Greetings from Beckriggthwaite

It's hard to invent an authentic-sounding placename, a fact that Victoria Wood satirised in Acorn Antiques, set in the town of Manchesterford. Real place names are far too bizarre.

At the moment I'm on the Furness peninsula in Cumbria. I have frequently seen Barrow-in-Furness written as Barrow-in-Furnace, because, knowing it is an industrial town, people think it has something to do with steel-making. Either that or they think it's very hot which, as any regular visitor knows, is most certainly not the case. Walking along the beach in a howling gale is a typical Barrow happening - well, it is in our family, anyway.

In fact, a Ness is a sort of nose of land sticking out into the sea. Greenodd is the first one: Odd is Viking for headland, apparently. The next one, is, appropriately, called Next Ness. And we are in Furness, the furthest one.

The Victoria Wood equivalent of the place names round here would probably be Beckriggthwaite. However, driving back to Barrow today we came across two which just don't fit the pattern. We passed a village called Po House which nestled next to a hill called Whirl Pippin. Who'd believe those if you put them in a novel?