea Palladio and was influenced by drawings originally made by Colen Campbell for Wanstead House in Essex. The main block had 15 bays and each of the wings 17 bays each. The surrounding parkland had been laid out in 1100 but following the purchase of the land by Allen 11.3 hectares (28 acres) were established as a landscape garden. Features in the garden include a Palladian Bridge which is also Grade I listed. Prior Park Landscape Garden is now owned by the National Trust.Following Allen's death the estate passed down through his family. In 1828 it was purchased by Bishop Baines for use as a Roman Catholic College. The house was then extended and a chapel and gymnasium built by Henry Goodridge. The house is now used by Prior Park College.

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Derbyshire is a county in the East Midlands of England. A substantial portion of the Peak District National Park lies within Derbyshire. The southern extremity of the Pennine range of hills extends into the north of the county. The county contains part of the National Forest, and borders on Greater Manchester to the northwest, West Yorkshire to the north, South Yorkshire to the northeast, Nottinghamshire to the east, Leicestershire to the southeast, Staffordshire to the west and southwest and Cheshire also to the west. In 2003 the Ordnance Survey placed Church Flatts farm, near Coton in the Elms, as the furthest point from the sea in Great Britain.The city of Derby is now a unitary authority area, but remains part of the ceremonial county of Derbyshire. The non-metropolitan county contains 30 towns with between 10,000 and 100,000 inhabitants. There is a large amount of sparsely populated agricultural upland: 75% of the population live in 25% of the area.

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Chesil Beach /ˈtʃɛzɨl/, sometimes called Chesil Bank, in Dorset, southern England is one of three major shingle structures in Britain.Its toponym is derived from the Old English ceosel or cisel, meaning "gravel" or "shingle".The beach is often identified as a tombolo, although research into the geomorphology of the area has revealed that it is in fact a barrier beach which has "rolled" landwards, joining the mainland with the Isle of Portland, giving the appearance of a tombolo. The shingle beach is 29 kilometres long, 200 metres wide and 15 metres high. The beach and the Fleet are part of the Jurassic Coast, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the location for a 2007 novel, On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan.At the eastern end of the beach at the village of Chiswell, against the cliffs of the Isle of Portland, the beach curves round sharply to form Chesil Cove. This part of the beach protects the low-lying village from flooding. Westwards the shingle forms a straight line along the coast, enclosing the Fleet, a shallow tidal lagoon.The beach provides shelter from the prevailing winds and waves for the town of Weymouth and the village of Chiswell.Varying with the Bank's unbroken increase in height, to 14.7 metres , above mean high water, the size of the flint and chert shingle varies from pea-sized at the north-west end  to orange-sized at the south-east end . It is said that smugglers who landed on the beach in the middle of the night could judge "exactly where they were" by the size of the shingle.

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The Lake District, also commonly known as The Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous not only for its lakes, forests and mountains, but also for its associations with the early 19th century poetry and writings of William Wordsworth and the other Lake Poets.Historically shared by the counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire, the Lake District now lies entirely within the modern county of Cumbria. All the land in England higher than three thousand feet above sea level lies within the National Park, including Scafell Pike, the highest mountain in England. It also contains the deepest and longest lakes in England, Wastwater and Windermere, respectively.The Lake District National Park includes nearly all of the Lake District, though the town of Kendal and the Lakeland Peninsulas are currently outside the Park boundary.The area, which was designated a National Park on 9 May 1951, is the most visited national park in the United Kingdom with 15.8 million annual visitors and more than 23 million annual day visits, the largest of the thirteen National Parks in England and Wales, and the second largest in the UK after the Cairngorms.Its aim is to protect the landscape by restricting unwelcome change by industry or commerce. Most of the land in the Park is in private ownership. The National Trust owns about a quarter of the total area, United Utilities owns eight per cent and 3.9% belongs to the Lake District National Park Authority. The National Park Authority is based at offices in Kendal. It runs a visitor centre on Windermere at a former country house called Brockhole,Coniston Boating Centre and Information Centres.In common with all other National Parks in England, there is no restriction on entry to, or movement within the park along public routes, but access to cultivated land is usually restricted to public footpaths, bridleways and byways. Much of the uncultivated land has statutory open access rights - which cover around 50% of the Park.The lakes and mountains combine to form impressive scenery. Farmland and settlement add aesthetic value to the natural scenery with an ecology modified by human influence for millennia and including important wildlife habitats. The Lake District has failed to be approved as a natural World Heritage Site, because of human activities, such as commercial forestry, which have adversely impacted the park's assessment. Another bid is being prepared for World Heritage Status, this time in the category of cultural landscape.

