Favourite bench

Just up the hill from our place in West Wales. It gets a sea view and a mobile signal, neither of which we get down the bottom of the valley

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Do I have one? I’m even sad enough to have a photo of it.

Sheffield Winter Garden.

[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51623194080_969f7dd7cb_k.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51623194080_969f7dd7cb_k.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/2mDLn5m ]Untitled[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/50334793@N03/ ]Pik n Mix[/url], on Flickr

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Mine

Do I have one? I’m even sad enough to have a photo of it.

Sheffield Winter Garden.

Hot property those benches. Don't think I've ever managed to sit on one.

This one.

We had a competition to design a memorial bench for Coombe Abbey in Coventry when I was teaching furniture making at College.
The student who won, Jan Waterston designed this one, and I helped him make and install it.

It's gone now. Rotted away and jumped all over by excited kids.

Oh that is beautiful, great job

link fail

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John Muir Country Park

I do like a good mid-ride bench to sit on and enjoy a cider. This is a favourite, although disappointingly the kebab shop across the road has been consumed by the ferrari garage. Spent many a late night drunkenly snaffling meat products followed by a wobbly ride home across the forest.

Boltons bench. Nowhere near Bolton.

I don't think I have one. My grandad passed away on his favourite bench. He lived in Ramsgate and would walk down to the front over looking the harbour with his paper whenever the weather permitted. He drifted off peacefully there. I couldn't say the exact bench as I was only young when it happened. Sorry to bring the mood of the thread down.

@mrwhyte not morose, a really nice story except maybe for the poor bugger that discovered him.

Nice thread this - STW vs Detectorists

@mrwhyte

Your not. I think that's an ace story. I'd far rather shuffle off this mortal coil during a lovey sit down rather than other options

I don't think that's brought the mood down.

In fact I think I want to go that way now I think about it..

This one used to be mine, it was on a nature reserve at Morgan’s Hill, near Calne, the one day I went up there for a walk, and it had disappeared! It was leaning forward a bit, but nothing that a bloke with a posting spade and several lengths of rebar couldn’t have fixed, but either Wiltshire Wildlife who oversaw it and decided it was a hazard, or someone took a shine to it and nicked it! It would have required some considerable effort either way.
Still makes me sad, it was a nice place to sit, the view is fantastic; on a clear day you can see must of the edge of the Cotswolds, from just north of Bath to up near Stroud, and beyond that, if you know where to look, you can see the Brecon Beacons and the Black Mountains, including Sugarloaf.

50" 39' 52
03" 22' 05

I’ve been sitting on it a couple of hours ago. At the top of Bank Road, Matlock, we call it old mans crevice. Set into the wall and perfect for post Farmacy, Newsroom and Bentley Brook Brewery afternoon session - chips and curry sauce from Wellington Street chippy! A picture would be more than any of you could take!

At Mariner, shouldn’t that longitude coordinate be -3?? As it is puts you in a field in northern France.

(Obscured by bike) stone seat in shedden clough on the Mary Townley loop. There's a carved dedication to someone, I can't make it out. Always stop there for a snack and a quiet rest.
Edit first time I've tried to post a pic from phone! Never mind.
Edit edit sorted

He lived in Ramsgate and would walk down to the front over looking the harbour with his paper whenever the weather permitted. He drifted off peacefully there.

That sounds like a great way to go to me.

I’m partial to this one at the top of Macc forest. Just a really nice place to sit, chill and think before ending a ride with a couple of choices of downhill bits and then cruising home

Though this is my favourite dedication

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Clent Hills, on a quiet track, looking out to other hills.
It’s not the best view in the world but it was the only place that could clear Mrs Lunge’s mind when she was really struggling with depression. We’d sit there for hours just looking out, listening to the birds and occasionally talking.
We don’t need to go there much anymore, thankfully.
For that reason alone, it’ll always be my favourite bench.

I don't have the photo of the bench, but I do have a photo 'from' the bench 🙂

Why?
It might not have a backrest, but its curved just so to make it really comfy after a long day on the bike and invites you to lie down.
Its old, dedicated to someones memory, and slightly off the way.
Its at the top of probably the worst hill on the SDW for a singlespeed, its calf snapping just walking!

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Another favourite bench of mine was this one on Dartmoor.
Here I am sat on it several years ago now. Can't recall the year.

I think it's gone now as apparently idiots used to climb up it and sit on it for photos, although I didn't see any while I was up there. 🙄

Anyone know what happened to it?

Here's another favourite bench (benches rock !) by a furniture maker called Phillip Koomen.

I don't have a picture but my favourite is in Milton Keynes - it's place less than 50m away from the M1.
I don't think I've ever seen anyone sit on it, but it makes me smile each time I cycle past it.

