Shropshire: It's more like it was now than it was then

As my Twitter followers may have gathered, I've made it back to Shropshire for a few days.

Of course, there have been changes. The Plough at Wistanstow has closed. You can't have tea in the courtyard at Stokesay Castle any more. The Land of Lost Content museum at Craven Arms really has gone.

But then I decided I was looking at things the wrong way. My memories of exploring the Shropshire hills cover nearly 30 years from the late 1980s - I first encountered Snailbeach and the Stiperstones on the day we won an important qualifying-group game against Poland on our way to Italia 90.

As a result, what I have is a jumble of memories that I sometimes struggle to put together into a single holiday or even a single day. 

Where, for instance, was I walking to or from when I discovered the little Catholic chapel at Plowden? I think it was on a walk from Church Stretton to Bishop's Castle - the first time I saw the latter town - but I may well be wrong.

So I decided to stop hankering for a past that may never quite have been and make some new memories. I went to look for Halford church on the other side of the Onny from Craven Arms. 

Not only did I find the church, I also found an agricultural village that long predated the founding of the town. I won't share the photos with your today - this is, after all, meant to be a holiday - instead, the photo above shows the Plough in its pomp

I shall leave you with a thought from the Shropshire-based sitcom The Green Green Grass. In one episode, an American returned to the county, where he had been stationed in the Sixties, and wondered if it had changed.

"Oh no," a local reassured him, "It's not changed. If anything, it's more like it was now than it was then."