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Robin Hood’s Bay is a small fishing village and a bay located within the North York Moors National Park, five miles south of Whitby and 15 miles north of Scarborough on the coast of North Yorkshire, England. Bay Town, its local name, is in the ancient chapelry of Fylingdales in the wapentake of Whitby Strand.The origin of the name is uncertain, and it is doubtful if Robin Hood was ever in the vicinity. An English ballad and legend tell a story of Robin Hood encountering French pirates who came to pillage the fisherman's boats and the northeast coast. The pirates surrendered and Robin Hood returned the loot to the poor people in the village that is now called Robin Hood's Bay.The town, which consists of a maze of tiny streets, has a tradition of smuggling, and there is reputed to be a network of subterranean passageways linking the houses. During the late 18th century smuggling was rife on the Yorkshire coast. Vessels from the continent brought contraband which was distributed by contacts on land and the operations were financed by syndicates who made profits without the risks taken by the seamen and the villagers. Tea, gin, rum, brandy and tobacco were among the contraband smuggled into Yorkshire from the Netherlands and France to avoid the duty.In 1773 two excise cutters, the Mermaid and the Eagle, were outgunned and chased out of the bay by three smuggling vessels, a schooner and two shallops.A pitched battle between smugglers and excise men took place in the dock over 200 casks of brandy and geneva and 15 bags of tea in 1779.

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The Saltburn Cliff Lift is a funicular railway located in Saltburn-by-the-Sea, Redcar and Cleveland and the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire, England. It is the oldest operating water-balance cliff lift in the United Kingdom.The Stockton and Darlington Railway arrived in Saltburn from Redcar on 17 August 1861, prompting a growth in day and holiday travellers.Like many seaside resorts, this created a local business initiative, resulting in various pieces of construction, including the Saltburn Pier completed in 1869. Access to the pier from the town via the steep cliff top was difficult, so a solution was sought.The Saltburn Pier company contracted John Anderson to engineer a solution, which was the wooden Cliff Hoist. Allowing up to 20 people to be placed in a wooden cage and then lowered by rope to beach level, it opened on 1 July 1870, some 14 months after the opening of the pier. Approached from the town by a narrow walkway, the passengers then descended 120 feet, after water had been added to or taken away from a counterbalance tank.

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Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Borough of Scarborough and English county of North Yorkshire. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a combined maritime, mineral and tourist heritage, and is home to the ruins of Whitby Abbey where Caedmon, the earliest English poet, lived. The fishing port emerged during the Middle Ages and developed important herring and whaling fleets,and was where Captain Cook learned seamanship. Tourism started in Whitby in Georgian times and developed with the coming of the railway in 1839. Tourist interest is enhanced by its location surrounded by the high ground of the North York Moors national park and heritage coastline and by association with the horror novel Dracula. Jet and alum were mined locally, and Whitby jet, which was mined by the Romans and Victorians became fashionable during the 19th century.The earliest record of a permanent settlement is in 656, when Streonshal, was the place where Oswy, the Christian king of Northumbria, founded the first abbey, under the abbess, Hilda. The Synod of Whitby was held there in 664. In 867, the monastery was destroyed by Viking raiders, and was re-founded in 1078. It was in this period that the town gained its current name, Whitby, (from "white settlement" in Old Norse). In the following centuries Whitby functioned as a fishing settlement until, in the 18th century, it developed as a port and centre for shipbuilding and whaling, trade in locally mined alum and the manufacture of Whitby jet jewellery.The abbey ruin at the top of the east cliff is the town's oldest and most prominent landmark with the swing bridge across the River Esk and the harbour sheltered by the grade II listed east and west piers being other significant features. Statues of James Cook and William Scoresby and a whalebone arch all point to a maritime heritage. The town also has a strong literary tradition and has featured in literary works, television and cinema; most famously in Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula.

