What we did in our Winter Holidays

At the end of the autumn, the mill was awarded Quality Assured Visitor Attraction status by Visit England for the seventh year in a run.  It's lovely to know that in these modern days with gadgets everywhere that the personal touch of millers at an ancient rural watermill is still valued.  We had our last visitors to the watermill in October, some school groups who had come to take part in our wartime mill workshop.  Since then millers have given the place a good clean throughout and put the mill to bed for the winter.  Maintenance work and repairs have taken place on the some of the machinery and the penstock by the overshot wheel.  These are the types of jobs that you can only get done when the mill is closed.  The sluice gates on the by-wash have been open through the winter to send the water past the mill rather than risk damaging the machinery inside if we have heavy rain.  Even so, with the year-long rain that we had in 2012 the pond has remained fairly full this past few months and millers have had to make regular checks on the place. 

As readers of this blog will know there are strong links between apple trees and watermills and so on 12th January, we wassailed our apple trees at the mill in keeping with tradition. 

Friends and people who have been keen supporters of the mill gathered as darkness began to fall.  One of the millers had been busy all day baking cheese scones and mulling cider for everyone to enjoy along with some hot spiced apple juice. 

We listened to the folk tale of the Apple Tree Man, then picked up our drums and bells to process around the trees and make much noise to drive away the evil spirits.

We hung toast in the branches for the birds.  Whatever the apple harvest this year, there was a fine crop of toast.

We sang to the oldest apple tree and poured cider on its roots. 

Then it was done and all headed off to the nearby Carden Arms for a meal and lots of music.

We'll be looking forward to the watermill opening up to everyone again in a few months, beginning with weekend afternoons from April, then each afternoon except Monday from May.  And of course there will be many special events through the spring and summer to bring to life the many stories of our wonderful mill.  Of which, more soon...

Apples at the Mill

There is a close bond between mills and apples, or rather apple wood.  At Stretton, the ancient machinery of the overshot wheels gears is hewn from sturdy oak.  A whole oak trunk forms the stout shaft, still strong after centuries, despite the shakes and cracks along its length.  The great spur wheel and crown wheel are likewise shaped from the powerful oak.  That's just what you need in the wood for such a task, strength and resilience.  But it's different with the teeth of the gear wheels.  Use oak there and the wood will get worn as the wheels mesh together and oak is so strong that if an obstruction falls into the gears the whole wheel will break.  What is needed is a wood that won't wear as the wheel turns and yet will shear off cleanly when meeting an obstacle and avoid further damage.  Apple wood is perfect, and so apple trees will often be found alongside watermills, for the miller to make replacements for the teeth of the gear wheels.

When Stretton Watermill was restored as a museum in the 1970s, apple trees were planted on the plot of the land where the Gregory family of millers had grown potatoes.  They have born fruit ever since, though these trees have gradually died off over the decades and only one of these remains.  They've been replaced with new trees, using old Cheshire varieties such as Wareham Russet and Millicent Barnes.  Apple trees in the garden of the former miller's cottage, just across Mill Lane, still bear a bountiful harvest and we enjoy the juice from these each autumn.

This coming January, we will be wassailing the apple trees of the mill.  Pouring cider around the roots, hanging toast in the branches for the birds and making loud noises against the witches.  So, at Old New Year, on Saturday 14th January 2012, join us at the mill at 4 o'clock as dusk falls for music, storytelling, mulled cider and wassailing as we enact an ancient tradition to protect the apple trees for the coming year.

A Victorian Harvest Weekend

For a few years now we've marked the traditional harvest-time with a special event at the mill, especially as the end of September is when the watermill closes its doors to the general public for the autumn and winter, so we go out with a bit of a celebration. 

We'd collected apples from the trees at the mill and been given several crates by friends to press into gallons and gallons of juice.  It was more or less all drunk by the visitors and millers that weekend, none left over to make cider.

We churned cream to make butter and ate cakes made to Victorian harvest-time recipes.

A steady flow of visitors for guided tours kept the millstones busy throughout the day so we ended up with a few sacks of flour.

Thanks to the creative talents of Chris and Joan, and a fair few pieces of string to hold things together, a little Victorian parlour appeared inside a tent between the mill and the bywash.   They provided us with nineteenth century tunes all afternoon and the cheery melodies drifted around the mill giving just the right atmosphere for a harvest home.