Inch Beach: The Face of God Apparition?

 

Near the Inch Beach car park, I saw the notice above, about somebody having seen (or claiming to have seen) the Face of God there on the 7th February in 2011.

Naturally, I've since scoured the Internet for information concerning the Face of God episode above. But, unfortunately, I have, as yet, found nothing.

Being schooled in the Sociology of Religion, I'm very open-minded about such episodes of religious phenomena, as, like the top sociologist of Religion Rodney Stark says, they are not usually scientifically measurable one way or another.

Just hope that the sign above is not some kind of hoax, because for sociologists of Religion, it looks interesting.

Never expected to see such a notice near Inch Beach and its sand dunes.

Inch-to-Annascaul

From Inch, we started heading up a path overlooking the beach:

 And soon, we were surrounded by resplendent greenery:

Interestingly, we seemed to be on both the Dingle Way and Kerry Camino at one point. 

I'd never heard of the Kerry Camino before, but I've just read that it is a pilgrimage route from Tralee to Dingle, a route commonly associated with St. Brendan in the 6th century.

The Kerry Camino is made up of three sections:

 

1. From St. John's church in Tralee, through Blennerville with its distinct windmill, to the hamlet of Camp.

2. From Camp to the big village of Annascaul (with Tom Crean's pub).

3. Annascaul to Dingle.

 

Anyway, our own path was from Inch to Annascaul to lunch at the wonderful Tom Crean pub there. 

Before reaching the Tom Crean pub, we saw a statue and memorial devoted to the great man:

Have just read about how Tom Crean, born near Annascaul in 1877, heroically served on three incredibly dangerous Antarctic expeditions: Discovery (1901-1904); Terra Nova (1910-1913) with Captain Scott; and Endurance (1914-1916) with Ernest Shackleton. 

About Tom Crean's life and Antarctic endeavors, the website below gives a decent summary:

https://www.tomcreanshow.com/about/

After returning to Britain and serving out the remaining time of the 1st World War, Crean returned to Ireland in 1919 where he married an Annascaul girl, had three daughters, and stayed in Annascaul running a pub until his death in 1938. 

The Tom Crean pub, the South Pole Inn, brightly coloured white and orange outside:

Was full of interesting pictures from Crean's adventurous life:

We saw American and British tourists buying t-shirts and lots of other souvenirs.

There was a nice cosy atmosphere in the pub:

And the food was second to none:

Can't remember how much the double beefburger and chips was above, but it was absolutely delicious, worth every penny.

Outside the pub, there was a nice tranquil atmosphere, with a statue of Our Lady at the side of the road:

And a river passing by:

After washing the burger down with a couple of pints, it was a few-mile stroll back to Inch, with the wonderful beach eventually coming back into sight:

From the view below, Inch Beach really did look the perfect setting for a horse-race:

And my friend told me for the umpteenth time that this is where the famous horse-race scene from Ryan's Daughter was filmed.

Yeah, with the rucksacks off, left behind with the tents, this was a peach of a small trip, a comfortable walk in gentle hills, a nice day out.

Rydal St. Mary's Church Visit

 

During my lightning fast 20 minutes stop at Rydal village, I knew that I had to visit St. Mary's church because of its connection to Wordsworth and his family.

Have just read that St. Mary's church was built upon the instruction of Lady Le Fleming of Rydal Hall in 1824, with Wordsworth, himself, having helped to choose the site, which was originally an orchard near his home at Rydal Mount.

Despite my shortage of time, I did get a quick look inside St. Mary's church:

Have just read that Wordsworth and his family had family pews at the front of the church, and that Wordsworth was church warden between 1833 and 1834, with there being a memorial plaque to him inside the church.

Have also just discovered that no burials take place at Rydal because St. Mary's church and grounds are built on rocky ground beneath Nab Scar.

The picture below is taken of St. Mary's church from the entrance to Dora's Field, while I was sheltering from gushing rain under a tree:

Have just read about the history of Dora's Field. It was initially bought by Wordsworth to build a house which never materialised. 

Moreover, after his daughter Dora died in 1847, an elderly Wordsworth went down to the field with his wife Mary, sister Dorothy, and his gardener, and planted hundreds of daffodils in memory of Dora.

Unfortunately, I became weary of braving the heavy rain, and ended up not taking any shots in Dora's Field. Should've made the effort, of course.

Seeing Rydal Mount

On my quick 20-minute look at Rydal village, with my friend keeping dry in the car, I got a glimpse of Wordsworth's beloved home, Rydal Mount:

Wordsworth lived here with his family from 1813 up to his death in 1850, which was far more time than he spent living in Grasmere. 

High up in the gardens of Rydal Mount, which Wordsworth designed, he also built a writing hut where he spent his creative time, and could peer at the Windemere and Grasmere Lakes from.

