Writings

Miniatures - Plant Pot

2011-10-04T15:08:00.022+08:00

Not having blogged a pattern before, I'm not guaranteeing the sizes of the finished project

Equipment Needed

Card – thinner than cardstock, but thicker than cereal packets.
Paint (colour of your choice. I’ve done white )
Very fine sand
Glue
Fine embossing tool

Instructions:

Place pattern on paper of your choice. Double sided tape will hold it
Cut out the pieces
To make it easier to cut out the bottom, score and fold the bottom of the plant pot under

Fold so that the dark cutting lines are on the inside

Fold each section separately to get a good sharp fold
Put glue on the side tab(2)
Let dry
Put glue on the bottom tab(1)
Fold under to form the base of the plant pot.
Let dry.

Finished pots

For the stone look

Paint glue onto 1 side of the plant pot

Dip the glue painted side into craft sand (colour depends on the effect you are looking for)

Let the side dry.
Repeat with other 3 sides.

Paint over the dried sand/glue (again the colour depends on the effect you are looking for). The paint needs to be quite thick to cover.

Use paint and/or sand to cover over any mistakes or pattern lines.

Finished stone look pots

Madeleine Hicks

4 October 2011

For personal use only

New camera

2009-05-28T17:31:00.001+08:00

Well as many of you know, I got my new camera last week. A digital SLR, very fancy, quite expensive, and I need a pilot's licence to run the damn thing. However, the old camera is heading off to Peru shortly (http://www.nadiagetstribal.blogspot.com/) which was the push to get the new camera. I've been thinking about it for probably over a year now, and when Nadz told me that her camera was broken, that was the push. I'm sure the old camera will have a lovely time in Peru with Nadz.

So we've had it out and about and have taken some shots.

I just loved the way the sun was coming through the clouds with all their darkness.

We did get a storm, and this was my attempt to capture the strength of the rain and wind in my garden.

And this was the sunset last night.

Not bad for a beginner.

Cheers

Madeleine

Thursday, 28 May 2009

Mine!!

2009-04-11T16:08:00.001+08:00

I bought myself a delicious muffin the other day. Sat down in my chair to enjoy it.

Looks nice, doesn't it??

Then someone came to visit me.

You can see her licking her chops.

I told her it was mine, but she didn't believe me.

When she was finished:

Off she went. She's my sweet toothed kitty cat.

Madeleine

Saturday, 11 April 2009

Playing

2009-03-22T20:10:00.001+09:00

I have a hobby that most people either don't know much about, or don't even know about. I make miniature things. 1:12 scale. I make all sorts of things. I belong to two groups where we get together and make little things. At the last Sunday group, we made a trunk.

I've made a thingee to photograph my miniatures and have a ruler to show the sizes. Often people use coins. Which is great!! American coins?? How big are they? I know cause I was born in North America. English and Australians generally have no idea. So I won't use Australian coins as they won't give people from other countries the idea of size.

This is the finished article. Whoops, shows the paint where I missed. Never mind. Won't show when it's all finished.

You can sort of see the size by the ruler next to it. It's less than 8 cm from front to back. I must remember to keep the ruler in mind when I am taking photos.

For next Sunday, we have to create a scene, and present it. The best will win a $10 voucher to our local miniature shop.

Once the trunk was finished, I had to decide what the scene would be. I decided that the trunk was being sold at a garage sale.

So I made a sign.

Then I found some items to sell. I found a long fluffy scarf that I had been given by one of my mates. It's going for $1.

I found some hangars I made ages ago. I will probably give them away

I think I will just give them away. Like most wire hangars, they are all bent out of shape. You can also see a pearl necklace in this photo. In amongst the pile is bookends, some glassware, and some tools.

A box of books. A must for every garage sale.

I found some toys and decided that there was a little girl who was leaning into the trunk and digging out some toys. She has a stick horse in her hand and is busily looking into the trunk to see what else she can find.

So there's my little story for today. As you can see, I've bee n busy making little things and making stories to go with them.

A bit like the night of Sylvanian families I had in Norwich with Colin and Co!!

Madeleine

Sunday, 22 March 2009

Puppy too pooped to piddle

2009-02-05T11:31:00.001+09:00

I decided last night that I wanted to keep up my walking fitness. While I was in the UK I was walking all over the place and could walk for ages. So last night I decided to walk the Ally Dawg down to the Kiara Food Hall which is about 2 km away from my house (I just realised that makes 4 km return trip – that’s almost 3 miles – not bad).

It was hotish yesterday, but not terribly hot, and certainly not as hot as it has been the last week. Different preparations for a walk here. Water bottle, rather than scarf. Still need a hat, but a different sort. Not a keep my head warm hat, but a keep the sun off my head hat. I also take a bum bag with my little poo bags, my phone (when it works) and my wallet. So that went with me as well. Find the dog lead and off we went.

Well, for starters it was considerably further than I had realised. Funny how things seem so much closer when you drive than when you walk. There was a nice breeze blowing which helped. And Ally stopping at every tree and post to check her peemail helped as well.

I didn’t take my camera this trip. I wasn’t sure if I could manage the dog on the lead, plus my bag of takeaway dinner and a camera.

The galahs were chattering away in the trees. This is their time of night. Cooler than during the day. Checking each other out and eating what seeds the trees have to offer. They are very vocal and incredibly beautiful with their pink chests. I would have tried for some photos had I had my camera with me.

Some of the lawns are parched as they should be at this time of the year. The green ones belong to people who waste water, a precious commodity here in Perth. I often wonder about people who water grass. They water to make the grass grow; throw on a bit of fertiliser to poison the groundwater; cut the grass as it’s too long and then start the whole process again. I just don’t understand their thinking.

It was interesting walking here in Perth again after such a long time away and the totally different walking in Oxford. Straight, for starters. Here the roads are planned, as opposed to roads that just happen. There are slight hills as well; Oxford doesn’t have many hills. They are not big hills, Perth is relatively flat in comparison. But not as flat as Oxford.

Individual houses, rather than terrace houses. Most people in Australia live in a single house, on a block of land. We have space around us. We have space inside our houses. Many of the houses I saw in the UK were on minute blocks of land, and attached to another house. Most of the houses here are single storey as well.

Green. This is an interesting colour. The ground here is mainly browns, reddy browns, except where people water their gardens. Dusty. Dry. But look up, and there is lots of green. The trees don’t lose their leaves the same way. The sky is incredibly blue. Clouds are fluffy and white. Very bright.

In Oxford, at this time of the year, the sky is often gray. The trees are leafless and stark. The whole world looks dark. Even on sunny days, there isn’t the brightness of the Perth summer. Our days are long. Sunrise is about 6 a.m. Sunset about 8:30 p.m. In Oxford, sunrise is about 7:30 a.m. and sunset is about 5 p.m. A big difference. I know the English summer days are much longer, but at this time of the year.....

However, when I was walking I was also aware of the world being too open. Too big.

When I was first studying to be a counsellor, I did an exercise.

Imagine you are in a box. The world is outside and you are closed in this box. The idea is that most people want to break free from the box, to come out of the enclosed space they live in. My response was totally different. I felt comfortable. I felt safe. Suddenly in my imagination, I had a pillow and a book and a little peep hole to look out at the world.

That’s the way I feel sometimes here in Perth. It is too open, too big. I think maybe that’s why I like the UK so much. You walk along little paths, with big trees covering. You drive down roads with hedgerows all along, so you don’t see the vastness of the world. It feels contained. But that’s just me.

Oh, yes, the title of this article. By the time we got home, Ally was too pooped to piddle on any more trees. She did a great job of trying to pee on every tree, and every bush, but finally ran out of pee and steam !!

Anyway, time to close for now. I’m back at work and tired this week and I know that will ease off as I get back into the routine again.

Cheers all

Madeleine

Thursday, 5 February 2009

6 a.m.

2009-01-28T06:55:00.001+09:00

Well it is 6 o’clock in the morning. I have almost finished my first cup of coffee and am half watching the morning tv shows and half reading my book. Anyone who knows me, knows that 6 a.m. just doesn’t exist for me. My body time clock is so out of whack, I woke up about a quarter past 5 and couldn’t get back to sleep. So I’m thinking about the house and what needs doing during the rest of the week until I go back to work on Monday.

I’m also waking up hungry. Which for people who know me, is also unheard of. My body clock says it is 9 p.m. and I haven’t given my stomach any dinner yet.

Kazza picked me up from the airport and, great person that she is, supplied dinner, a chocolate bar and a bottle of coke. I like the way she thinks. All the important things one might need when returning home after 4 months. Also, the house sitters have left me a meal. So having only eaten half of what Kazza left, I now have meal for at least the next three nights.

On the way home, we stopped at the local petrol station and got some bread, chips, butter and plastic cheese. You can’t buy plastic cheese in the UK. So basically with the coffee that has been in the freezer for the last 4 months, and the sugar that has been in the cupboard, I am set for the next couple of days.

