St.John the Baptist well?

It was a bit of a jumbly old day. My supply of local wells is metaphorically drying up and so they are becoming increasingly tenuous. I knew my chance of finding anything at this spot was just about nil but I’d been reading that summer solstice is traditionally St.John’s Day and I'd read in Hope’s ‘Wells of England’ that there was a holy well by St.John the Baptist church at Melmerby. Nothing on the OS maps though. Nothing on the Cumbria holy wells google maps either. I went back to the historic maps and saw it marked in the field opposite the church but the modern maps show a lot of building has happened since. It seemed a bit pointless.

Instead I set off to do something even more pointless. For some absurdly idiotic reason I thought I might go for a walk and the van needed a run so I headed down to Patterdale. I reckoned I could get a definite holy well under my belt (St.Patrick’s) and a bit of a walk. What on earth possessed me? Every square inch was mobbed. I turned tail and headed for my pointless plan B instead ... better chance of a holy well than a parking spot in the lakes.

In the tradition of observing all good Holy well hunting ritual I had done the research, I peered a little inappropriately too long into people’s gardens, I checked out the church, I ventured into a field of horses and clambered over a fence and through nettles to look across at a building site where I think there might be a cap on a well? Who knows. I then did that thing of asking a chap in his garden who said he’d lived there all his life and hadn’t heard of it so he then called across to the next house to another chap and said ‘hey dad, do you know anything about a well?’ ...dad didn’t either. I then did that thing of hopelessly trying to look saner than I must have seemed by saying it really is there, honestly, on the maps, and in the 1890’s list of holy wells, and retreated with as much dignity as I could, picking up a freshly baked loaf from the bakery on my way. Poor Melmerby having to live with that constant buzz and roar of motorbikes. It would make any holy well run a mile, or more.

Once home I cycled to Whale to see the wildflower meadow (extra) and then gripped by hey-fever I headed home and took to a darkened room to recover.

Postscript: One of the loveliest (and strangely synchronous after watching Small Island) bits of the day was seeing a young guy walking along the road between Eamont Bridge and Yanwath as I was driving home. It’s not the nicest bit of road to walk and I wondered where he was heading. I carried on home, had a cuppa and then got on my bike. As I was approaching Askham I passed him again as I was inching my way up the hill. He looked hot too and I puffed a hello as I crawled past. He asked if Askham was far and I said he was very nearly there and we both agreed it was pretty warm and humid (you can tell how fast I was going). I headed on past Askham towards Whale and the wildflower meadow and stopped to take photos before turning back for home when who should I see again...? Still stoically walking, the now familiar young man and I met again on the bridge and I said ‘but you’ve passed Askham!’ ...yes, he said, he was going to his friend’s at Whale. Goodness, that’s quite a trek, I said, but he was quite happy saying it was only his second time out after lockdown and it was good to have a change of scene from just being at home with his parents. They moved to Penrith from Jamaica four years ago. There was so much that I wanted to ask him on this tiny lane in the most rural part of Cumbria that you could find. We chatted for a bit but I didn’t want to detain him from his long walk to his friend’s. As I cycled off he waved and said ‘I hope we meet again’.