2021 Autumn Holiday Part Ten - Muncaster Castle gets ready for Halloween

 If you've never heard of St Bees, then I won't hold it against you. I had only heard of it from watching a documentary about the St Bees man. His body was found during excavation at St Bees Priory, in 1981 and is one of the best preserved medieval bodies found in the United Kingdom, so well preserved, that skin and the iris's of his eyes still had colour to them.

Isn't that fascinating? It was due to a layer of lead sheeting placed over the body in the wooden coffin. The lead sheeting, while damaged, kept moisture out of the burial. The body was so well preserved, that the contents of his stomach could even be analyzed. Though historical research, the St Bees man was determined to be Anthony De Lucy, who had been sent on a crusade in Lithuania, and was killed during battle there. He was buried next to his sister Maud, who inherited the estate as the only member of the family left. 

The inside of St Bees church, check out the fancy carpet! 

The story of the St Bees man fascinated me for two reasons. One was that so rarely do we get the chance to find burials like that, where we can really ascertain things like diet, wounds and clothing with certainty due to the condition of the body. The second, is how rarely it is we get to put a name to someone with some certainty when it comes to burials. Over time, things get moved, headstones and monuments get broken, churches are busy places! Especially when you consider the fact that the burial sits in a part of the priory that was ruined BEFORE the dissolution, apparently due to a collapse of the part of the building due to weak foundations. Now, that really is a first!

The lovely front entrance of St Bees church, you can see this would have been an entrance to the priory at one point in time, due to the romanesque style of decoration around it. It's free to visit in reasonable hours, and contains a little section with information panels about the St Bees man and the church.

With Halloween fast approaching, signs and decorations were starting to appear, and Muncaster Castle had done a brilliant job of getting the place ready. Coffins and burials, skeletons and even tentacles in the pond, the place was well and truly ready for Halloween.

Muncaster castle was a great place to visit, aside from just the Halloween decorations. It's set in a fantastic landscape, as far as the eye can see is forest, craggy peaks and dreamy looking clouds.

You can explore both the castle and the gardens, as well as there being a gift shop & cafe to grab something to eat, which we did before heading in. The inside of the castle has an almost whimsical boutique feeling to it, with period fittings and decoration throughout, but with these fun little details that really added a specialty to it, like this starry night ceiling.

I spotted this beautiful piece of embroidery and showed it to James, who was a little nonplussed by it. It tells the story of Lot's Wife, and the destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah. Lot was visited by angels, who warned him to flee the city before it was destroyed by god, due to the amount of sin & wickedness that went on inside it's walls. Lot and his family were helped out the city by Gabriel himself, on the one condition that they did not turn around or look back as fire and brimstone rained down upon the city, killing every living thing inside it. Lot's wife disobeyed, and as punishment, was turned into a pillar of salt.

It's one of the few stories of the bible I can remember fully, and I'll just make it very clear, I am not religious at all. I do not believe in a god or any form of higher being. People use religion to justify their actions, and fail to take any ownership of what they do wrong. I'll do a full post about my thoughts on religion at another date, but the story captures my attention in two way. One of them, is the sheer storytelling of the story, angels coming from heaven to rescue Lot's family, the cities burning and being destroyed, it captures your attention in no uncertain way. I've always found it very descriptive, and your imagination really can run riot with this one. The other thing that always fascinates me, is how Lot's wife has no name. I'm sure in the original story she may well have done, but nowadays, is just Lot's wife. I think it verges on being disrespectful that her name is never used. She is a mother, and a wife, yet none of the family ever give her name. I think it tries to re-inforce the bible's point of women should obey and do as they are told, rather than allowing them to think and do as they please. But it just seems unfair that we do not know her name, or for that matter, her daughters either. The bible is staunchly silent on women's names, and it's unkind to do so. But anyway, that's why I find the story so interesting.

Obviously James was not so captivated by this, and just sort of huffed and went and looked at something else instead. At least I have you guys to listen to me!

One of the corridors filled with art on the walls. There were many family pictures hanging up, especially of the Pennington family, who have owned the castle for over 800 years! Also, during the Second World War many pieces of art from the Tate Gallery were brought to Muncaster for safe keeping.

Something really special at Muncaster is the feeding of the herons. One of the gamekeepers comes out with a bucket of mice, and throws them to the Herons. It sounds grisly, but actually it was so interesting to see these rarely seen birds, as well as learn a little bit about them from the game keeper. There were five Herons on this occasion, but there has been double figures of them before, think how many mice you would need to keep a dozen of them fed!

The (deserted) little courtyard for the cafe and gift shop, it was just about to rain and it seemed most people had gone inside, while we sat and ate our ice creams!

We had just enough time to wander through a bit of the gardens before the heavens really did open and soak us through to the bone, but we got to see some more of the fun Halloween decorations as we walked around.

Me too mate, me too! 

Tickets for the Castle & Gardens start at £24.50 for adults, and you can also visit the newly opened Hawk & Owl centre too, which is included in the price. The website does say pre-booking tickets gets you guaranteed access, so probably aim to do that if you can. For more information, visit their website for more information, plus to see what other special events are on across the year: Muncaster Castle

I'd really recommend giving Muncaster Castle a visit, we had a fantastic time, and would love to come back again soon!

We headed back to Brockwood Hall Lodge to get ourselves changed out of our freezing and soaking clothes, before heading to the pizza place on site in the Hall itself. There is something about fresh pizza isn't there? Nothing in the world quite tastes like it! The pizza was fresh, good value and most importantly, very tasty! The pizza place does get very busy, we managed to get the last table, and people coming after us were told of a long wait to sit or to order pizza to take back to their lodges, so might be worth pre-booking a table on busy nights. I wonder if those Herons would ever want to try mouse pizza?