Today the backdrop to my existence changed

We all have, at least I do, an image of where we are. A sort of bird's eye view of where we line up. Mine's an aerial map of Cumbria (like the one in the Keswick Museum - Flintoft's amazing 4m Scale Model of the Lake District). I saw it when I was 8 and it's been in my head ever since. The view overlooking Cockermouth towards the Lorton valley with Hopegillhead and Grassmoor and of course sleeping Skiddaw dominates the natural; but there are a couple of man made items that provide me with my in-built satnav positioning device.

The first was the pile chimneys at Sellafield and the second the 4 cooling towers at Chapelcross nuclear power station on the Scottish side of the Solway.

I declare an interest - my gran came from Seascale and Calder hall and my earliest memories were the 2 chimneys (every other Sunday teatime)- now reduced to approx. 1 and a bit.

The Chapelcross quad towers gave me the North Cumbria trig point when we had our bi-weekly Sunday outings for Twentyman's and Longcake's ice cream from Allonby and Silloth. There's at least another couple of posts on the delights of Silloth- but not today. This morning RenWoman brought the cup that revives and without the need for a second we set off for Bowness on Solway and the site of the old railway line across the water to Scotland. The 2 piers on the site of the railway line are worth a post in their own right... but later. By 8.30 am (along with an assorted thousand or so other train spotters) we were attempting to find a parking place between Bowness and Anthorn. The occasion - the demolition of the cooling towers - at 9 - at 2 second intervals the towers would be dropped. And so there they were gone.

How am I going to find my way to Silloth in future? It could explain why bendigo (the dog) got disorientated on his way back to the car. The national news informed me that migrating geese use(d) the towers to navigate - though not for Longcake's vanilla.

I would have been tempted to have left the towers, their carbon impact long neutralised, and painted them pink or found an alternative use. I actually quite like dereliction (look at Italy for instance - though not at Barrow-in Furness). RW and I drove home in subdued silence until I took a wrong turn near Newton Arlosh (now there's a place) and ended up back in Silloth. See! I've lost the in-built satnav already.