I’m really not quite sure what to do with myself. The house looks familiar and yet totally unfamiliar at the same time. At one level, I know where everything is, I put things where they are; at another level, I have to stop and think where is my coffee cup? It’s a really interesting feeling.

The fur kids: Ally was the first to see me. She looked totally stunned and still does. She didn’t run around like a wild animal, she was incredibly subdued and quiet in her reaction. Her tail is down and her ears are down. Not a happy puppy. I wonder if she misses Jacqui and Alex who have been looking after her for the last four months. I just went outside and there she was, tail up, ears up, playing with Harry. Hopefully, she gets that I’m here to stay now, even though the suitcases are still on the table waiting to be emptied.

Harry: He came to visit while Kazza was here. Only briefly. Didn’t come for a pat, but then Harry never does. But he is hanging around and came for a pat this morning.

Sunny: I went into the cupboard after I got home and there was my cupboard cat. She’s not been in the cupboard since. She follows me around. Too hot for lap sitting, but she stays very near where I am.

Jacqui and Alex’s comments about Sunny (they’ve been thinking she is a he all this time):

“Sunny: what can I say about Sunny, only that he won our hearts. He is such a lovely cat. Likes to be cuddles lots and to be with you all the time. We gave him one of our pillows for his Christmas presents as he is not a big eater (a bit fussy only likes his tin food).”

All the fur kids got Christmas presents and they left me a photo of Ally amongst the presents. I must admit, she does not look happy.

A mossie is trying to eat me. I’ve not had a mossie bite in over four months.

Overall, I’m happy with the way they looked after the place. But it is going to take a while to get back into the swing of things. I’m going to go and try and start the car and take it in for a service. That’s task number 1.

Catcha soon, hopefully with some photos.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 28 January 2009

Leaving Singapore

2009-01-26T21:22:00.001+09:00

Well this is the last day of my big adventure. Tomorrow at the crack of dawn I get out of bed, packed and to the airport to head back to Perth. Today I saw in the Chinese New Year, with a Dragon Dance which was really great. Then this afternoon, I took a tour of the zoo. Both of which I will write about when I get home. I got some great photos of the Dragon and I think some great zoo photos. Other than having a nana nap between the Dragon and the Zoo, not much happened today. I've talked to some great people from all different places in the world.

So if anyone wants to come and visit me, I will be at home from Wednesday and ready for visitors I suspect. Just give me a ring to make sure I'm not having a nana nap.

So my next post will be from hot Perth.

Madeleine

Monday, 26 January 2009

Singapore

2009-01-24T23:46:00.001+09:00

Arrived safely in Singapore. Internet access is available, but costs $5 per half hour session and must be used all in one session, so I’m writing this and will check my emails and then log onto the net and post my writings at the same time.

The trip here was deliciously uneventful and so far Singapore has been fine. It doesn’t even feel as hot as it did when I was here 4 months ago. Could it be that I was a bit feverish??

Finally managed to get most of my stuff in my suitcases and am totally wondering if I can actually lift them. M&K helped me get them to the airport and booked into Singapore and when I arrived in Singapore I grabbed a trolley and took my cases outside. Singapore customs is hilarious. I went through Immigration, got my passport stamped and all and then there were two doors – things to declare and nothing to declare. Having nothing to declare, I simply walked out of the airport.

When I arrived outside customs, I wandered around for a few minutes getting my bearings and made eye contact with a man who asked me if I wanted a taxi. I said yes, he said %35. I said that when I had been here last it had only cost $20. He said something about airport taxes and I figured it was worth the money. So he parked me and my bags outside the terminal while he went and got the taxi (a bus really, like a tourist bus). He put my luggage in the bus, drove me to my hotel, took the cases out of the bus, gave them to the hotel man, who subsequently brought them up to my room for me. Now how easy was that !!

You all would have had a lovely giggle at me tonight. I got into my room with one of these card things. Now remember, it’s been a while since I’ve actually stayed in a hotel. I came into the room and no lights. I flipped switches all over the place, tried the lamps etc. Nothing. It’s dark at this stage of course, so I had the door propped open with my back pack and the phone rang. I answered and it was the luggage man saying that he was bringing up my luggage. I figured I could tell him that the lights weren’t working and he could help me. As I was standing by the door waiting, I saw a white thing on the wall with a little red light and a sign that said “Please insert key card” which I did. And guess what – all the lights came on. Talk about a DUH! Moment. I guess I can get away with it as being very tired.

I slept on the plane. I had booked my seat online the night before and got a middle seat. I hate anything but an aisle seat, so when I got to check in at the airport, I asked if there were any aisle seats available. There was, so I got one!! So much better.

Lovely young couple from Melbourne sitting next to me. We chatted a bit, but not too much and I slept most of the way.

So right now I’m in my hotel room, there is a wedding downstairs, and a lovely view from my window. I can see the Singapore Eye, which is the same as the London Eye, a big ferris wheel type thing that looks over the city. Room is lovely, large, comfortable, but cold. The air conditioning is just a bit cold for my liking. I’ve taken possession of one of the lovely white dressing gowns that was in the wardrobe.

So other than taking a quick walk around the block, nothing much has happened. I am close to the Raffles Hospital where I spent most of my last visit to Singapore, and this room is far more comfortable than the hostel I stayed in last time. Worth the money.

Also, I have arrived just in time for the Chinese New Year so there should be lots of photos happening over the next few days.

Catcha all later.

Madeleine

Saturday, 24 January 2009

Endings

2009-01-23T18:21:00.001+09:00

I have had great difficulty writing this post. I keep thinking about what to say. This is my last day here in Oxford. I’m getting organised to finish my big adventure. Looking at the stuff I bought and wondering how it will all fit in my suitcases. I’m saying goodbye to the places I’ve known for the last 4 months and knowing that even if I do return it will all be the same, but different. I’m saying goodbye to M&K for the next little while. They are planning a trip to Australia in October so I will see them then, but I’m feeling sad. I hate flying so that doesn’t help as well.

Nothing much to say. I’ve had a great trip. Probably one of the adventures of my life – and there have been a few of those during the last 62 years and there will be more.

In the mean time, this one is coming to an end and I’m feeling sad about it. It has been a great adventure and M&K and I were talking about how much I have seen over the last 4 months.

Time to start planning my next adventure.

I will be back in Perth on the 27^th January, but till then, I may or may not be online. So my Perth friends, I will be available from the 28^th if you want to drop by and say Gdday. For the rest of my friends, particularly my new ones in the UK, I will see you again one day, and do remember, there is a bed for you in Australia if you ever decide to come and visit me.

Madeleine

Friday, 23 January 2009

Norwich Cathedral

2009-01-20T01:42:00.001+09:00

We were lucky in our guide for the cathedral. Colin (Heritage Interpretation) knows more history about Norwich than most people will ever. He had some of the most interesting stories to tell about the Cathedral, most of them involving misdemeanours of the common person of the times. Interesting as most of the history we hear about and read about is about the Kings, Queens, Bishops and the “important” people of history. We all tend to forget about the “little” people of history, and let's face it, everyone reading this blog is a “little” person in the historical sense.

This is Norwich Cathedral from Pull's Ferry.

A rather majestic structure !

This next photo is looking into the cloisters.

The Skeleton – he was apparently buried standing up so he could be one of the first into heaven. People will do crazy things for religious beliefs.

Here's the sign, translated from old English.

It's a wee bit fuzzy.

Here's a close up of the top.

One of the columns in the cathedral.

And this is the sign telling about the column.

I took some really great photos of the bosses on the ceilings. The descriptions are from Colin, and I quote him verbatim (except for tidying up typos!). Here they are:

“One of several 'Green Men' amongst the cathedral bosses. This pre-Christian figure represents the changing of the seasons and was tolerated in this space because, being outside of the sacred space of the cathedral proper, it was accomodatable.” (Colin Howey)

"A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit. Commonly used as a decorative architectural ornament, Green Men are frequently found on carvings in churches and other buildings (both secular and ecclesiastical). "The Green Man" is also a popular name for English public houses and various interpretations of the name appear on inn signs, which sometimes show a full figure rather than just the head.

The Green Man motif has many variations. Found in many cultures around the world, the Green Man is often related to natural vegetative deities springing up in different cultures throughout the ages. Primarily it is interpreted as a symbol of rebirth, or "renaissance," representing the cycle of growth each spring. Some speculate that the mythology of the Green Man developed independently in the traditions of separate ancient cultures and evolved into the wide variety of examples found throughout history." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Man

“Typical of disorderly figures represented on the margins of Norwich Cathedral cloister, musicians had, and have, a tendency to riotous and disorderly behaviour. “ (Colin Howey)

"One of my personal favourites: here we see a washer woman giving a thief a thick ear. I wouldn't want to cross her. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that the mason may have depicted one of his work colleagues, putting his face onto that of the thief - or the woman." (Colin Howey)

"A bare-arsed figure in the cathedral cloisters. Dating from the early Fourteenth century he is one of several characters representing disorder beyond the Christian order." (Colin Howey)

“This is a Fifteenth century depiction of the Pharaoh and his soldiers being drowned in the (literally) Red Sea. Notice that the 'chariot' is a Fifteenth century Norfolk hay cart. “ (Colin Howey)

Oh, yes, and last but not least, this really tickled my fancy.