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Coniston is a village and civil parish in the Furness region of Cumbria, England. It is located in the southern part of the Lake District National Park, between Coniston Water, the third longest lake in the Lake District, and Coniston Old Man; about 18 miles north east of Barrow-in-Furness.Coniston is a popular spot for hill-walking and rock-climbing; there are fine walks to be had on the nearby Furness Fells and Grizedale Forest, and some of the finest rock in the Lake District on the eastern face of Dow Crag, 3 miles from the village. The Grizedale Stages rally also takes place in Coniston, using the surrounding Grizedale and Broughton Moor forests.The creation of the national park in the 1950s provided a further boost to tourism, with attractions such as the John Ruskin Museum and ferry services across the lake developing. Donald Campbell added to the profile of the village and lake when he broke four World Water Speed Records on the lake in the 1950s. He died attempting to break the world water speed record for the eighth time in 1967, when his jet boat, "Bluebird K7", crashed at 290 mph, having already set the record for the seventh time at Dumbleyung Lake, Western Australia in 1964. His body and boat were discovered and recovered by divers in 2001 and he was buried in the new graveyard in Coniston in September 2001. A new wing has been built at the Ruskin Museum to accommodate the fully restored Bluebird K7 boat. It opened in late 2009 with the K7 due to arrive in late 2011 or early 2012.The village is also home to a number of hotels and two Youth Hostels, one at the edge of the village, the other in the nearby Coppermines Valley.Two slate quarries still operate at Coniston, one in Coppermines Valley, the other at Brossen Stone on the east side of the Coniston Old Man. Both work Coniston's volcanic slates, being blue at Low-Brandy Crag in Coppermines Valley, and light green at Brossen Stone.Coniston is also an important local centre, with a Secondary School,Primary School, bank, petrol station and other such services. It has also repeatedly been highly placed in the Village of the Year award, winning it in 1997.The scenery around Coniston derives from Coniston Limestone and rocks of the Borrowdale Volcanic Group.

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Carnewas & Bedruthan Steps is a stretch of coastline located on the north Cornish coast between Padstow and Newquay, in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom.It is within the parish of St Eval and is part owned by the National Trust. The Trust maintains a shop and cafe and the cliff–top view of rocks stretching into the distance along Bedruthan beach makes the area a popular attraction for tourists and painters. The property affords walks along the coast path and the steep steps at Bedruthan allow access to a series of rocky beaches at low tide. Signs at the top of the steps down to the beaches warn visitors not to risk swimming in these waters due to heavy rips, fast tides and submerged rocks.There have been people in the area since at least the Bronze Age with six barrows nearby to the north, and overlooking Bedruthan Steps is Redcliff Castle, which dates back to at least the Iron Age. Redcliff Castle has three ramparts divided by two ditches, part of which have been quarried to improve the defences. Much of the internal parts of the castle have been eroded by the sea. There is a second castle within a mile to the north at Park Head and two miles to the south at Griffin's Point, a third. Cliff Castles or Promontory forts are defensive structures which are thought by archaeologists to be permanently occupied.In 2009 a menhir or longstone was discovered in a boundary hedge close to the coastal footpath. The stone lies on its side and is 9 feet long.There is evidence of mining with shafts on the cliffs nearby at Trenance Point, and adits above the beach at Carnewas. The National Trust shop was originally the count house of Carnewas Mine and the cafe was one of the mine buildings. Between 1871 and 1874, 940 tons of brown haematite were produced and it is thought that the ladders and steps to the beach were needed to reach the mine workings. The name Bedruthan Steps is said to be taken from a mythological giant called 'Bedruthan' who used the rocks on the beach as stepping stones, and seems to be a late nineteenth century invention for Victorian tourists. The first written record of the name is from the West Briton newspaper in February 1847 and is likely to refer to one of two cliff staircases used by miners to get to the mine workings and now refers to the whole beach.Each of the stacks has a name and from north to south they are Queen Bess, Samaritan Island, Redcove Island, Pendarves Island and Carnewas Island. Samaritan Island is named after a ship the Good Samaritan which was wrecked there in October 1846 with the loss of nine lives.