Wordsworth is also said to have been visited by Samuel Taylor Coleridge at Rydal Mount, as Coleridge often visited Greta Hall in Keswick long after his own tenancy ended there (between 1800 and 1803).

Interestingly, Rydal Mount still remains in ownership of the Wordsworth family, and has been open for the public to visit since 1970.

Unfortunately, during my quick runaround Rydal, I had no time to even consider going inside the Wordsworth house.

Grasmere-to-Rydal Water

After visiting the banks of the Lake, it was time to leave. We took the top road, out of Grasmere:

 Not long after, we were next to Rydal Water, it was bucketing it down.

But I jumped out of the car, braved the elements, got a few shots:

 In its own way, Rydal Water looked stunning in the grey, murky conditions.

Located in the hamlet or small village of Rydal, between Grasmere and Ambleside in the Rothay Valley, Rydal Water only measures less than a mile long, with a maximum width of 380 yards.

 

On all my previous trips to the Lake District, we'd driven straight past Rydal Water, without time to ponder its beauty.

But this time, it was an honour to see the place a little longer. 

I kind of imagined Wordsworth, who lived in Rydal 1813-1850, wandering around this small Lake, musing about all kinds of great things.

Trout Woman

 On the Canterbury campsite, we sometimes hand-washed our clothes, leaving them to dry outside:

We sometimes had to do this because a Trout Woman tried to monopolise the washing and drying machines on the campsite.

One morning, our clothes were still not dry in the tree, so we went to the campsite washroom, and there She stood, arms crossed with bulging eyes and wide-open mouth, her 10-year-old son replicating the facial pose:

      "Morning, it's a nice day, isn't it?" 

      - No response

      "Ah well, let's get these drying machines on, it won't take long".

The Trout Woman's face was now a 'pretty picture', bright red with flabby rage, her young son exactly the same. They wanted the washroom to themselves, unused drying machines and all.

At this moment, a nice old man entered the washroom:

      "Hi lads, alright love, you don't mind if I do a hand-wash, do you? As all the washing 

      machines are being used".

The Trout Woman's eyes bulged out further, smoke bellowed out of her ears, but still no words exited her mouth. 

In a second or two, the Trout Woman and her son trudged outside.

The nice old man was from Canvey Island.

He told us about his years of watching West Ham. He'd also been a shop steward. 

He had a story to tell, time to chat. 

He had some social skills.

Oxford-to-Canterbury in a Flash

After finishing off in Oxford, we caught the train to Canterbury in Kent.

In London, we had to get off at a station:

 Where we saw a War memorial:

And then somehow got to Edgeware Road metro station:

 

Which took us to another London train station for our train to Kent, and in incredible time, we were in Canterbury itself.

Finding our usual campsite (with cash being refused again):

Setting the tents up once again. This time on bone hard dry, grass-ridden land:

 But at least this campsite had a big shower block and good washing machines.

Inch Beach Porridge

 Having woken up real early, I took a stroll along Inch Beach (Strand):

Still early in the morning, I had to wear a hat and gloves for an hour or two, waiting for the sun to fully arise.

My friend had told me that the famous horse race scene from David Lean's classic film, Ryan's Daughter, had been filmed on Inch Beach. With this being part of the reason why the beach was so special, so magical. 

And people love to camp and kip in their vans on the beach:

 Think I've heard that horse racing still takes place on Inch Beach.

Inch Strand seemed to go on forever. Every now and again, I saw a fresh jellyfish:

As I strolled back to the campsite, I stopped at the beach bar:

Where I had some porridge:

 Now, the Irish really do know how to make porridge, thick and lumpy, the best in the world.

Dingle to Inch

Having walked outside Dingle, we encountered our old 'friend', the Conor Pass.

But instead of walking up the long winding mountain road, we veered right somewhere near the bottom, passing a farm, and crossing over a small bridge.

 The scenery was luscious green and rugged, plus my friend pointed out that old farming and defensive settlements could be seen in the landscape.

Sometimes, the uniform greenery was broken up by bright coloured flowers:

At some point, we found the main road for Inch over the top of some hills.

But by now, we were literally inching along. We were knackered with our heavy rucksacks on, the sun was beating down. Our exertions on the Slea Head Way the previous day were taking their toll.

Then, literally out of nowhere, a young lady stopped in her car, and offered us a lift to Inch. We jumped at the chance, we didn't need to be asked twice.

On the way to Inch, we told the young lady about our adventure on the Great Blasket Island:

 

      "We saw about 1,000 seals come onto the beach, the bull seal called them all in".

 

But the young lady recalled a macabre tale:

 

      "Some local fishermen hated the seals so much that they beheaded one, and pinned

      the head to the gate of a seal sanctuary not far from here. It was really awful".