This is the font in the Norwich Cathedral.

Not a great photo, but here's the sign that tells about the font.

This, to me, is the ultimate in recycling.

That's all for today folks.

Madeleine

Monday, 19 January 2009

Louie de cat

2009-01-16T21:01:00.001+09:00

The trip to London was interesting. I met a cat on the bus. Now I know in Australia animals are not allowed on public transport. Here is it totally different. I could write a book about dogs I have met on my travels, but a cat on the bus was a first. Why, you ask? A cat in a cage. Travelling. Yah, okay, it happens. This cat did not stay in his cage, but quite happily sat on his owner's lap the whole trip.

Let's start at the beginning. The bus to London stops at a number of places. Eventually, all the seats had one person sitting in them and people had to double up. This woman came to me, arms full of all sorts of things, and asked if I minded cats. I looked at her a bit puzzled. I hadn't noticed the cage in her hands. I said I love cats. I have two of my own and where I'm staying right now has two cats. So she sat down beside me, with a bit further chat, and place the cat cage on her lap.

Fine. Then she opened the door of the cage. I thought, Okay??? Now we are going to have to worry about this cat wandering the bus. Eventually, Louie poked his head out of the cage and started investigating his surroundings. Lovely looking fellow. Long haired.

As time went on, the cat hopped out of the cage, and she put it down on the floor and Louie started to investigate a bit further. He started to head to the floor. His owner touched him and said: No, you stay on my lap. And he did. For the next hour or so, while we were talking, she petted him, and he sat there, quite happily on her lap.

In the course of our conversation, she talked a bit about Louie and his travel adventures.

On one of his trips, train, they were sitting in one of the sets of four seats, which in the UK have a table in the middle. She mentioned that there were three business looking men, wearing suits, that sort of thing. She needed to go to the loo, so she sat Louie on the seat, told him where she was going and to stay where he was. She did say that the others in the seats gave her a bit of a funny look. When she came back, Louie had found a lap to sit on with one of the men. But he hadn't gone wandering around the train.

I don't remember all the stories she told me of Louie's travels. But she, and the cat, were both fascinating.

At one stage, the bus driver's offsider came and moved the cage, reckoned it was in the way if there was an emergency. Louie looked at him, and needed some time to resettle himself when his home went off down the bus aisle. But he did.

When it was time for her to get off, she hooked Louie over her arm, picked up her packages, popped him back into his cage and off she went. One very happy little cat and his owner.

Madeleine

Friday, 16 January 2009

London - Reminiscing

2009-01-16T20:31:00.001+09:00

Yesterday, I spent a day in London. Shopping. Tourist. It was a long day and I was exhausted by the time I got back. I hopped on the Oxford Tube. Now there's an interesting anomaly. The London Tube is an underground train. The Oxford Tube is a bus. The Oxford Tube is a regular bus from Oxford to London. The trip there was interesting and I think that's another blog. This one is about reminiscing.

As we approached London, I looked out the bus window and realised we were on Bayswater Road and I was immediately thrown back, literally 40 years to 1968 when I first lived in London. I knew, without a doubt, exactly where I was and where I would end up. It didn't matter that the shops and roads had changed. I knew that in a few minutes, Edgeware Road would be on my left, Marble Arch would be on the right and Oxford Street straight ahead. I could even see in my minds eye, what it looked like 40 years ago. I only lived in London for about a year. I had not really spent much time on Bayswater Road, but it was all very clear where I was, and where I was going.

I got off the bus and had to retrace my steps back to 1968. First, I took photos of Marble Arch. The whole area looks different than I remember. There are more cars and I'm sure they have changed the roads around. I can't say for sure, but it's not quite the way my mind's eye sees it.

Here's Marble Arch.

I never knew the history when I was living in London. Too busy being a Londoner, working and being 22 years old. Today I discovered that Marble Arch used to be the main entrance into Buckingham Palace until it was moved to it's present location in 1851 when extensions to the Palace meant that there wasn't room for it at Buckingham Palace.

From there, I started to wander up Edgeware Road. This area looks totally different than I remember. All the shops have changed and I am sure the cinema I worked in for a short time was on Edgeware Road, but there is no sign of it now.

This was the view up Edgeware Road. Lots of traffic, noise, people and shops.

I was intrigued by this sign. That was certainly different from when I was there.

I stopped for coffee, a bite to eat (pee stop as well!!) and a chance to get my bearings. I had bought myself an all day ticket for buses and tubes in London so decided to hop a bus and head up to Clifton Gardens near where I used to live.

As I got off the bus, I looked around and nothing looked familiar. So I started walking. Suddenly, everything was familiar, but unfamiliar at the same time. I realised that somewhere in this new block of shops was where our old cafe was. The one we went to when we had a bit of cash and didn't feel like cooking. The cafe was cheap and old and obviously didn't stand the test of time. But I think it is where Cafe Rouge is today (the red sign in the middle of the photo). Maybe. Maybe not. But it definitely was somewhere in this block of shops.

This was the road I walked down most days. I would take a bus up Edgeware Road to Clifton Road and then walk down this street to our little flat on Warrington Gardens. I wrote about the flat on another blog and might dig it out when I get home and re-post it. I will see.

And then the church, on a little island in the middle of the roads.

And then there it was, the place where I used to hang my hat and call home. Or was it. I had discovered on my last trip that the old building, of cheap flats and bedsits had been totally demolished and replaced with a modern, high class, expensive flats. The old place no longer existed.

This was then:

This is now:

It used to be part of a row of terrace houses, broken up into smaller flats and bedsits. Joan, my friend, and I had the rooms right at the top, under the eaves so if you forgot and stood up too quickly you could knock your head on the ceiling.

I remember being very disappointed in 2002 when I discovered what had happened. I expected changes, but not that the whole building would be gone. Such a shame. Although it was pretty ramshackle. I remember running down the stairs one day (yes, I ran down stairs in those days), grabbing the railing as I went from one level to another, and the railing coming adrift and me falling.

There was a public phone on one of the floors. That was where I met my husband to be. In that phone box. On the floor below us lived the only man. I thought he was the bees knees and so did most women. Australian he was. One day, we heard someone go from his flat to the phone, so being the idiot I was (and still am), and figuring he was probably ringing some female, I ran down the stairs, opened the door to the phone booth, and said “who told you you could use my phone?” thinking to embarrass him. Well, it was me who was embarrassed. It wasn't Greg. It was a man I had never seen before in my life!!

So there you go. I did a bit more wandering around the area, took a few more photos, and then caught the tube to my next stop.

That's all for now folks.

Madeleine

Friday, 16 January 2009

For KazzaB

2009-01-14T20:31:00.001+09:00

I keep hearing from KazzaB how much she likes foggy photos so this morning I went out, in the fog, and got some photos for her. Enjoy, Kazza. Let your imagination run wild !!! You could write me a story about the foggy photos.

I took a second one without the man, but felt this one would really spark your imagination!!

The river looks particulary spooky. I reckon, Kazza, there's a body down there somewhere!!

Botley Road

And more of the river

Hope you enjoyed these.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 14 January 2009

A day at the beach

2009-01-14T02:54:00.001+09:00

I'm finally getting around to writing about our trip to Norwich. Our first full day there, the lovely L suggested we go to the beach. She also reminded us to rug up nice and warm as it was pretty cold. She was right. Very cold and windy, but “bracing” - which in English terms means fucking cold, politely of course!!

This shows the overall greyness of the day. What it doesn't show is the strength of the waves and the wind and the brownness of the water. In Australia, our oceans are really blue/greens. This water was incredibly brown. I guess that's why they have the groynes, as the waves seem to pick up a lot of the sand and move it around. This was the first time I had heard of groynes. They are apparently used to reduce erosion.

Here's a photo of the waves against the groynes.

The next thing that caught my attention was the row of beach houses. You can see the tops of them in the first photo. They are all painted different colours, many of them have names. They were originally bathing machines, used by beach goers so they could get into the water without showing naked body parts.

Here's one with wheels. They are very small wheels

and this one is from the net and shows bigger wheels.

http://www.beach-huts.co.uk/imagery/bath_machine.jpg

The idea was that the bathing hut was rolled into the water until it was deep enough that the people could get into the water without showing their bodies. There's a great article on them at http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A3371591

Nowadays they can cost up from ₤10,000. I've just found one on the net that is going for ₤140,000.

Although the day was mainly overcast, there were patches of blue. I managed to photograph the sun shining through the clouds. I like these two.