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Lindisfarne Castle is a 16th-century castle located on Holy Island, near Berwick-upon-Tweed, Northumberland, England, much altered by Sir Edwin Lutyens in 1901. The island is accessible from the mainland at low tide by means of a causeway.The castle is located in what was once the very volatile border area between England and Scotland. Not only did the English and Scots fight, but the area was frequently attacked by Vikings. The castle was built in 1550, around the time that Lindisfarne Priory went out of use, and stones from the priory were used as building material. It is very small by the usual standards, and was more of a fort. The castle sits on the highest point of the island, a whinstone hill called Beblowe.Lindisfarne's position in the North Sea made it vulnerable to attack from Scots and Norsemen, and by Tudor times it was clear there was a need for a stronger fortification, although obviously, by this time, the Norsemen were no longer a danger. This resulted in the creation of the fort on Beblowe Crag between 1570 and 1572 which forms the basis of the present castle.After Henry VIII suppressed the priory, his troops used the remains as a naval store. In 1542 Henry VIII ordered the Earl of Rutland to fortify the site against possible Scottish invasion. By December 1547, Ralph Cleisbye, Captain of the fort, had guns including; a wheel mounted demi-culverin; 2 brass sakers; a falcon; and another fixed demi-culverin.However, Beblowe Crag itself was not fortified until 1549 and Sir Richard Lee saw only a decayed platform and turf rampart there in 1565. Elizabeth I then had work carried out on the fort, strengthening it and providing gun platforms for the new developments in artillery technology. These works in 1570 and 1571 cost £1191.When James I came to power in England, he combined the Scottish and English thrones, and the need for the castle declined. At this time the castle was still garrisoned from Berwick and protected the small Lindisfarne Harbour.In the eighteenth century the castle was occupied briefly by Jacobite rebels, but was quickly recaptured by soldiers from Berwick who imprisoned the rebels; they dug their way out and hid for nine days close to nearby Bamburgh Castle before making good their escape.In later years the castle was used as a coastguard look-out and became something of a tourist attraction. Charles Rennie Mackintosh made a sketch of the old fort in 1901.

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The Lake District, also commonly known as The Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous not only for its lakes, forests and mountains, but also for its associations with the early 19th century poetry and writings of William Wordsworth and the other Lake Poets.Historically shared by the counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire, the Lake District now lies entirely within the modern county of Cumbria. All the land in England higher than three thousand feet above sea level lies within the National Park, including Scafell Pike, the highest mountain in England. It also contains the deepest and longest lakes in England, Wastwater and Windermere, respectively.The Lake District National Park includes nearly all of the Lake District, though the town of Kendal and the Lakeland Peninsulas are currently outside the Park boundary.The area, which was designated a National Park on 9 May 1951, is the most visited national park in the United Kingdom with 15.8 million annual visitors and more than 23 million annual day visits,the largest of the thirteen National Parks in England and Wales, and the second largest in the UK after the Cairngorms.Its aim is to protect the landscape by restricting unwelcome change by industry or commerce. Most of the land in the Park is in private ownership. The National Trust owns about a quarter of the total area, United Utilities owns eight per cent and 3.9% belongs to the Lake District National Park Authority. The National Park Authority is based at offices in Kendal. It runs a visitor centre on Windermere at a former country house called Brockhole,Coniston Boating Centre and Information Centres.In common with all other National Parks in England, there is no restriction on entry to, or movement within the park along public routes, but access to cultivated land is usually restricted to public footpaths.The lakes and mountains combine to form impressive scenery. Farmland and settlement add aesthetic value to the natural scenery with an ecology modified by human influence for millennia and including important wildlife habitats. The Lake District has failed to be approved as a natural World Heritage Site, because of human activities, such as commercial forestry, which have adversely impacted the park's assessment. Another bid is being prepared for World Heritage Status, this time in the category of cultural landscape.

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Southern England, the South and the South of England are imprecise terms that refer to the southern counties of England that border the English Midlands. A number of different interpretations describe its geographic extents. Many consider the South a cultural region, with a distinct identity from the rest of England—but without universal agreement on what the special cultural, political, and economic characteristics of the South are, nor even on its geographical limits. For government purposes, Southern England is divided in South West England, South East England, London, and the East of England. Combined, these have a total area of 62,042 square kilometres, and a population of 26 million.People often apply the term "southern" loosely, without deeper consideration of the geographical identities of Southern England. This can cause confusion over the depth of affiliation between its areas. As in much of the rest of England, people tend to have a deeper affiliation to their county or city. Thus, residents of Essex are unlikely to feel much affinity with people in Oxfordshire. Similarly, there is a strong distinction between natives of the south-west and south-east.