One halfway up a local hill, cut into the rock by someone years ago. Surrounded by woodland on all sides, small lake about 100' feet below it.
Used to love to sit here late night/early morning when the trees have full canopy and just observe. The owls and foxes you hear and see going about their business is gorgeously meditative.
Was lucky enough to doze off one night, about 3am, to be woken by a family of about 7 badgers snuffling around me. You ever heard a troop of startled badgers run full pelt through the woods? Sounds like a herd of cows.
Anyway, that bench.

This one

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Has anyone got a pic of the bench at Swinley just before Labyrinth? I am always amazed how it appears to float on a sea of litter

Top of kinver edge looking across to the sheepwalks on a late summers evening deciding which pub to stop at on the way home.

When I used to work in an actual office I used to religiously walk up to the parkeach lunchtime Theres a secret spot by the bowling green with a bench that's an utter suntrap. Even in the cold and wind, so long as it's sunny you can lie down for a snooze.

It's probably the only thing I miss about going to the office!

sargey that might be one of the benches I put in

Dedicated benches are at epidemic level around here. Despoiling the best bits of the countryside.

'My' bench is on a headland off Myrtle Bay on Derwent water looking over towards Keswick.
My first memory of it is in 1987 as a sixteen year old camping in the woods nearby for a week with mates.
34(!) years later I regularly go to the caravan site in Manesty woods with the family (this week in fact) and the kids love sitting reading the ancient initials carved into it and it's now 'their' bench.

Now I'm disappointed that I don't have a favorite bench. ☹️ But I'll definitely be thinking on this thread on my future complative sitting moments.

Halfway up the climb out of Kinlochleven. Great place to rest going up towards Loch Eilde towards Lubielt.

My favourite is a work bench

When it was first built

And now

Nice bench WCA. Plenty of space for tool boxes. Did you do those inset bits specific to bosch or festool boxes
Seen a number with a router table one end, saw bench the other.

Nice sized workspace too. Wish I had something that size to get as messy and cluttered. Mines small and cluttered 😆

This one, next to the Stanza Stone at Scammonden dam. It's just a really nice bench cut from layers of local stone in the shape of the reservoir (when full)

shouldn’t that longitude coordinate be -3?? As it is puts you in a field in northern France.

OOPs yes -3 but probably rather be in a field in northern France.
All the years I have been sitting on this bench I never took a photo of it just from it.
On a clear day I can see over to Lyme Bay with Portland on the horizon.
Takes me a couple of hours to ride there and feel really miffed if someone else is sitting there when I get there.

There's an odd bench overlooking bumbles green

Definitely not kosher but a fine view all the same

@sargey, Which one? (taken for a photo thread a while back.. 2011 even)

I like the Freddie Gilroy and the Belsen Stragglers one in scarborough

(Not my photo or my kids)

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The statue of Sir Nicholas Winton on platform 3 at Maidenhead station. Used to pass it daily on my commutes into London, which made me look up why it was there. Well, he organised the rescue of 669 primarily jewish children from Czechoslavkia prior to the outbreak of WWII. He was knighted for services to humanity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Winton

My first is at Mystic Mountain in Bright
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My second isn't really a public bench. It was "The Bench." My old 110 Defender that we lapped Australia in.

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Best bench ever - Winter or Summer . . . .

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360° bench....

Fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, fricasse shrimp...

California 2009

The one with this view.

https://flic.kr/p/2nRLp4g

Top of Sutton Bank.

Currently this one, that I usually sit on for a bit while on my extended walk back home from town. It’s a lovely little park that’s well used, the band stand does actually get used.

@spooky_b329

Hi there, what hill is that you mention mate?

Thanks!

Heading back down the bridleway from Roundhouse Farm just outside Henley is a bench looking down a small valley and on toward the Thames. Don't think I've ever actually stopped there but the view is a bucolic idyll given its proximity to Reading.

@poopscoop

It's between Southease and Rodmell in East Sussex. If you are riding East to West it rises up from South Farm, the bench is at the top of Mill Lane, Rodmell. I highly recommend Mill Lane as a kinder alternative if you don't want a push 🙂

The bench up at the Mast at Glentress. Never tire of that view.

Not the greatest view but the bench at Cwm Rhaeadr at the point where the singletrack starts on the fireroad climb ends is always one that sticks in the mind. It's always incredibly peaceful there, you have to earn the rest and it's all fun on the way back down. Have seen Red Kites flying around from it, watched planes fly along the valley and even had a nice little snooze on it when doing laps a few times too. It's a dedicated bench that's starting to rot, hopefully it'll be replaced when the time comes.