As at many English beaches, there was a pier. I'm not sure of the purposes of the piers on the beaches. Often you can't fish from them, so that rules out fishing as a reason. I do know that doing a Google search, turns up piers as being an attraction. Then when I search a bit further, Wikipedia says:

“Pleasure piers were first built in England, during the 19th century. At that time the introduction of the railways for the first time permitted mass tourism to dedicated seaside resorts. However, the large tidal ranges at many such resorts meant that for much of the day, the sea was not visible from dry land. The pleasure pier was the resorts' answer, permitting holiday makers to promenade over and alongside the sea at all times. “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piers

This was it from a distance.

Maybe I should get a job taking pictures and comparing all the piers on English beaches. How fun would that be??!!

These were some of the attractions on the Southwold Pier.

These include:

Being frisked like you've never been frisked before
Unravel the secrets of your DNA

immerse yourself in a total eclipse

just to mention a few attractions available.

Here was one of the possibilities

I must admit, I don't get the attraction. The others thought it was great. I think it's cultural.

On this pier, there was also a water clock. I found this fascinating but the others didn't.

It is a crude metal sculpture featuring two men wearing metal trousers. On the hour and half hour, they perform by dropping their trousers and watering the tulips below. This attracts quite a crowd in anticipation!

http://www.seasidehistory.co.uk/traditional.html

This sign explains the clock:

I waited to see it work, but must have been one of the days the wind was too strong. Here's the whole thing:

I took pictures of the details of each part of the clock. I really wish I could have seen it work.

From the beach, we headed into Southwold town to find some lunch. Spotted the “Corn Chandler”. I loved the look of the shop. I have no idea what a corn chandler is so time to do a Google search I think.

That makes sense, a corn chandler is someone who deals in corn and meal. If you want to read a Norfolk tale, check out this site:

http://norfolkcoast.co.uk/myths/ml_aclebridge.htm

We didn't go in, but I reckon it would be a great shop to browse around in.

This is St. Edmund Church in Southwold. Just across the road from where we parked the car.

From there we went to a town called Dunwich. That's another blog.

Madeleine

Tuesday, 13 January 2009

Oxford in Winter

2009-01-11T01:11:00.001+09:00

January Snow Looking into the allotments

Fog Looking into the allotments

Community Centre, with snow

Community Centre car park with fog

This morning I went for my constitutional and saw something. I had forgotten my camera, so went home, got M&K moving and we all went to see.

These were very hard to photograph. With the white of the water and the clear of the icicles, they only showed up in this photograph. We tried to find another spot to get a better photo of them, but couldn't. How kewl is this??

This was some ice on leaves.

This photo's from the Osney Bridge looking towards the lock in the fog.

This is ice on Osney Lock. M&K went out late one night to see this. I stayed home but went down the next morning to check it out.

This one's taken from a bit of a distance.

We've all been fighting the flu and colds which is why I've been so quiet. Getting back on deck again so hopefully I will be writing about Norwich soon.

I'm rapidly running out of time so I'm also getting all the goodies I've picked up organised. I'm going to have to buy a new suitcase - one of my old ones has died.

Cheers

Madeleine

Saturday, 10 January 2009

Working backwards

2009-01-06T00:53:00.001+09:00

I seem to be working backwards this morning. There has been so much that has happened over the last couple of weeks that this seems to be the only way to keep some order in my brain. Also the most recent are in the top of my brain so I figure if I take off the top few layers of thoughts that the older ones will come up again.

The travelling to and from Norwich has been really interesting. M had to work on Friday, K had Friday off. So K and I drove up to Norwich on Thursday leaving M and the cats behind. As they had no one to mind the cats and it was a long weekend, the plan was that M would come up (down, across) to Norwich on Friday night by train and then K would head back Saturday night by train so that cats didn't starve to death. M & I would drive back on Sunday afternoon/evening depending on our mood. Plan worked really well.

M's train was totally late. Apparently there was a power surge or something that knocked out all the signals from Didcot, so he sat on the train for several hours while it was fixed and just as it got fixed there was another power surge and they all went out again. He didn't get in until about 12:30 a.m. Instead of arriving at 6:30 pm. So by the time he got there he was buggered. And this was after going back to work after being off for a couple of weeks.

Driving in the UK is an experience in itself. My first glimpses of the UK motorways was exciting and I've written a bit about it in English Countryside. The drive to Norwich was probably the longest drive I've taken since I've been here. Along the major highways, at regular intervals, they have "services" where you can stop, get petrol and a bite to eat. Some of them are quite small; others are almost like small shopping malls. In fact, I just discovered there is a whole website about Motorway Services which doesn't appear to have been updated in a while. It talks about best/worst services for 2007 but nothing more recent.

On the way up, K and I stopped at a "Little Chef" one. It was quite small, Burger King, Little Chef and another coffee/sandwich eatery. Toilets, of course, are a main target for long distance drivers.

I took a photo of the one M and I stopped at on the way back. It was a pretty big one, had a bookshop as well as the usual fast food places. I was cold so wanted something really warming so I went for hot soup and a toastie. I went to the counter to order, and was told that my toastie was in the fridge – over there – I thought about that for a couple of seconds and then realised that in good English fashion, the sandwiches were already made up. I went and got one and gave it to the lass to toast, and ladled out my soup – almost cold. By the time I got to the table, the sandwich was almost cold as well. So much for that idea.

These are some photo of the place. You can see a number of different places to eat, a book shop, plenty of seating and even a television to entertain travellers who didn't want to talk to each other or were travelling alone. Burger King (Hungry Jacks to Australians) even had a pay in advance with your credit/debit card where you made your order, paid for it and then went to collect it.

WH Smith in the background is a bookstore chain that you often find in train stations and sell sandwiches, cold drinks, packets of chips etc.

That, I think is where my toastie was waiting for me.

We have similar things in Australia, but not on the same scale as here in the UK. In Australia, mainly there is one main highway going from Point A to Point B with side roads which are local roads. Yesterday, we were on three motorways, and about two more major highways all linking in via roundabouts, large roundabouts.

All just very interesting to the intrepid little traveller.

Madeleine

Monday, 5 January 2009

Snow

2009-01-05T20:51:00.001+09:00

Well I finally got my wish. I woke up this morning and looked outside. In the back garden I spotted this:

We all commented that it had been cold last night and what a big frost there had been. M reckoned that this was good. Meant that the ground was cold enough that if it did snow, the snow wouldn't melt as soon as it touched the ground.

For people who don't understand. In the summer, the ground warms up. For snow to stay on the ground you need two things: the ground to have got cold and enough snow to cover the ground. When the first snow happens, it usually melts immediately as the ground is still warm. As the weather gets colder for longer, the ground gets cold enough to not melt the snow. That's when the snow stays on the ground. Hence M's comment about the frost. It meant that the ground was losing it's heat.

We all oohed and aahed over the frost and then M went off to his class. About 10 minutes later the phone rang. It was M. It was snowing and what we had thought was frost, was snow. So off went Madeleine with her trusty camera to see what she could see of the snow.

This is the entry to the allotments down the road from our house.

I had to pick up the snow and photograph my glove covered in snow.

The only problem was that being right handed, I automatically collected the snow with my right hand. Then I had the problem of how to photograph my right hand using my left hand on a camera made for right handers !! I didn't realise at the time, but you can see the lens cap dangling in the background as I turned the camera around.

So that is snow on my black glove on my hand.

I'm amazed at how excited I get by snow. I grew up with snow as the norm and yet I still find it exciting.

This is the entrance to the car park for the Community Centre.

By this stage, there were some really nice flurries of snow and I tried to photograph them coming down and it didn't work, so I got my jacket with a few snowflakes on it.

Not a lot, but a few flakes there. Along with a bit of cat fur (or maybe Rag's dog fur from our Norwich visit).

A short time later this was our back garden. Didn't last long. The snow has all gone now and the sun is out so I don't think there will be any more today. However it is really cold outside so there is still hope for more before I leave.

Cheers

Madeleine

Monday, 5 January 2009

Beautiful Wales

2008-12-31T22:40:00.001+09:00

Today Kahless and I set off for the mountains of Wales. The idea was that we would head for the Menai Bridge (my idea) and that was as far as the plan went. As we drove, we saw signs for Caernarfon Castle and Kahless suggested we go there after the bridge. Of course, I agreed. I'm easy. I just like visiting places so as long as everyone is happy, I'm happy.

Along the motorway we went and we started getting closer and closer to the mountains – Snowdonia. The motorway has been built through the mountain in places so instead of going up and over, you drive through. When you get to Llandudno Junction, the road goes under what I think is Conway Bay. There was no place to stop so this photo is taken through the filthy car window looking towards the tunnel.

Getting a bit closer

And then we are in the tunnel and going under the water.

This is a lousy photo, but it gives the idea. I love tunnels.

