Hand painted on a Derby Porcelain teapot stand is a scene of Burley in Derbyshire. It shows a hill and a river with a bend.
My map confirms that the River Derwent flows past Burley Hill and has a distintive bend at that point. A good start. There’s a problem though, no public footpath where I need to go. Not easily thwarted, I go anyway.
I get to Burley and approach the area but I’m stopped in my tracks by a water treatment works with a high perimeter fence. Noticing that the nettles have been trodden down around the fence I decide to go for this narrow path alongside the railway line. I’m regretting wearing shorts straight away but after 10 minutes of struggling through the undergrowth I emerge bitten and stung right into the scene of the painting.
It’s glorious open countryside on this side of the fence. What a shame it’s not a place to roam as it was in Jockey Hill’s day.
I can’t get the photograph to look like the painting because the river bank is treelined so I climb down and photograph into the sun at river level. This makes the hill look tiny but wherever I stand, it’s obvious that he’s increased the height of the hill for dramatic effect.
I’m left wondering how I can prove I’m in the right place on the bend of the river when the answer is in front of me. Suddenly a canoe comes round the bend and I photograph it as it turns. It strikes me as funny that he’s not tresspassing so long as he stays in the canoe but I am.
I decide to get out fast.
