Hello, I'm Wellmet listeners. Thank you for joining me once again on this new episode of the Little Places Travel Journal podcast, with me, your host, Molly Dolman.

This week we continue our winding tour of the hills and paddocks of the English countryside, and I have a charming hidden gem to speak with you about today.

Croxmont.

Here are my travel journal snippets of Little Croxmont.

So, listen, relax and imagine with me the rolling fog,

wide fields and heavy trees of this quiet, lonely village.

I drove into Cruxmont via the singular particularly paved road in and out.

It's clear that this is a sleepy town, a pass-through town, the type of no petrol station,

and a corner grocer where the shopkeeper knows everyone's name.

The town is surrounded by rolling hills covered in manicured orchards and ringed by a low stone wall and a row of trees planted decades ago to denote the orchards end.

Patches of sparse forest and dotted trees cross the otherwise pristine hills beyond, a true piece of Northern England's area of outstanding natural beauty. Inside

the small village, dotted with narrow pitch roof houses and well-tented gardens, flowering

and freshly painted here and there, it can be seen in every fence post and every cobbled

road that the people of Croxmont take great pride in their home.

Shops are orderly and not a chain store is to be seen from the woman and her daughter moving clothes tracks outside on a sunny day for locals to peruse,

to the small chat of regulars as they exit the local grocer. But outside of the grocer,

overflowing with tended pale foxgloves,

falling blush wisteria and vibrant violet Delphinians

is a homemade stand of mint-painted wood,

contrasting the sharp and vibrant purple of their abundant wares. Plums. Plum juice, plum wine, plum jam,

plum candies and sweets, plum chutney, plum salad, spicy or sweet. Plum fizz and plum concentrate,

plum cobbler and scones, little wreaths and dolls made of plum boughs, plum-cented

...