Heading, a bit blindly, towards the Menai Bridge, we finally saw signs for the bridge and lo and behold, we are on a bridge. But not the right one. I discovered later this one was called the Britannia Bridge, built a bit later than the Menai Bridge and originally mainly for rail traffic. It has an interesting history. I've written a bit about the history below.

I've decided I love Wales. This was the Britannia Bridge as we were driving across. Again through the grotty windscreen but a rather imposing look.

Rather neat looking bridge. Something I didn't know at the time, but found out later is that there is a rail bridge under this one. This bridge was opened in 1850 to help take travellers from the mainland of Wales to the Island of Anglesey over the Menai Straits. The Menai Bridge we had originally set out to see is further down the strait from here.

There are apparently 2 lions guarding the entrance to the bridge, but these days can only be seen from the train. The original bridge was ruined by fire in 1970 and had to be totally rebuilt. If you want to read the whole article, you will find it here.

We crossed the bridge and a bit further down the road we spotted the Menai Bridge. Of course we stopped to take photos. Not only was the bridge a sight to see, so was the scenery.

This was our first sight of the bridge.

And the view around us.

You can see Snowdonia in the background in this next one.

Absolutely stunning spot. We were looking down on the Strait from Holyhead Road or in Welsh Ffordd Caergybi (pronounced Forth Kyre Gubby) and in a later photo I picked up this little island quite unintentionally.

That little island is apparently quite famous. People live there and at times can't go home because the tides are too high. It is called Ynys Gored (or Gorad) Goch.

Ynys means island and is pronounced Unniss

Gored means fish-trap

Goch means red and is pronounced gauk

This is the only island between the bridges inhabited by the living. The Welsh name of island means 'island of the red fish trap'. A 'gorad' is a trap which is flooded by the rising tide allowing fish to swim in but empties with the ebb trapping the fish. In the past the inhabitants of the house depended on the trap for their livelyhood. The rocks in the foreground are the Cribiniau (the rakes) http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/386168

The last photo was looking from the Menai Bridge back on the Britannia Bridge.

This next photograph, I just liked the way the sun was shining on the gold lettering on the pub.

This next photo was looking down from the bridge. It was rather scary looking down. As you guys know I'm not real happy with heights and this was rather a long way down and not all that safe feeling. It didn't feel near as scary as the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct though.

In fact, this one was Kahless's photo. I asked her to take it for me so I didn't have to lean over the edge!! This was my shot looking down.

It was a loooong way down. This next photo was the bridge itself. Kahless and I both had to stand in the middle of the road to take photos. Dodging the traffic wasn't as hard as you might think. Although as quick as you thought you had a shot, another car would come through or behind you.

I actually like the looks of the Britannia Bridge better.

I had looked on the map before we left and discovered that Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch was close by and I needed to be the total tourist and get some photos of this name. When I was in the UK in the late 1960's I remember seeing a photo of one of my friends under this name and had to finally see it for myself.

If you want to hear how to say it, go here - remember to turn your sound on.

"It's both the longest place name and railway station name in Europe. According to the Guiness Book of Records, it's also the longest valid web domain name in the world, though www.llanfair.wales.com is a more memorable alternative."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/culture/sites/aboutwales/pages/geography.shtml

Here is a quick history of the town

“This Welsh town on the island of Anglesey is only known due to the fact that it has a very long name, and is the longest railway station name in Britain, and probably the longest domain name in the world.

The name translates as 'St Mary's church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the church of St Tysilio of the red cave'.

Originally called Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll, which means 'The Mary church by the pool near the white hazels' the village was renamed in the 19th Century.

This was around the time when the railway was built between Chester and Holyhead at the beginning of the 1850s. A local committee was put together to try and encourage trains, travellers and 19th Century tourists to stop at the village in order to help develop the village as a commercial and tourist centre. It is believed that the name

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch was invented by a cobbler from Menai Bridge; little did he know that he had implemented one of the most successful tourist marketing plans of all time. Today the village is signposted as Llanfairpwllgwyngyll and is known to locals as Llanfairpwll or Llanfair.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A403642

And here is one of my photos.

Kahless bought me a neat little present, didn't cost much, but really lovely. In the shop in

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (I do the like copy and paste function on computers – imagine having to write that name out every time!!) they had a machine, you put in a penny and a 50p, and the machine squashed the penny and imprinted Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch on it for you. It's a really cool reminder of the town.

I am going to take a photo of it at some stage, but I'm very aware of the fact that I'm off again tomorrow and will have another 4 days of tourist information on top of this last lot and if I don't write it now, it will get lost in amongst Norwich and that trip.

From there, we headed to Caernarfon Castle and that will be another blog. This one's too long already.

Cheers guys.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 31 December 2008

TRAVELLING

2008-12-31T19:44:00.001+09:00

I have become a seasoned traveller here in the UK. I realised that this had happened when I didn't bother to book my return train from Wales, looked online the day before I was leaving and just grabbed a suitable train rather than booking a seat in advance.

I did, however, get a bit too smart for my own good. I was supposed to change trains at Birmingham International Train Station and the station before was Birmingham New Street. Now I've been to Birmingham New Street on several occasions and knew that there were regular trains from there to Oxford. So smart Madeleine decided to hop off the train at Birmingham New Street instead of Birmingham International. Problem was, I then had to find out which was the next train to Oxford and I've still not worked out the destinations!! Like does the train to Wolverhampton go through Oxford? What about the train to Southampton? Does that go via Oxford??

I wandered around like a bit of a lost soul for a while and then decided I needed a pee. I'm assuming everyone has heard the expression “Spend a penny”. That used to be the cost of having a pee in a public place. Prices have gone up since that expression. Now it's “spend 30p to have a pee”. I'm not quite sure how you would translate that into cents for Australians, but it has a rather nice ring to it for the UK. I met another little dog travelling with his owner. The owner was going to have a pee as well so we had a bit of a chat while we were working out how to get in. If I'd thought of it sooner, I could have done a series of blogs on “Dogs I met while travelling”. Some of them have been rather gorgeous.

Anyway, after having a pee, I found a customer service place, checked out when the next train was to Oxford and realised that I had to move to catch it. Off I hopped, down the stairs, and onto my train. Which, to my disgust, stopped first at Birmingham International. I could have stayed on my first train and ended up in the same spot !!

This train was totally full. I mean people in the aisles and all. So this journey was spent in the entrance, chatting with a young lass and her man and Ralph the dog. Now Ralph was pretty special. Staffordshire Bull Terrier. Brown. With the soft brown eyes of the staffie and the same soft nature. The four of us spent the next hour chatting and keeping out of people's way as they wandered through the carriages. An hour later I was in Oxford. If I had booked my seat, I couldn't have got to it anyway. The couple I was chatting with had reserved seats and someone was sitting in their seats.

The trip itself was fine, no major dramas.

The trip to Chester was rather interesting. I had 2 changes to make. One in Birmingham (again), and the second one in Crewe. I arrived in Birmingham safely and found which platform I needed. Arrived at the platform. The train was there so I got on. Then the fun began. After a little while, an announcement said that the train would be delayed as they couldn't find a driver. Okay!! I wonder what happens now ! Why would you schedule a train and not schedule a driver? Oh, maybe the driver is sick. Anyway, after a number of different announcements, and about 30 minutes, we got our driver. I'm not sure how happy he was though. When he made the announcements of where we were and where the next stop was, his voice was incredibly bright and cheerful, but almost had a sarcastic tone to it.

Then, then, just before my stop (Crewe), he made an announcement to say that this train was not going as far as Liverpool, but would stop short and that people would have to get off and find alternative routes. Didn't affect me at all. In fact, the 30 minutes I waited in Birmingham just meant that I didn't have to wait in Crewe for the next leg. The train still went to Crewe and that was all I cared. However it is pretty standard for British Rail that they chop and change, trains break down and are cancelled, staff don't turn up for work so they lack drivers etc. I wonder what the German's think of this British system. Theirs would run on time always. I wonder if Australians could do any better or whether it is simply a product of a very well used, extensive train network.

I still enjoy travelling on British trains.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 31 December 2008

Stratford-Upon-Avon Butterfly Farm

2008-12-25T00:55:00.001+09:00

I'm not sure if I've been to a butterfly farm before or not. I have a sense that somewhere in my travels I have, but for the life of me I can't remember where or when. This was a fabulous experience. M&K waited outside for me, they didn't want to go in.

Of course, Madeleine started going mad with the camera and much to my disappointment, they were all fuzzy. I turned the camera off and on again; tried different settings, and generally fiddled with my camera. All the photos were fuzzy. Damn!! I sat down on a bench and looked at my camera in frustration and realised that coming from the cold outside into the warm, muggy butterfly atmosphere the lens was fogged up!! Once I sorted that out and my lens became the same temperature as the enclosure, all was well.

Here's one of the photos with the foggy lens. I had just wiped the lens down and by the time I took the photo, it had partially fogged up again.