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Tower Bridge is a combined bascule and suspension bridge in London which crosses the River Thames. It is close to the Tower of London, from which it takes its name, and has become an iconic symbol of London.The bridge consists of two towers tied together at the upper level by means of two horizontal walkways, designed to withstand the horizontal forces exerted by the suspended sections of the bridge on the landward sides of the towers. The vertical component of the forces in the suspended sections and the vertical reactions of the two walkways are carried by the two robust towers. The bascule pivots and operating machinery are housed in the base of each tower. The bridge's present colour scheme dates from 1977, when it was painted red, white and blue for Queen Elizabeth II's silver jubilee. Originally it was painted a mid greenish-blue colour.The nearest London Underground station is Tower Hill on the Circle and District lines, and the nearest Docklands Light Railway station is Tower Gateway.Contrary to popular belief, the song "London Bridge Is Falling Down" has nothing to do with Tower Bridge, instead referring to the collapses of other various London Bridges.In the second half of the 19th century, increased commercial development in the East End of London led to a requirement for a new river crossing downstream of London Bridge. A traditional fixed bridge could not be built because it would cut off access by tall-masted ships to the port facilities in the Pool of London, between London Bridge and the Tower of London.A Special Bridge or Subway Committee was formed in 1877, chaired by Sir Albert Joseph Altman, to find a solution to the river crossing problem. It opened the design of the crossing to public competition. Over 50 designs were submitted, including one from civil engineer Sir Joseph Bazalgette. The evaluation of the designs was surrounded by controversy, and it was not until 1884 that a design submitted by Sir Horace Jones, the City Architect,was approved.Jones' engineer, Sir John Wolfe Barry, devised the idea of a bascule bridge with two towers built on piers. The central span was split into two equal bascules or leaves, which could be raised to allow river traffic to pass. The two side-spans were suspension bridges, with the suspension rods anchored both at the abutments and through rods contained within the bridge's upper walkways.The bridge was officially opened on 30 June 1894 by The Prince of Wales, and his wife, The Princess of Wales .The bridge connected Iron Gate, on the north bank of the river, with Horselydown Lane, on the south – now known as Tower Bridge Approach and Tower Bridge Road, respectively.Until the bridge was opened, the Tower Subway – 400 m to the west – was the shortest way to cross the river from Tower Hill to Tooley Street in Southwark. Opened in 1870, Tower Subway was among the world's earliest underground railway, but closed after just three months and was re-opened as a pedestrian foot tunnel. Once Tower Bridge was open, the majority of foot traffic transferred to using the bridge, there being no toll to pay to use it. Having lost most of its income, the tunnel was closed in 1898.Tower Bridge is one of five London bridges now owned and maintained by the Bridge House Estates, a charitable trust overseen by the City of London Corporation. It is the only one of the Trust's bridges not to connect the City of London to the Southwark bank, the northern landfall being in Tower Hamlets.Construction started in 1886 and took eight years with five major contractors – Sir John Jackson, Baron Armstrong, William Webster, Sir H.H. Bartlett, and Sir William Arrol & Co.– and employed 432 construction workers. E W Crutwell was the resident engineer for the construction.Two massive piers, containing over 70,000 tons of concrete,were sunk into the riverbed to support the construction. Over 11,000 tons of steel provided the framework for the towers and walkways.This was then clad in Cornish granite and Portland stone, both to protect the underlying steelwork and to give the bridge a pleasing appearance.Jones died in 1887 and George D. Stevenson took over the project.Stevenson replaced Jones's original brick façade with the more ornate Victorian Gothic style, which makes the bridge a distinctive landmark, and was intended to harmonise the bridge with the nearby Tower of London.The total cost of construction was £1,184,000.

