It’s grim up North?

Been a while since I sat behind the keyboard for this blog. Plenty water has passed under the keel and many port visits have come and gone. Time to blow new life into Tims Times again.

I had a chance to take the bicycle ashore in Immingham, a port I hadn’t been to in many moons, maybe even years. The opportunity to get ashore for a cycle is always great, Immingham is of course hardly the greatest place on earth in fact I think God has forgotten about the place to be honest. It defines the phrase “It’s grim up North” the port is busy as hell ships in and out all the time, but the poor village and environs are depressing and gray even the sunshine couldn’t warm the atmosphere up. The recession has given a further blow to this region, or it hadn’t recovered from the previous recession and it has been flattened again. Derelict buildings, shut down pubs and shops, weeds and briars growing out of the roadside and kerbs. Rubbish all over the place, for sale signs on houses that no one will buy and old cars with hopeful prices scrawled across the windscreens. All that was missing was the “Abandon hope all ye who enter here” sign. The economic turnover at the port must be enormous, millions, the place is huge, the scale of operations is colossal. But none of this money seems to have filtered down to the poor misfortunate souls that inhabit the village which is surrounded by the port.

I went looking for an old pub called the “Lock Inn” which was beside the locks surprisingly enough but it was gone, demolished, not only shut down but erased from the skyline. It was a shrine to plastic, Formica and fluorescent lighting with a heavy coating of nicotine on the wall, I suppose the smoking ban must have killed the place off completely, the shop was held together by the tar stained wall paper. The atmosphere was smoky and oily and you could get chips and gravy at the bar along with your bitter while listening to the swearing. The smell would have brought a tear to a glass eye, another good reason to knock the place down. Pint of Bitter? Great name for beer!

It wasn’t beyond redemption however, everybody you met was friendly. Even the security guards at the gate, dead friendly and chatty.  All oblivious to the gray surroundings, so it only looks grim, and looks can be deceptive.

Who put the Grim in Grimsby? The Vikings of course but Scunthorpe is another kettle of fish altogether.