Blue Morpho butterfly with wings open

Blue Morpho butterfly with wings closed

When they sleep at night, they fold their wings so that only the underside is seen. The underside of their wings is a dull brown color. This makes them invisible to other creatures who may want to eat them. When a bird comes too close to a blue morpho butterfly, they flash the blue on their wings to startle the bird and make it fly away.

http://mle.matsuk12.us/rainforest/emergent_layer_animals.html

In various spots they had little tables with obviously butterfly treats as the little critters kept landing on them. This was one of the yellow ones enjoying it's treat.

I have no idea what this butterfly is, but she/he is rather beautiful.

There were heaps of these guys. Very slow moving and seemed to hang off the leaves.

Now what a stunning fellow!!

This is a very poor photo of the “Emerging Cage” where the butterflies “emerge” !! I didn't see any butterflies emerge.

And here's a bit of information about the “Emerging Cage”

This guy was on the ground near the Emerging Cage and I almost stepped on him/her.

If anyone knows the names of these butterflies, please let me know because I have absolutely no idea. I don't even know if they are British or not. I just know that they are gorgeous.

There were a few birds in the Farm as well. I noticed this little guy when I first came in and when I got near the end, he was still sitting there watching the world go by. I think he needs a name. Any ideas??

There was a spider enclosure (which I stayed well away from) and a caterpillar enclosure that I figured I would go back to if I had time. I knew my time in there was limited.

A pond with fish.

This butterfly was just sort of sitting on the mesh around the enclosure. Not a great photo, but I felt it was an interesting shape.

My camera had a bit of problem deciding what to focus on. He moved before I got a chance to try again. Problem with butterflies is that they won't just sit still while I take their pictures. A bit like the Ally dawg. As soon as she sees the camera, she has to move towards me to check out what I'm doing.

One more bird

Now it was time to leave. I spotted an M coming inside and figured he had snuck in to let me know it was time to move on. Problem was, we had a limit on our parking and didn't want a parking ticket. As it turned out, we were 1 minute late and the parking guy was wandering around checking tickets, so we were lucky.

I will be offline for the next little while. Tomorrow is Christmas. Boxing Day we are off to Southampton to visit the family that has adopted me and M (K's extended family). On Saturday the 27^th I'm off to Wales again to visit Kahless and Mrs. K. I'm not sure when I will come back from there. The following Thursday, the 1^st January, K and I are off to Norwich for a few days. M will join us on the night of the 2^nd and then we all come back on the Sunday.

So a pretty busy next couple of weeks. I will be writing as I go, but not sure when I will be posting. So, until the next time.

Cheers you lot

Madeleine

Wednesday, 24 December 2008

Stratford-Upon-Avon via Chipping Norton

2008-12-24T21:18:00.001+09:00

We all went for a drive yesterday afternoon. Needed a bit of a Madeleine adventure. We decided to go to Stratford-Upon-Avon and when M was organising the GPS, he told it to take us via Chipping Norton. Don't ask me why, he just did. It's slightly longer, but we passed through some delightful villages.

The first part of the trip followed the same route as when I took the bus to Blenheim Palace. So we passed the lovely little towns of Yarnton and Begbroke. I've still not taken any photos of either of these towns, but noticed how pretty they both were on each time I've been through them.

The houses in the towns in this area appear to be mainly made from stone. So as you drive along, there is stone houses all along the side of the road.

The hedgerows have mainly lost all their leaves so as you are driving you can see into the fields behind. Whereas during the earlier part of the year, the fields behind the hedgerows are a mystery.

We arrived at Chipping Norton to discover that there was a farmer's market happening.

However, after a very brief time in the market, I realised that M&K had disappeared. In the distance, I spotted:

Books and coffee in the one spot. Well I figured I'd better go and check to see if they'd found this place. And, yes, they had. M had ordered some coffee to keep him going until lunch. I ordered some blueberry and pear cake and told them not to bother too much with wrapping it up as it wasn't going to last very long. Here's the last little bit. I started eating before I remembered to take a photo.

Lovely !!

A quick browse around the town. This was the market. When I said “small” I mean “small”. It just filled in that corner and that was it. More of a food market, than a craft market, meat, cheese, bread, vegetables. And people meeting up and catching up on a Sunday.

And the local pub:

And then we hopped in the car and headed for Stratford-Upon-Avon. Like many places, when we first arrived, finding a place to park the car was the first priority. Luckily, most people were out Christmas shopping and not touristing. One of the reasons we decided to tourist today and not go anywhere near the shops.

After M&K grabbing a quick something food wise to keep them going (they hadn't eaten at the Jaffe & Neil Bookshop like smart Madeleine had), we started to wander and the first thing we saw was this:

Would you believe, a shop selling nothing but Christmas items. Everything from tinsel to miniatures (well, things small enough to use as miniatures). It was enchanting. Music in the background to dance to, and lots of pretty things to look at and buy. Apparently they have four shops. I didn't ask what happens after Christmas, so either their business is very, very slow at other times of the year, or they sell other things. I have no idea. However, it was a gorgeous shop.

I must admit, although I enjoyed our day out, I was disappointed with Stratford-Upon-Avon. Other than Shakespeare's birth place the main area consisted of shops, shops and more shops. Some with very interesting names. “The Little Sweet Shop”, “As you like it”, “Presents in Mind” and similar sorts of names. I can't remember them all. Tacky is the word that comes to mind, but it didn't feel tacky. Very much aimed at the tourists and money making.

However, Stratford-Upon-Avon had lots of charm in other areas. At one stage, the sky clouded over and with the sun shining on the buildings and the dark, overcast sky, this is what it looked like.

As we were wandering around looking for a place to have lunch, we could hear some singing and a dog howling. Of course, Madeleine had to check it out. A man, singing, with his best friend, and making some money. Not a bad source of income. People felt that if they took a photo, they should put some money in his hat. He would sing away, the dog quite happy on his blanket with his human close by.

Then the man would lean towards the dog, obviously the dog's signal and in this photo, you can see the dog getting ready.

And then he would take off with the funniest howl in time to the man's music. Truly entertaining for everyone, including me, M&K.

Lunch was here at Mistress Quickley (a character in one of Shakespeare's plays). The food was pretty good. A bit too much cheese on my omelette, but the chips were much nicer than most I've had here.

Across the road Shakespeare's birthplace.

Then, Madeleine wanted to have a look at the Avon river and wander across the bridges.

This photo is a bit dark. The sky looks much more threatening than it really was. But I rather like the photo. This was looking from one bridge to another along the Avon River.

On the right of this picture is a bit of an island. I haven't been able to find out it's name, but apparently this is a bird sanctuary and is the home of the “mute swan”. This is a photo of a young one. From my research it appears as if the young cygnets have these brown feathers and when they are fully grown, become the snowy white I have seen before. I don't know what happens to the black cygnets. He/she was arguing with the duck about something in the water. I just caught the duck's bottom.

As we were walking across the bridge, with me taking photos, we discovered we were making some rather neat shadows, so M&K started playing with the shadows and of course, Madeleine photographed their shadows. This is my favourite.

On the other side of the river was the Butterfly Farm. That's another post for later today.

When I had finished with the butterflies, it was getting close to the time when we had to head back to the car before our parking pounds ran out. On the way back across the bridge I'd been photographing, K spotted these little guys hiding and playing in the grass.

I even managed to get the cotton tail bottom of one of them !!

The final sight before getting to the car and heading back to Oxford was Santa.

This really made my day.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 24 December 2008

Cold Hand

2008-12-20T01:43:00.001+09:00

Went for another walk this morning. I followed one of the paths I had wandered down shortly after I arrived here and blogged at the time. This time I walked further as I was more confident in where I was going and how to get home again. That was almost 2 months ago so I've learned my way around Oxford quite well in the last couple of months.

I guess I'm amazed at how many people use these paths. This morning, Friday, I must have met 10 people wandering along the path. A number of people had their dogs out for a stroll. As usual, I took heaps of photos.

Here's my friend the swan:

I do like the shadow on the water.

This was the path wandering through two bits of water with the path going down the middle.

Stark trees having lost all their leaves in the last couple of months.

The next photo was in a similar spot, but looking the other direction, taken in October.

As I got past the little island walk, three creatures came to meet me.

They didn't run away; they didn't bother me for food; they just wandered around my feet while I took a number of photographs and then moved on.

A little further on, someone had prepared a spot for me to rest.

They'd even left a drink for me,I thought that was very kind of people to leave a chair for me to rest on, and a drink to revitalise myself.

A bit further on, I met up with some horses. This guy was wanting a drink of water from the river.

And he's got what he wants. Isn't he stunning. He lives in a place called Port Meadow.

At 440 acres, Port Meadow is the largest area of common land in Oxford. Freemen and the Commoners of Wolvercote have grazing rights that are still exercised today.

