Interesting/amusing addresses

[malcontentcontent]

This probably doesn't count, but there's a Festus Road near here.  My friends and I always misread the sign as Fetus Road.  Recently, it's been flooding so the sign was knocked over.  I drove by today and someone had put up a sign that said "Fetus Road."   

[Sorontar]

Birmingham has an area called 'California'. 

Perth, Australia, has an area called Hollywood, complete with Hollywood Primary School and Hollywood Hospital.

[Mr. Boltneck]

I was reminded today that out in the Central Valley, a couple of hours drive or thereabouts, is Manteca, California. For those who don't speak Spanish, that's more or less "Lard" or "Fat." Next time you hear some place described as Fat City, you'll know where the original is.

[Zwack]

I used to live in Birmingham, there is also an area aptly called World's End.

Edinburgh also has a World's End.  It's just inside the old city walls (which mostly don't exist any more).  I suspect that might be the origins of the Birmingham World's End too.

Z.

[LadyAsprin]

I used to live in Birmingham, there is also an area aptly called World's End.

Edinburgh also has a World's End.  It's just inside the old city walls (which mostly don't exist any more).  I suspect that might be the origins of the Birmingham World's End too.

Z.

Its a pub location now.

[Zwack]

Indeed, but there is also a World's End Close just to the west of the pub.

Z.

[Darkhound]

A person in Western Pennsylvania who starts at Blue Balls, proceeds through Intercourse, and stops at Climax might be describing an innocent road trip through the little mining towns.

[IdenticalBowlerHats]

Saw "Pringle Road" the other day driving home from Sacramento, it made me really want Pringles

[Athanor]

Surprised no-one's mentioned this; there's a good sized town in Yorkshire called Penistone, and just a short distance away another town called Wombwell. Over in Cumberland (now renamed, by executive fiat, Cumbria), there's a hill called Great Cockup. Nearby there's another one called, I kid you not, Barf. Lancashire has an Oswaldtwistle, and a place called Rose Grove which was in the middle of one of the most blasted, blighted, smoky and altogether insalubrious areas of industrial squalor imaginable (it might be different now), Cheshire has Cholmodeley, pronounce Chumly, and Cholmodeston, pronounced - well, your guess is as good as mine, probably. Shropshire has a minute village called Ruyton of the Eleven Towns and another called Eyton upon the Weald Moors, and a village half way up a mountain called Snailbeach, which doesn't have a beach and is 50 miles from the sea - and doesn't seem to have an unusual number of snails. Further south there's a River Piddle, a town nearby called Piddletrenthide and another called Puddletown. Up on the edge of the Pennines there is Buxworth, which used to be Bugsworth before the local council changed the name, hoping to attract wealthy Manchester stockbrokers to come and live there. Then, of course, in the south of England there are the quite beatiful little villages of Upper Slaughter and Lower Slaughter.

Street names? In my old home town there's a Dog Lane, a Cowfields (no fields anywhere around, and certainly no cows), a Gas Alley, a Volunteer Fields (again, no fields anywhere around), a Meeanee drive which, I'm told, commemorates a battle fought in India in which a local regiment took part, a Pillory Street which is where miscreants were shoved in the stocks and pelted with....well, with whatever, and a twisty lane called, quite simply, The Gullet. And that's just one small town. Elsewhere I've seen a There and Back Again Lane (a cul-de-sac, obviously), a Balls Pond Road; and  a pub called the Ram Jam Inn.

Then there's that small town in Norway, near Trondheim, called Hell. I has its own rail station, so you can go into the ticket office in Trondheim and, quite literally, buy a ticket to Hell.                  

[r_is_for_rachel]

Tickle cock Bridge in West Yorkshire,UK has been in the news recently as the local council tried to change the name to Tittle Cott but residents (mostly elderly!) rallied against this and won!

another very rude one was very common in ye olden days (but mostly changed because people really were offended!) is under the cut as it's really NSFW

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Gropecunt Lane

on a nicer tangent, in Gloucestershire there is a wonderfully named village that always brings a smile to my face called Tiddlywink!

[Capt. Dirigible]

another very rude one was very common in ye olden days (but mostly changed because people really were offended!) is under the cut as it's really NSFW

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Gropecunt Lane

Most major cities had a street named that at one point but over the years as the c-word became less popular in polite society the names were all changed but originally it was normal practice for a medieval street name to reflect the street's function or the economic activity taking place within it...and that particular thoroughfare was  a haunt of prostitutes.

[Zwack]

At one point my father lived in Paradise, next door to the pub.   

It's a village in Gloucestershire.

Z.

