All Around Arundel

Now that the airshow has come and gone, we went farther afield in search of entertainment. So we drove west along the south coast to a village called Arundel. This place has been inhabited sine Willy the conqueror. It is tucked along the South Downs on the Arun River.

We were lucky to arrive as their annual Art Festival kicked off. There were over 60 displays of various artist work. There is also a substantial pile called strangely enough Arundel Castle.

This the home to the Duke of Norfolk. He has other homes it seems, but when he stands on the top of this place, everything he sees belongs to him. Although we chatted with some of the villagers and they did own their houses. Any painted surfaces with a rusty red colour belonged to him.

There were many visitors in town to explore the displays. We tended to look at the painters and fabric artists. But one twig artist caught Sheelagh's eye.

The ancient Priory has been turned into a 77 seat theatre and we had a look at that. The artistic director showed us around . It has been putting on plays for almost 50 years. The last Duchess rented them the space for 1 rose a year. 

It was getting morning tea time and so we stopped by a display called There And Not There in the St Nicholas Parish church. This was the 100th anniversary of the end of WW I. There were  93 local boys who had perished in that conflict. One family sent off 5 boys and 1 came home.         Clear plastic outlines  of the dead sit in the pews of the church. It is quite haunting. We all required a piece of cake and a cup of tea.This church had been part of the Priory. When Henry VIII outlawed Catholicism the Duke, who was catholic continued to worship in the Fitzwilliam Chapel. That was the east end of the church. It was separated from the Protestant end by a screen.

Everyone kept quiet and the local authorities did nothing about it. The walls of the old church had friezes that had been painted over by Henry and then badly damaged by people trying to restore them.

The rest of the day was spent wandering the charming streets looking at art and  picking out where we would like to live.

It was another wonderful day with the Prices, the Duke and Duchess of Eastbourne.