Port Meadow is bordered on the western edge by the Thames and for a large part of the year parts of the Meadow are flooded, bringing flocks of migratory birds. A burial ground can be found in the centre of the meadow and for these reasons the Meadow is both a SSSI and a scheduled monument.

A classic Oxford activity is to walk up the west side of the Meadow, have a pint at the Perch, and then continue up north for another pint and some roasted chestnuts and mulled wine at the Trout Inn in Wolvercote. It's approximately a 50 minute stroll to the Trout from the southern edge of the Meadow.

http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Port_Meadow

Now that sounds like an interesting way to spend an afternoon.

At the end of my walk is this bridge

Straight ahead was nothing but water and turning left over the bridge, who knows. So I decided to turn around and retrace my steps home. I was getting hungry and I figured it had to be getting close to lunch time.

As I was walking, I was fascinated by the way the water flowed around the branches of the trees in the water and took quite a number of photos trying to capture the sense of the water flowing. This was the best photo I got

I took many more, but this was the only one I felt gave the impression I was aiming for.

I also liked these reflections. I took heaps and now I have to decide which ones I like the best.

Back across the bridge checking out the train bridge. A number of trains went past while I was fiddling around, but didn't manage to photograph one.

One last look at the bridge I had just walked across

And in the water below me, a sleeping swan

Oh, yes, and why the title “Cold Hand”? Well it is very difficult to take photographs wearing gloves so almost the whole trip, I had one warm hand and one cold hand.

Madeleine

Friday, 19 December 2008

Tuesday Walk

2008-12-11T01:46:00.001+09:00

I went for another little wander yesterday and I’ve been playing around with Google Earth today.

This is where I ended up

That bridge you can see is called Folly Bridge. Made of stone, built buy a guy called Ebenezer Perry in 1825–27.

“The bridge is in two parts separated by an island. The origin of the name is uncertain although it has been suggested that it originated about 1650 after a tenant of Bacon's study.......The bridge apparently stands at the place of the original oxen ford, which gives Oxford it’s name. The first known bridge on the site was built by Robert d'Oilli in around 1085, but there was believed to be a bridge in the time of Ethelred of Wessex.Remains of the Saxon structure may still be seen beneath the present bridge.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folly_Bridge

This is my photo. I didn’t see any remains of a Saxon bridge but then I didn’t go underneath the bridge.

I did part of this walk earlier in my stay here (I Love the Paths) and this time decided I was going to walk all the way into town. This was my route:

I went along one of the paths by the river, which took me past the incredibly ugly ice skating rink.

I read this the other day from another web page and had to giggle:

“We passed under an ornate footbridge, then round the back of the ice rink with its ridiculous external cable supports (I swear I'm going to attack it with my junior hacksaw one day), and under another railway bridge which barely gave me enough headroom.”

http://www.billwalfordpublishing.co.uk/chapter_3.html

It is not the prettiest of buildings!

I think they were going the opposite direction from me. This, I think, is the “ornate footbridge”. I must go back and get a proper photo. You can just see the pillars in the water and the ornate “things” (no idea what to call them) on the side of the bridge.

They are rather ornate, aren’t they?

According to the signs at this spot, I could have crossed the river and ended up almost at the same spot as I did. I chose to stay on this side of the river. Again, maybe that is a trip for another day.

I have no idea what this building is, in spite of all my research. So if I walk the other side of the river, I might just find out. This is a composite of three photos. I just liked the look of it.

On my side of the river, the path was a bit scary. In many places there was no railing between me and the river.

The first photo is looking back where I had been and the next one is looking forward

Then I came upon this lovely set of buildings

And a bit closer

Again, I’m not sure what the blue building is. It’s on that little island you can see in the Google Earth image at the beginning. Things look totally different from above than on the ground. The island appears to be called simply “The Island” and not to have it’s own name – just the island at Folly Bridge.

My next stop was The Head of the River. This pub has been photographed millions of times. I had thought this was something to do with the Oxford and Cambridge boat races, but I was totally wrong. That is in London and no where near Oxford. The river here, IS used for races but not the Oxford/Cambridge one.

“It is here that the college rowing crews race against each other in the two annual regattas - 'Torpids' in late February and 'Eights' in mid May.”

http://www.dailyinfo.co.uk/guide/riverwalks.html

And to explain a bit more:

“Head of the River. Winning crew or college in Eights Week or Torpids. A bump supper may be in order. Also the name of the next pub up the river from the finishing line, at Folly Bridge.” http://web2.comlab.ox.ac.uk/oxinfo/guide/glossary.html http://www.peetm.com/OxfordTerms.htm

Don’t ask me what Eights Week or Torpids are. You will have to do your own research on that one.

It is also not particularly old:

“They held a competition to name this pub when they built it in the 1970s, hence the name.”

http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Head_Of_The_River

However,

“The building was originally used to build boats and still has the original crane used to lift boats in and out of the water in the forecourt area.” http://www.tourinaday.com/oxford/best-hotels-oxford.html

And for a bit of a laugh:

“....it is said, in the good old days when racing eights were made of wood, the leading university crew were proclaimed “head of the river” and ceremonially burnt their boat as a prelude to a memorable (if not remembered) evening.”

“That custom was not quite as daft as it seems because what they were doing was ensuring that they got a new boat for next year (and there was, and still is, considerable development in the technology of racing boats - so a new boat is usually an advantage) and that all those college boatmen were kept in full employment.“

http://thames.me.uk/s01680.htm

So there are races from here, but not the one I thought.

Here’s the pub. Not bad looking for an ex-warehouse!

And this photo is looking from the bridge down on where I walked.

And this one is also from the bridge looking in the other direction.

After a short walk, I was back in central Oxford, and guess where I was:

I’ve seen this shop before and so have you guys, here and here.

That’s all for now folks.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 10 December 2008

The Window and Hearth Tax

2008-12-09T03:35:00.001+09:00

Something M said on the weekend has triggered some research on my part. Apparently a sign of wealth was the number of chimneys and windows in a house. So I wondered where this had come from.

In 1662, the Hearth Tax was introduced by the government of Charles II in 1662 “at a time of serious fiscal emergency”.

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/RdLeaflet.asp?sLeafletID=233&j=1.

Parliament had decided that the king needed a regular source of income and this tax was supposed to cover his income.

Reading about the history, it sounds like the original bureaucratic mass of paperwork while they tried to make it work. The law was adjusted in 1662, 1663, 1664 and different means were tried to assess and collect the tax. Remember this was in the days of horses, paper and pen, and long physical distances between the seat of government and the people. Besides being very difficult to administer, it didn’t have the desired affect in producing enough money for the King. Including the difficulties in collecting, certain households were exempt from the tax and in some cases had to produce certificates of exemption. Apparently if your house was worth less than 20 shillings, you were exempt from the tax.

I suspect this was also an issue in a day when many people were unable to read and write.

“A revision of the Act in 1664 made the tax payable by all who had more than two chimneys: a stopped-up chimney, on discovery, being charged double. The revision also made landlords liable to pay the tax of poor tenants.” http://www.witheridge-historical-archive.com/taxes.htm

So the more hearths or fireplaces you had, the more you paid.

'every dwelling and other House and Edifice …shall be chargeable ….for every firehearth and stove….the sum of twoe shillings by the yeare' http://www.roehampton.ac.uk/hearthtax/hearthtax/history/

The tax was abolished by William III in 1689, ostensibly as being "a great oppression to the poorer sort"

“and a breach of civil liberies in that it allowed every man's house to be entered and searched by persons unknown. In fact, the abolition seems to have been due to the tax not having raised the revenue that had been estimated, and being too expensive to collect. “ http://www.witheridge-historical-archive.com/taxes.htm

The Window tax was brought in in 1696 and repealed in 1851

The tax would be paid on a house of more than six windows. Unfortunately none of these records appeared to have survived, one way for a person to by pass the tax was to brick up one or two windows over the stated six, even today on some of the older houses the bricked up windows are still there.

In 1792 houses with 7-9 windows had to pay a tax of 2 shillings, and those people with property containing 10-19 windows would pay a tax of 4 shillings.

In 1825 the number of widows taxable went from six to eight windows. The Window Tax would be replaced in 1851 with a tax called House Duty.

http://www.longparish.org.uk/history/windowtax.htm

The Window Tax could be assessed from outside the house, which overcame one of the main objections of Hearth Tax. Nevertheless it was very unpopular and viewed as a tax on light and air.

The tax was levied on occupiers not owners. Small dwellings which were not subject to poor and church rates were exempt. The charge per house was a basic 2s. but houses with between 10 and 20 windows paid 8s. In 1709 the rate for larger houses was increased.

Over the years the yield from the tax gradually reduced, as a result of poor administration and the fact that more and more householders blocked up non-essential windows to avoid payment of the tax. In 1747 the old Window Tax Act was repealed and a new one put in its place.

