Tallington. CHURCH : ST LAWRENCE

Tallington was the fourth church visited on a Saturday churchcrawl, which saw nine churches visited, and nearly 50 miles cycled. Overall, this was one of the warmest Saturdays of a pretty miserable English Summer. However, when I arrived at Tallington the clouds had gathered and the prospect of yet another downpour was looming.

  For that reason, lighting conditions were far from ideal, and I was disappointed with the exterior shots. A nice cycle ride from my own village, through some lovely countryside, so it is no real hardship to make the return trip at some point when the Sun is shining.

  The church of St Lawrence is set in a lovely area, and I was not short of company when visiting as a flock of sheep were busily engaged in keeping the grass down outside the church perimiter.

  The church was open, but it was very dark inside, the gathering clouds not helping in this respect. Didn't see church history booklet but a postcard was available showing a nice line drawing of the church.

  For me, as is often the case, my fondest recollections of this church were to be found in the church grounds. One gravestone, dating from the 1730's caught my eye. A very crude representation of a skull in the bottom left, a selection of tools such as spade and pick is represented in the bottom right. A representation of an angel is in the top right hand corner of the grave. With regards the Angel, I have seen a very similar representation in the church grounds at Hacconby. Interesting to think that the same hand might have carved the two all those years ago.

  This stone was in very deep shadow, but I was able to get a shot of the skull. Thise who are regular visitors to my site will probably know that I am very fond of these so at least I left happy in that respect.

  A frustrating experience this one, particularly as about an hour later the Sun was out, my sweater had come off....and the Sun was blazing down for the rest of the day.