WideAngle Wednesday: Wood

Today we've driven to Macclesfield again to visit Mum-in-Law in her care home, and to continue the job of sorting out her house ready for sale.

We chose to use the route west towards Carlisle then south on the M6, using the "Military Road" between Heddon & Greenhead for part of the journey.

We stopped for lunch at a new(ish) visitor centre called "The Sill", near part of Hadrian's Wall. It's named after the Whin Sill, a layer of igneous rock which extends from Teesdale towards Berwick.

Although I'm really not sure that I like The Sill aesthetically, it's an interesting building. It has a roof garden planned to demonstrate the sort of vegetation which can grow in the rather poor soil produced when the rock of the Whin Sill disintegrates.

Anyway, the roof garden provided the opportunity for my Wide Wednesday blip of a long wooden bench seat on the roof, along with the excuse to research the information above.

The journey was interesting in another way: as a consequence of the very dry weather we're having, there's currently a nasty fire raging on Saddleworth Moor to the east of Manchester: our route avoided that area by (at a guess) at least 20 miles but we still drove through several miles of hazy, rather acrid smokey air northwest of Manchester - presumably the wind must be blowing the smoke a long way.

Happily the smoke hasn't reached Macclesfield, although the journey was complicated by a flat tyre - but fortunately only in the last mile. I was glad that when we chose our current car 4 years ago, we insisted that it should have a spare wheel - and a full-size one at that, so we were mobile again very quickly. But I'll be off to the tyre fitter in the morning to get a new spare - the damaged tyre looks reparable as there's a screw in the tread, but as it's fairly well worn anyway a new one is probably the best bet. (That's odd isn't it? - usually if you get a puncture it happens to the newest tyre!!)

Many thanks again to steveng for hosting Widwed this month, in Bobsblips's absence.