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Rousham House is a country house at Rousham in Oxfordshire, England. The house, which has been continuously in the ownership of one family, was built circa 1635 and remodeled by William Kent in the 18th century in a free Gothic style. Further alterations were carried out in the 19th century.In the 1630s Sir Robert Dormer bought the manor of Rousham. He immediately began construction of the present house but work was halted by the start of the English Civil War. The Dormers were a Royalist family and the house was attacked by Parliamentary soldiers who stripped the lead from the newly completed roofs.In 1649 the estate was inherited by Robert Dormer's son, also Robert. He left the house much as his father had created it, only repairing the damage of the Civil War. However, he did more to restore the family fortunes by marrying twice, each time to an heiress. His second wife was the daughter of Sir Charles Cottrell, a high-ranking courtier of Charles II.Colonel Robert Dormer-Cottrell, the grandson of the house's builder, inherited Rousham in 1719 and began the huge transformation of the gardens to its current appearance. Initially he employed Charles Bridgeman to lay out the gardens in the new and more natural style that was becoming popular. Bridgeman's layout of the garden was completed circa 1737. Rousham was then inherited by the Colonel's brother, General James Dormer-Cottrell. He called in William Kent to further enhance and develop the garden that Bridgeman created. This Kent did with considerable success over the next four years. In 1741 Sir Clement Cotterell inherited the estate.At this time Kent also embellished the house itself, with crenellations and two wings containing a drawing room and a "delightful" library, according to Horace Walpole who said of Rousham in 1760 "it reinstated Kent with me; he has no where shewn so much taste".The interiors were altered a century later but the hall, the principal room of the house, has survived alteration by successive generations unchanged, and remains as completed in the 17th century. Kent's exterior work is today almost as built, but in 1876 the original octagonal paned glazing was replaced with innovative large sheets of plate glass, during a heavy-handed restoration of the house by the architect James Piers St Aubyn. The house contains fine collections of Jacobean and 18th-century furniture, paintings and statuary, all displayed in a domestic setting.

The gardens, created by Bridgeman and then Kent, overlook a curve of the River Cherwell. Bridgeman had laid out the layout of the garden, with meandering walks through the woods, and pools of varying degrees of formality. Kent's theme was to create and transform the natural landscape created by Bridgeman into an Augustan[clarification needed] landscape to recall the glories and atmosphere of ancient Rome. Thus the Roman Forum was to be recreated in the verdant English countryside. "The garden is Daphne in little, Walpole told George Montagu:"the sweetest little groves, streams, glades, porticoes, cascades, and river, imaginable; all the scenes are prefectly classic.Away and unseen from the house Kent's garden extends past classical temples, follies and statuary representing the spirit of that era, dying gladiators, a horse being savaged by a lion and other statues depicting similar themes. Paths lead through woods where the abundant water from the Cherwell is fully utilised: small rills lead to larger ponds and formal pools, classical statuary of Roman gods and mythological creatures are skilfully positioned to catch the eye as one progresses from a cascade to the cold bath and on to the next temple or arcade, each set in its own valley or glade, a succession of picturesque tableaux.Among the most revealing and thought-provoking of the follies is a grotto with a small cascade with the inscription: "In Front of this Stone lie the Remains of Ringwood an otter-hound of extraordinary Sagacity": this shows that while the English squire who created this garden attempted to achieve Arcadia, his interests and loves remained hunting and hounds.A separate garden closer to the house evokes the spirit of the Tudor and Stuart eras of English gardening. Box-edged beds and borders of old roses and herbaceous plants are surrounded by walls of ancient red brick; here an historic circular dovecote still retains its doves and close by through a small gate is the parish church where generations of Cottrell-Dormers are buried. One memorial in the church commemorates three sons of the family killed in combat in the First World War.The house and grounds have been used as filming locations for productions including ITV's Lewis.Rousham House is still the home of the Cottrell-Dormer family.

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Cornwall  is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. Cornwall is a peninsula bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of 536,000 and covers an area of 3,563 km2 . The administrative centre, and only city in Cornwall, is Truro, although St Austell, a town, has a larger population.Cornwall forms the westernmost part of the south-west peninsula of the island of Great Britain, and a large part of the Cornubian batholith is within Cornwall. This area was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods. It continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age peoples, and later by Brythons with distinctive cultural relations to neighbouring Wales and Brittany. There is little evidence that Roman rule was effective west of Exeter and few Roman remains have been found. Cornwall was the home of a division of the Dumnonii tribe – whose tribal centre was in the modern county of Devon – known as the Cornovii, separated from the Brythons of Wales after the Battle of Deorham, often coming into conflict with the expanding English kingdom of Wessex before King Athelstan in AD 936 set the boundary between English and Cornish at the Tamar.From the early Middle Ages, British language and culture was apparently shared by Brythons trading across both sides of the Channel, evidenced by the corresponding high medieval Breton kingdoms of Domnonee and Cornouaille and the Celtic Christianity common to both territories.Historically tin mining was important in the Cornish economy, becoming increasingly significant during the High Middle Ages and expanding greatly during the 19th century when rich copper mines were also in production. In the mid-19th century, however, the tin and copper mines entered a period of decline. Subsequently china clay extraction became more important and metal mining had virtually ended by the 1990s. Traditionally fishing, and agriculture, were the other important sectors of the economy. The railways led to the growth of tourism during the 20th century, however, Cornwall's economy struggled after the decline of the mining and fishing industries. The area is noted for its wild moorland landscapes, its long and varied coastline, its many place-names derived from the Cornish language, and its very mild climate. Extensive stretches of Cornwall's coastline, and Bodmin Moor, are protected as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.Cornwall is the traditional homeland of the Cornish people and is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, retaining a distinct cultural identity that reflects its history. Some people question the present constitutional status of Cornwall, and a nationalist movement seeks greater autonomy within the United Kingdom in the form of a devolved legislative assembly, and greater recognition of the Cornish people as a national minority.

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Chrome Hill is a limestone reef knoll on the Derbyshire side of the upper Dove valley. It is adjacent to the more distinctive but lower Parkhouse Hill.Chrome Hill was declared open access land under the provisions of the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000. However, the only access from the North West remains along a concessionary footpath. Chrome Hill contains good exposures of Gigantoproductus fossils; it is part of a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest and visitors are asked not to remove geological samples.In 1997, the writer Jeff Kent discovered that a double sunset could be seen against Chrome Hill from the southern flank of Parkhouse Hill. Two years later, the author discovered that a similar event took place from nearby Glutton Bridge, on the upper valley of the River Dove, which was more easily accessible. Shortly afterwards, the phenomenon was first captured on film by the photographer Chris Doherty.Since 2002, Kent has offered guided public viewings of the occurrence from Glutton Bridge on the summer solstice and the night either side, with a fair degree of success.The phenomenon is visible from Glutton Bridge in good weather for a short period around the summer solstice, when the sun sets just to the southwest of the summit of Chrome Hill, begins to re-emerge almost immediately afterwards from its steep northeastern slope before fully reappearing and later sets for a second and final time at the foot of the hill. The precise event and its location are described in Kent's book The Mysterious Double Sunset.Chrome Hill has had songs written in its honour by the Norwegian musicians Sigurd Hole and Jonas Howden Sjøvaag. In 2008 the Norwegian jazz quartet Damp changed its name to Chrome Hill.

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Bolsover is a small town near Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England. It is 145 miles from London, 18 miles from Sheffield, 26 miles  from Nottingham and 54 miles from Manchester. It is the main town in the Bolsover district.The civil parish for the town is called Old Bolsover. It includes the town and the New Bolsover model village, along with Carr Vale, Shuttlewood, Stanfree, Oxcroft and Whaley. Its population at the 2001 UK Census was 11,291.The origin of the name is uncertain. It may be derived from Bula's Ofer or Boll's Ofer, respectively the Old English for Bull's Ridge or Boll's Ridge , alternatively in the 1650s it was referred to as 'Bolsouer'.Bolsover is mentioned in Domesday Book, named as Belesovre, where it is described as the property of William Peverel. The description refers to the villans, the ploughs, 8 acres of meadow, and woodland pasture, which is given as two leagues by a league.William was possibly an illegitimate son of William the Conqueror. Bolsover became the seat of the Peverel family, and in the twelfth century a keep was built.The present castle was erected in 1613.In 1657 William Cavendish produced the book 'La Methode et Invention nouvelle de Dresser les Chevaux' which he produced in exile in Antwerp during the Cromwellian Protectorate. This was translated in 1743 to 'A General System of Horsemanship in All Its Branches' this covered the dressage of horses, at his 'Bolsouer', Welbeck and Antwerp stables and there are etched prints existing showing the 'Monsieur le Marquis a Cheval' amongst many other views of the town. The etches are attributed to Abraham van Diepenbeeck a pupil of Van Dyck.The district of Bolsover is notable for three sites of historical importance: Bolsover Castle, Creswell Crags and Creswell Model Village, an example of early twentieth century design from the Model village movement.Two railway lines once served Bolsover, but both were early casualties. The Midland Railway, arrived first with their north-south running "Doe Lea Valley Line" from Staveley to Pleasley, opened in September 1890 and thus enabling a through service between Chesterfield and Mansfield to be operated, but services were withdrawn as early as September 1930.The Bolsover railway station on this line was known as "Bolsover Castle" in its latter days.The other line was the highly ambitious west-east running Lancashire, Derbyshire and East Coast Railway, later part of the Great Central Railway and subsequently the LNER. Only the middle section from Chesterfield to Lincoln was ever built, opening in March 1897, but the section between Chesterfield and Shirebrook was brought to a premature demise in December 1951 by the deteriorating state of its biggest engineering feature, the 2,624-yardBolsover Tunnel which ran beneath the limestone ridge on which stands the castle. The tunnel was mostly filled in with colliery waste in 1966-7, and today only the eastern portal is visible, at the end of an unusually deep sheer-sided cutting in the village of Scarcliffe.

