Steep Stairs and a Tumbling Toy

One of the curiosities of many watermills, including Stretton, is that they have an upstairs and a downstairs but both are on the ground floor.  The rear of the mill building is, in effect, part of the dam that holds back the mill pond.  Outside the ground slowly slopes from the front to the back of the watermill and so each floor can be entered on the level.

But, if you want to get upstairs from the inside then there are some rather steep ladder like stairs.  Millers sometimes rush up and down them faster than they perhaps should. 

Ascending the stairs, you get glimpses of the building's history which the mill otherwise keeps secret - like the square oak mullions of an unglazed window,

or the holes where the hazel uprights of a wattle panel were once held tight.

Sometimes when schoolchildren who are visiting the mill have a few spare minutes at the end of the day there is a chance for them to play with some traditional toys.  The jolly sailor tumbling down his rigging has been a long standing favourite, but seemed a bit out of place at the mill.  But then - sudden realisation - it's not rigging, it's the steep stairs of the mill.  And he's not a sailor but a jolly miller, well, with a bit of repainting anyway.  And if he now happens to look like one of our favourite millers at Stretton, that's just coincidence!