Meeting the other John Moxon

Thursday was a day of contrasts. A dreadful day's driving, although the scenery was wonderful. I think we must have been in the Yorkshire dales. It was very hilly anyway, lots of narrow windy roads through villages and towns with traffic lights. Including Bradford.

We seemed to take forever to get from Bingley to Tadcaster, probably because we didn't obey Jane's instructions. Jane is our SAT NAV (satellite navigation system) and she is very insistent, and has got us out of many scrapes, but gets us into some too by sending us through very narrow streets with lots of cars parked any which way on the side of the road.

English drivers however, are very polite and patient, probably because they'd always be beating each other up otherwise. The roads are a disaster, being so narrow. We will never suggest anyone hire a motor home in the UK! I don't know how lorries manage.

So I was exhausted by the time we arrived at Ulleskelf near Tadcaster. We had two one and a half hour drives with a fabulous lunch in between, so it doesn't sound too bad, but it was. Give me a motorway any day.

But back to the lunch. I'd met a Betty Moxon on the Internet, and she sounded so nice and friendly and amusing that we had no hesitation in accepting an invitation to look her up - and her husband, another John Moxon - when we were passing through Yorkshire. And we weren't disappointed.

Betty and John Moxon live in a tiny hamlet called Ryecroft, near the village of Harden (nothing like ours in NSW) near Bingley, west Yorkshire. Haworth, the home of the Bronte sisters is just across in the next valley. They have a stunning view from their totally renovated miners' cottages (three joined together) on the side of a valley overlooking Harden. And it was a glorious day. The two Johns exchanged their potted life stories. It turned out that all four of us had gained degrees as mature age students, Betty in teaching and John in Opera. I didn't know there were degrees in Opera, but apparently so. He did it by distance education after retirement. Interesting fellow. Like us, they have five grandchildren.

The two Johns, as I said on the photo album at http://picasaweb.google.com.au/JohnMoxon1/RyecroftHamletHarden29May2008
are related through a common ancestor born in 1751 (Joshua Moxon of Silkstone).

The photos tell it all. Glorious country. They have a north facing conservatory in which they can sit and watch the snow swirling in winter. However, they don't get the sort of snow they used to get. Climate change in action. They used to get 20 foot drifts, but now only six inches.

We travelled from their place to Whitecote Caravan Park in Ulleskelf, near Tadcaster where John's great great grandmother Sarah Middleton was born. More in the next post.