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Avebury is a Neolithic henge monument containing three stone circles, around the village of Avebury in Wiltshire, in southwest England. Unique amongst megalithic monuments, Avebury contains the largest stone circle in Europe, and is one of the best known prehistoric sites in Britain. It is both a tourist attraction and a place of religious importance to contemporary Pagans.Constructed around 2600 BCE,during the Neolithic, or 'New Stone Age', the monument comprises a large henge with a large outer stone circle and two separate smaller stone circles situated inside the centre of the monument. Its original purpose is unknown, although archaeologists believe that it was most likely used for some form of ritual or ceremony. The Avebury monument was a part of a larger prehistoric landscape containing several older monuments nearby, including West Kennet Long Barrow and Silbury Hill.By the Iron Age, the site had been effectively abandoned, with some evidence of human activity on the site during the Roman occupation. During the Early Medieval, a village first began to be built around the monument, which eventually extended into it. In the Late Medieval and Early Modern periods, locals destroyed many of the standing stones around the henge, both for religious and practical reasons. The antiquarians John Aubrey and William Stukeley however took an interest in Avebury during the 17th century, and recorded much of the site before its destruction. Archaeological investigation followed in the 20th century, led primarily by Alexander Keiller, who oversaw a project of reconstructing much of the monument.Avebury is owned and run by the National Trust, a charitable organisation who keep it open to the public.It has been designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument,as well as a World Heritage Site, in the latter capacity being seen as a part of the wider prehistoric landscape of Wiltshire known as Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites.At grid reference SU10266996, Avebury is respectively about 6 and 7 miles from the modern towns of Marlborough and Calne. Avebury lies in an area of chalkland in the Upper Kennet Valley, at the western end of the Berkshire Downs, which forms the catchment for the River Kennet and supports local springs and seasonal watercourses. The monument stands slightly above the local landscape, sitting on a low chalk ridge 160 m  above sea level; to the east are the Marlborough Downs, an area of lowland hills. The site lies at the centre of a collection of Neolithic and early Bronze Age monuments and was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in a co-listing with the monuments at Stonehenge, 17 miles to the south, in 1986. It is now listed as part of the Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites World Heritage Site. The monuments are preserved as part of a Neolithic and Bronze Age landscape for the information they provide regarding prehistoric people's relationship with the landscape.Radiocarbon dating and analysis of pollen in buried soils have shown that the environment of lowland Britain changed around 4,250–4,000 BCE. The change to a grassland environment from damp, heavy soils and expanses of dense forest was mostly brought about by farmers, probably through the use of slash and burn techniques. Environmental factors may also have made a contribution. Pollen is poorly preserved in the chalky soils found around Avebury, so the best evidence for the state of local environment at any time in the past comes from the study of the deposition of snail shells. Different species of snail live in specific habitats, so the presence of a certain species indicates what the area was like at a particular point in time.The available evidence suggests that in the early Neolithic, Avebury and the surrounding hills were covered in dense oak woodland, and as the Neolithic progressed, the woodland around Avebury and the nearby monuments receded and was replaced by grassland.

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