This episode starts with injection of molten rock across northern England a rock that is responsible for a huge chunk of our tourist economy. Then it takes a tour of hot deserts, evaporating salty seas, and finally our secret bit of every fossil hunters dream rock. On the way we’ll hear about plots to blow up a famous stone circle, dispose of nuclear waste, a mass global extinction and a more recent awful tragedy. Sounds dismal, but its really not!

A virtual tour of six rocky places across the north of England that help us understand exactly what the environment was like around 330 million years ago in the Carboniferous period. The land we now call Britain wasn't 55 degrees north then, we were close to the Equator and our landscape alternated between steamy swamps, coastal lagoons, huge lazy rivers, and even coral seas. The story is written in our rocks.

This is the first episode of the first season of these podcasts. They are based on my five books about northern rocks and their connections with our landscape ….and us. The stories of this first season – Time travelling - begin almost 500 million years ago and end with the Roman conquest of the north. Episode one begins deep in a southern ocean ....and on a hill in the Lake District of England.