 

As the kind young lady was dropping us off, she advised us to visit the Italian restaurant in Inch for the lasagne there, but we were thirsty, more interested in the beer:

Feeling fully refreshed, we set up camp for the night:

And lo and behold, the campsite manager was a Pakistani man from Birmingham. Who would've expected that?

The mist over the mountains was beautiful the following morning:

Thomas Hardy and St. Barnabas Church, Oxford

 

Outside St. Barnabas church, I tried to take pictures of the place from all angles, as, for me, it was the jewel in the crown of Oxford.

Being known as an Anglican high church, it wasn't surprising to see Mass and Benediction offered by a parish priest (all Catholic religious terminology, of course):

And inside, we saw the high altar, stations of the cross, elevated pulpit etc.

Also, the sound of a man doing solemn-sounding organ practice kind of made the empty church come alive.

My friend, a non-practising Anglican (and believer without belonging), went in first and came out saying that he'd had some kind of spiritual experience, as he'd felt something profound inside.

While taking a shot of the rear end of the St. Barnabas building:

I saw a short list of famous people, including Thomas Hardy, who were in one way or another connected to the church:

Through quickly searching the Internet, and finding an interesting article entitled Clement Shaw on Jericho's role in Jude the Obscure (https://www.jerichocentre.org.uk/about_jericho/about_arts_item/thomas-hardy-in-jericho), I've just discovered that the suburb nicknamed Beersheba where Jude Fawley takes cheap lodgings seems to be a reference to the Jericho district of Oxford (Hardy's Christminster).

At the tender age of 16, Thomas Hardy worked as an apprentice for the architect and church restorer, John Hicks, in Dorchester.

Moreover, between 1862 and 1867, Hardy is known to have been the assistant architect to Arthur Blomfield who was commissioned by Thomas Combe to design St. Barnabas church:

Besides being pre-Raphaelites, Thomas Combe and his wife were prominent high church (Tractarian Movement) people in the Church of England. 

In his article, Clement Shaw (2022) reveals that the Combes instructed Blomfield to design a church in Romanesque style like Torcello Cathedral near Venice. 

Moreover, St. Barnabas church was completed in 1869, with Jude the Obscure being published 30 years later when Hardy was 58, with the novel making many references to the Tractarians and the kind of influence they had on Jude and his cousin (forbidden fruit) lover, Sue Bridehead.

From all this, Clement Shaw concludes that the young Thomas Hardy's work-related association with Jericho and St. Barnabas church must've played a big part in helping to inspire one of the greatest passionate and tragic English novels ever written.

Indeed, Jude the Obscure is a deeply profound and moving account of one man's tragically failed attempt to access high cultural (academic and religious) joy and enrichment, as the cloistered walls of Christminster look down on him and don't treat him seriously.

 

For me, there are four truly great novels in English Literature: both Tess and Jude by Hardy, and The Rainbow and Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence who was a massive Hardy fan, of course. I would also be tempted to include Hardy's The Woodlanders; The Mayor of Casterbridge; and The Return of the Native on this list.

For me, Hardy's great tragedies are painfully sublime, as ordinary, everyday characters dare to dream and try to build higher passionate lives, with the mechanics of wider society not allowing them to do so.   

Oxford: Finding St. Barnabas Church

Shortly after passing the big, grand Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, said to be Britain's first public museum, we entered our target area, the Jericho district of Oxford, an important place for me.

The first small houses we saw reminded me of the kind of cramped dwelling-place(s) that Jude Fawley and Sue Bridehead, with their out-of-wedlock small children, and Father Time (Jude's son from his marriage to Arabella Donn) must've lived in:

Thomas Hardy's full-blown tragedy, Jude the Obscure, this is what had brought us into the Jericho district of Oxford.

Other buildings were ornate:

And others strange:

We passed the Oxford University Press building:

And a beautiful church building: 

Which now functioned as some kind of upmarket bar that refused payment by cash, and didn't serve beer on tap.

To our relief, this church building wasn't that of St. Barnabas.

It'd once been St. Paul's, a budding popular Anglican high church, not far from St. Barnabas, the high church that we sought.

St. Barnabas is commonly thought to be the model for the high church that Sue Bridehead attends before embarking on her outside marriage relationship with her cousin, Jude Fawley, in Jude the Obscure.

Not long after, we found ourselves being signposted towards St. Barnabas church:

And getting ever closer, some more small-looking houses reminded me of the place(s) that Jude and Sue, their tragically ill-fated, young children, and the melancholic-sinister Father Time must've lived in:

The Father Time-small children hanging scene in Jude the Obscure is the most shocking and harrowing episode that I've ever encountered in Literature, can still recall how my heart painfully jumped when encountering it many years ago, as a late teenager in the mid-1980s.

Eventually, we turned a corner, and the tower of the church of St. Barnabas stared us in the eyes: