Stanhope

Hard to pin down the allure of Stanhope, the adopted home in the North Pennines of England, though many others, incomers and locals (often defined as having several generations of residents in the Dale), feel it. Perhaps an energy powerpoint ... beautiful views of course and whilst less spectacular than the Lake District over the top to the West, it has its own bleak simplicity ... zen maybe ... and the advantage over the Lakes of relatively few tourists, though that is changing ...

Being consciously positive in general, the few negatives are mostly ignored, though there are two centres of darkness here, to balance the light ... firstly (and recognising that a major employer is not to be sneezed at hereabouts, since the demise of the lead and fluorspar mining and reduction in quarrying) is a foundry apparently making weaponry (in the interests of disclosure and non-hypocrisy your blogger once worked at such a facility in the New Forest); the second is the Castle, an old hunting lodge for the Prince Bishops of Durham, then a home, approved for young men in need of chastisement and retraining ... more recently acquired by a retired gangster, sometime acquaintance of the Kray twins, having spent many years as a guest of Her Majesty, whose flag is flown as a gesture of appreciation and loyalty ...actually he really wants to be somewhere warmer, on the Costa del Sol, home to many other retired gangsters ... his problem is that he is only out on licence, never having confessed to the murder for which he was convicted ... indeed he is most affronted that he was framed for it all those years ago, when police forces around the country decided things needed tidying up and politicians mollified ... and police forces generally know who the bad guys are, sometimes from personal and corrupt relationships ... and when the heat is on and evidence hard to come by, then the crime may be found to fit the criminal, whether or not he or she actually did that crime. Anyway, he has written his book, if you like that sort of thing, and is now a fairly respectable pensioner, albeit not very happy with his lot ...