[Mr. Boltneck]

And not to forget Truth or Consequences, New Mexico: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_or_Consequences,_New_Mexico

[sanityattack]

There is a small village near me called Bully Hole Bottom.

[MissBelaqua]

An old friend of mine used to live at 123, The Street. It was somewhere near Bristol.

Also- I don't know if someone's already mentioned this one- but there's a little village in Scotland called Ecclefechan (pronounced ekk-ul-fek-un)
which has always tickled me. 

[Capt. Dirigible]

Saw "Pringle Road" the other day driving home from Sacramento

Now there's a town that needs a tube station!  'Pringle'...'tube'...yeah?

Oh please yerselves..

Surprised no-one's mentioned this; there's a good sized town in Yorkshire called Penistone,

Looks funny written but is pronounced 'Pennis-ton'


I thought it was really funny that Manchester City Football Club wanted to name one of their new stands after one of their most famous players, Colin Bell. Which would have meant that it would have been referred to as 'The Bell End' (fnar-fnar)

[Arceye]

About a mile from me is 'Deadman's Hole Lane' in the area known as 'Ickles'.

One of my favourite town names is the delightful Cambridgeshire town of Godmanchester.

[Danbury Shakes]

Birmingham has an area called 'California'. 

Perth, Australia, has an area called Hollywood, complete with Hollywood Primary School and Hollywood Hospital.

Tyne & Wear has got both Washington and New York

Street names? In my old home town there's a Dog Lane, a Cowfields (no fields anywhere around, and certainly no cows), a Gas Alley, a Volunteer Fields, a Meeanee drive which, I'm told, commemorates a battle fought in India in which a local regiment took part, a Pillory Street which is where miscreants were shoved in the stocks and pelted with....well, with whatever, and a twisty lane called, quite simply, The Gullet. And that's just one small town. Elsewhere I've seen a There and Back Again Lane (a cul-de-sac, obviously), a Balls Pond Road; and  a pub called the Ram Jam Inn.

My dad grew up in Gluehouse Lane, Elswick, Newcastle which ran along next to the cemetery (what did they make glue from in those days?).  There was also a Glue Terrace which ran off it - I guess they just stuck to the same naming theme 
Map of Elswick in 1919
Gluehouse Lane is now, for some unfathomable reason, called West View (and they've also demolished half of it).  The bit that survives has the cemetery on the western side of it.

Then there's that small town in Norway, near Trondheim, called Hell. I has its own rail station, so you can go into the ticket office in Trondheim and, quite literally, buy a ticket to Hell.                 

OK, that's now on my places to go to.  I also want to go to Christmas and to Easter (although I don't want May Day involved in any of my travels)

[aldebaran]

There's a suburb in Brisbane called Burpengarry.

[MWBailey]

Her ein Houston, we have a street called West Mount Houston - no mountains anywhere, (this is Houston, the middle of the Texas flatlands). There's also a Buffalo Speedway (never heard of or seen any high-speed buffaloes on it. Lots of BMWs, though, some of which carry people who look like they'v been eating buffaloes...

[Atterton]

If we can include general place names, there´s the Sky Mountain in Denmark. Which is a hill 136 meters high. I think they were being ironic.

[Athanor]

Does anyone know how to pronounce Alfardisworthy and Hertingfordbury, both in England, and Featherstoneheugh, in Scotland?

There's a tiny village in Dorset, England, called Eype, pronounced Eep, and another in the far southwest of Ireland called Sneem. I wanted to go there when I was in Ireland two years ago, but for some reason I never made it. I just wanted to see what a place called Sneem acttually looked like - but it is probably just like any number of Southwest Ireland villages.

Other notable place names in Britain include Beer, Talke, Speke, Knockin, Black Dog, Cowes (pronounces Cows), and a railway station, now closed, called Twenty. Apparently it was so far from the nearest habitation of any kind that it was simply named for an adjacent field which was numbered 20 on the large scale Ordnance Survey map of the area.

[Choreocrat]

I think Featherstonehaugh as a surname is often pronounce Fanshaw or Fessonhaye.

I can only guess at the other two. I'd *guess* Alsworthy and Hernbury, but I'm probably way off.

This is an interesting list to look through, though none of the three are there. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_names_in_English_with_counterintuitive_pronunciations

I like Greater and Little Barugh, both pronounced Barf.

[LadyAsprin]

How about No Place, Pity Me, Bearpark, Idle, Once Brewed and Twice Brewed? In the North East.

[Pheobsky]

Not immediately amusing, but I live on "dale rd" which if left uncorrected in predictive text comes up as fake rd...
The only interesting one I can think of is I used to live nearish an "Amen corner" so called as it was where people used to be hung....

Oh and there is a place, always highly amusing to get directions to: 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

condom Fr.