Sunday Times Where was I? Holiday Competition

Near as I can figure it, as viewed through the possibly flawed perceptual filters of my own reality tunnel, the most likely answers this week, seem to me to be:

Q1. Cleeve Abbey

Q2. Minehead

The initial clues seem to place us in the village of Watchet, in Somerset and legend has it, that it was here c 1797, after walking from his home in Nether Stowey, with William Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy, that Samuel Taylor Coleridge, was inspired to write his epic nautical poem, 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner', which was about a swabby who incurred the wrath of a genius loci, after shooting one of the albatrosses that it was responsible for. There appears to be a statue in the hamlet of said ancient mariner with the dead albatross around his neck.

The Vikings appear to have holidayed in Watchet on several occasions, one of them c 988AD. They generally visited places twice, with the purpose of the second visit, being to apologize for the first. The patron saint of Watchet is St Decuman, feast day 27th of August. St Decuman must have been a pretty good mariner himself, as he crossed the Bristol Channel on a raft, with only a cow for company. The local pagans chopped his head off but apparently he picked it up, washed it in a stream and put it back on his shoulders. There appears to be a hiking trail in the area called 'The Coleridge Way',

The West Somerset Railway passes through Watchet and the next stop south west of there, is Washford and from there it is a short walk to Cleeve Abbey (Cistercian c 12th century). The next station along the line is Blue Anchor and South west of there, lies the dorp of Carhampton (patron saint appears to be St Caranog aka St Carantoc, feast day May 16th). St Caranog seems to have sorted out a giant serpent and the cult that worshipped it, for King Arthur.

The penultimate station on the West Somerset Railway, passes close to Dunster Castle, which has been there for around one thousand years, so would be c 11th century in origin. The railway terminates in the town of Minehead and it was here, c 1917, according to some of his biographies, that the science fiction writer and great British genius, Arthur C Clarke was born. He wrote a short story called 'The Sentinel', which may have later become the film 2001. Minehead, from some of the sources I checked, had a seven hundred foot long pier from c 1901 to c 1940, when it was removed, to give the local gun batteries, a clear line of fire, should any of the opposition show up.


N.B. Due to the number of people who normally write poison pen letters in green ink posting on his page, the Eastender has moved to moderated comments but rest assured, if you have a non abusive post relating to solving the puzzle, he will endeavour to publish it.