|
Welcome to my web site which contains maps, stories, history, advice and over 800 photographs to help you explore Portland, Dorset - The Jewel of the Jurassic Coast |
||
 |
West of Southwell Portland, Dorset |
 |
|
Welcome to my web site which contains maps, stories, history, advice and over 800 photographs to help you explore Portland, Dorset - The Jewel of the Jurassic Coast |
||
|
West of Southwell Portland, Dorset |
|
Back to Portland Home Page |
 |
Back to Portland Map Index page |
||
 |
MOVE |  |
||
 |
| All the pictures on this page showing a thick border are thumbnails. Clicking on the picture will produce a larger version. Use your browser BACK button to return to this page. | |
 |
Perhaps the least interesting area in this web site! Mostly a large field between Reap Lane and the cliff edge. The rougher pasture land in the upper right-hand was a deep quarry, Grangecroft, until the 1960s when it was in-filled and cultivated. Now there is hardly any clue that this was once a large hole apart from a few boulders breaking the surface near the middle right-hand edge of the red square. Please click here for a detailed map. Click the BACK button on your browser to return to this page. Please click here to visit the satellite image of this area on Google Maps. Click the BACK button on your browser to return to this page. |
| Perhaps the only interesting thing to say about this area is that it a place to find little furry animals that run around and burrow in the quarry debris. Whatever you do, never say or write the 'R Word' on Portland. Stuart Morris, in his excellent "Illustrated History of Portland" never uses the word but refers instead to bunnies, conies, underground mutton, etc. |
 |
Old Portlanders have a strong superstition about these furry creatures. If a Portland quarry worker or fisherman saw a bunny on the way to work he would turn back and stay at home all day. I know one visitor who was being taken on a fishing trip in the 1970s and said the 'R Word'. The boat was turned around and the crew went silently home. So, even today, it is no joke. |
|
There are several stories of the origin of this superstition. Some say that bunnies digging in quarries caused fatal rock falls. Also, when blasting the explosion would sometimes run along bunny burrows and rocks would be blown uncontrollably in all directions. A long exchange of stories in the Dorset Echo in 2003 suggested that neither of these origins was true and that the bunny aversion was a 20th century invention. Who knows? In December 2002 huge numbers of dead bunnies were found around Portland Bill. In October 2005 the film "Wallace and Gromit - Curse of the Were-R****t" was released but posters on Portland were defaced. The media descended on Portland and the Bunny Curse was widely publicised. One brave ITV reporter dressed in a r****t suit and hopped around the Island. Strange to say, within days of Aardman Films posting the r****t pictures on Portland, their entire warehouse of props and models burned down. Say no more! Nudge! Nudge! Wink! Wink! That's why I'm not going to give 'that there Underground Mutton' their real name on this website! |
|
|
Back to Portland Home Page |
|
Back to Portland Map Index page |
||
|
MOVE | |
||
|