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Welcome to Belper

With its busy shopping streets packed with unique independent businesses, its history and heritage, its parks, reserves and beautiful spaces, Belper in Derbyshire is a great place to visit.

Find out more about this thriving, historic market town here: belper.madhm.uk.

Welcome to Belper

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Pyramid Power

Gary Osmosis believes that Egyptian Pyramids are the fossilised remains of interstellar starships that once carried aliens to Earth, many years before the dawn of human civilisation. Where Mr Osmosis differs from other lunatics is that he has the cash to put his ridiculous theories to the test, and after experimenting with a scale model of the Great Pyramid in a wind tunnel he concluded that it was 68% more aerodynamic than a bungalow.

Proof, so he believes, that a pyramid could easily cross vast intergalactic distances and drop safely through a planetary atmosphere. His results also explain, so he says, why bungalows are hardly ever observed to do that kind of thing. In fact, Mr Osmosis is so confident that his theory is correct that he now plans to build a full-sized fusion-driven pyramid to take him to Jupiter, where he will descend to the surface in a nuclear Taj Mahal and roam around the surface using a solar-powered stealth-enabled Stonehenge.

Synchronised Lifeguard

Surfer Colin Phlegm may not have had the most dignified rescue when he found himself struggling against the tide while on holiday in Australia this summer. All the same, he was thankful when lifeguard Ricky Flambeau hauled him to safety. Fortunately Ricky, who has never completed his lifeguard certificate, is nevertheless an accomplished synchronised swimmer.

"I'll admit, it was a great relief when Ricky came up from below me and lifted me out of the water, perched on his shoulders," Colin told us. "But I didn't really have time to register any surprise before he swung me round in a circle by my ankle, prior to performing a couple of inverted twists and ending up in the flamingo position. I gather, from what spectators have told me, that it was quite an impressive spectacle. Well, I don't know about that. All I can tell you is that I have never, in all my life, been so grateful for the sight of a spangley leotard."

An Anglo-Saxon Christmas

Archaeologists have discovered what they believe to be a haul of unwanted Anglo-Saxon Christmas presents under a car park in the West Midlands. The collection is still being cleaned and catalogued, but already some very interesting finds have been announced, including a scented bath set, some comedy reindeer antlers and a fragment of a storage jar - because there's always a storage jar.

"This is a very exciting find," lied chief trowel waggler, Ian Soil. "We know quite a lot about the Anglo-Saxons. We know where they lived, what they ate, where they worked and what they built. But this is the first indication that we've had about the kind of crap they gave each other for Christmas."

Mr Soil, a dour man with filth under his fingernails and a dirty look on his face, went on to explain why he is particularly pleased with this find. "Everything is so perfectly preserved," he told us as he fiddled with something unpleasantly in his pocket. "The goods are all in their original packaging and have been very carefully stowed away. More importantly, everything has its original receipt, which means we stand a good chance of being able to take all of this shit back to the shop and get a refund."