Under the new Act there was a basic rate of 2s. plus 6d. per window for houses with between 10 and 14 windows. This increased to 9d. between 15 and 19 and 1s. per window over 20. At first the tax yield increased but then so did the blocking up of windows and in the 1750s and 1760s the rate of tax was increased. The tax was not finally abolished until 1851 but towards the end it was not strictly enforced.

Rugbourne provides a good example locally of a large house with windows blocked up to avoid payment of tax

http://www.highlittletonhistory.org.uk/transcriptions0905/Rates&taxes/Window%20Tax.pdf

According to the BBC

People dodged payment by bricking in windows, camouflaging them or even building dummy windows so that inspectors were confused. Some people blocked in windows and then unblocked them as soon as the tax man had gone.

Over the years people became so clever at avoiding the tax that revenue fell and the law was tightened in 1747.

The window tax continued until 1851.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/northyorkshire/iloveny/architecture/windows/gallery/gallery25.shtml

According to Wikipedia

The window tax was a glass tax which was an important social, cultural and architectural force in the United Kingdom during the 17th and 18th centuries.

Glass making was costly and the use of glass for windows and other purposes was even costlier because of a tax levied specifically on it. The tax was introduced in 1696 under King William III of England and was designed to impose tax relative to the prosperity of the taxpayer. The bigger the house, the more windows it was likely to have, hence the more tax the occupants would pay. This is the reason for the bricked-up windows so often seen in very old houses in the UK.

The richest families in the kingdom used this tax to set themselves apart from the merely rich. They would commission a country home or a manor house whose architecture would make the maximum possible use of windows. In extreme cases they would have windows built over structural walls. It was an exercice in ostentation, spurred by the window tax.

The tax was not repealed until 1851, when it was replaced by a tax akin to the present-day "council tax".

http://july.fixedreference.org/en/20040724/wikipedia/Window_tax

So there you go. Rich people, in years gone by, liked to have hearths (and therefore chimneys) and windows to prove how rich they were.

I tried to find photos of buildings with their windows bricked up, without any luck. I will continue to keep my eyes open.

Madeleine

Monday, 8 December 2008

Oxford University Park

2008-12-08T23:46:00.001+09:00

Saturday, we had a visit from an old friend of M’s. D was one of the “gang” that used to stay at our house when the boys were teenagers. So we’ve known D for many, many years. He has recently moved to London to be with his English partner R. So old friends and new friends. During their visit, we went for a loooooooooong walk through Oxford University Park, a place I didn’t even know existed until Saturday.

My first introduction to the park was when K said: “Madeleine, come over here!!”. I was busy looking at something else. This was what she had to show me.

I was so fascinated, I forgot to ask the man what exactly the bird was. I think it’s a hawk judging by the Google images I found. He/she was apparently 12 years old and the bloke has had him since he was a little bird. How gorgeous. I don’t even know why they were there in the park. The bird had been on his arm until just before I took this photo. Apparently, they like to have the wind under their wings and this was what he was doing. Also, apparently, they don’t weigh anything when they have the wind under their wings like that. He was sort of hovering on the sign.

Here’s a close up.

The Oxford University Parks, more normally the University Parks, or just Uni Parks to members of the local community, is one large parkland area slightly northeast of the Oxford city centre in England. It is open to the public during the day, and boasts beautiful gardens, large sports fields, and rare and exotic plants.

From 1853 to 1864, the University of Oxford purchased a total of 91 acres of land from Merton College to build the parks. Some of this land was then used for the University Museum and the Science Area, so the current site is measured at about 74 acres. The park is situated mostly on the west bank of the River Cherwell, though a small plot of land called Mesopotamia sits between the upper and lower levels of the river. The Parks are bounded by Norham Gardens to the north, Parks Road to the west and the Science Area on South Parks Road to the south.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_Parks

The is the High Bridge or Rainbow Bridge over the River Cherwell, it is shaped like a rainbow (hence the name) and was built in 1923/4 as a project for unemployed people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_Bridge,_Oxford

Here’s a photo going up the bridge and the backs of M & D.

After more walking, we came across this:

For some reason I didn’t take a photo of the whole scene. This is called the Punt Rollers, but I’m not quite sure why. Maybe because when punts get to this point they are likely to roll over?

This is not my photo. I took it off the net

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c4/Punt-rollers-river-cherwell-oxford.jpg

There was a lot more water flowing when we were there and here’s some close-ups of the water.

I do like my close-ups.

I subsequently discovered that there are a couple of interesting stories about this part of the park.

Mesopotamia is a narrow island (about 800 yards long by 30 yards wide) that forms part of the University Parks, Oxford, England. It lies between the upper and lower levels of the River Cherwell. The name Mesopotamia in Greek means "between the rivers" and originally referred to the area between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in present-day Iraq.

The land was purchased by the University of Oxford during the expansion of the Oxford University Parks between 1860 and 1865. A footpath, Mesopotamia Walk, laid out in 1865 runs along the centre of the spur to Kings Mill.

The Domesday Book records a watermill on this site and milling continued until 1825; one level of the river was once the mill stream. From 1914, attempts were made to introduce wild ducks and geese to the area, but these proved fruitless because of the predatory local otter population. Until 1926, a ferry operated from a point half way along the Walk, when it was replaced by a footbridge.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesopotamia,_Oxford

Also, in Wikipedia (and this one gave me a giggle):

Parson's Pleasure in the University Parks at Oxford, England, was a secluded area for male-only nude bathing on the River Cherwell. It was located next to the path on the way to Mesopotamia at the south-east corner of the Parks. The facility closed in 1991 and the area now forms part of the Parks.

Parson's Pleasure was traditionally frequented by dons of the University. To save the embarrassment of ladies who might be sitting in passing punts, they could be directed to a path that skirted the area behind a high corrugated iron fence. If a pretext were needed, the ladies could be told that the men needed to haul the punt over "the rollers" — a track made of concrete with metal rollers — next to the nearby weir. Women's use of the path declined in later years. The path and the rollers remain.

Parson's Pleasure is now part of the folklore of the university. One anecdote goes that a number of dons were skinny-sunbathing on the Pleasure when a group of students floated by in a punt. All but one of the startled dons covered their modesty — one placed a flannel over his head instead. When asked why he had done that, he replied haughtily, "Oh, well my students know me by my face.".

There are many variations of this joke. One, which appeared as a series of cartoons on a weekly wallpaper in Oxford about 1990, had a punt of camera toting Japanese tourists glide past the Pleasure, flashbulbs popping, much to the disgust of the dons enjoying their Sunday Times crossword. All but one of the dons covered their modesty with the crossword, and of course, the caption below stated something along the lines of" "Old Chap, I am rather known by my face in these parts!"

In 1996, the Oxford University Beer Appreciation Society commissioned a local brewery to produce a barley wine that was called Parson's Pleasure Ale.

A similar Dame's Delight for female bathers also existed nearby, but this closed even earlier than Parson's Pleasure.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parson%27s_Pleasure

And just a bit more information about Dame’s Delight

Dame's Delight was a place for family bathing on the bank of the River Cherwell in the meadows near the Oxford University Parks opposite Mesopotamia Walk in Oxford, England. It was started in 1934, but closed in 1970 due to maintenance difficulties because of flooding. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dame%27s_Delight

Interestingly enough, the story about the don covering his head rather than his genitals, is one I have heard. I can’t remember where, of course. I think it was in a movie somewhere.

Roald Dahl wrote a story called The Parson’s Pleasure which is a lovely little story, but has nothing to do with university don’s bathing naked. You can find the story here:

www.daltonvoorburg.nl/file/5147/1068724036/Parsons+Pleasure.doc

Here’s a bit of a map with our travels. After our walk, we stopped at the Royal Oak for a drink and a rest before heading back to the house.

And that’s all for now folks.

Madeleine

Monday, 8 December 2008

Cold

2008-12-08T18:23:00.001+09:00

Overnight was below freezing. I went for a walk Sunday morning, not particularly early, around 11 a.m. Lots of ice, puddles. This was a puddle on the side of the road.

Frozen!

Interesting shadows This was the footpath. You can see the shadows of the railings on the bridge where the ice had been shielded from the sun. All along I could see the melted ice where the sun had touched the surface; and the ice in the shadows.

Different clothes on people depending on how much they felt the cold. I saw a man wearing a t-shirt, shorts, running shoes, and gloves. No hat, no jacket, but gloves. Another man was wearing a normal suit and carrying what looked like a fur coat. Most people were rugged up the way I was.

That’s the other thing. Before you go out in this weather, there is a whole process to go through. I had to put on my long johns, which means removing the outer layer of clothes, and then dressing again with the long johns on. Then you have extra socks, shoes, coat, hat, gloves and once these are all arranged properly (scarf tucked into jacket so the cold doesn’t get in, jacket done up etc), you are ready to brave the world. I am so glad I don’t have small kids.

This was the railing on the bridge. Again, you can see where the sun had touched and melted the ice and where it hasn’t.

A close up of the ice crystals.

Looks almost furry.

And the misty view from the bridge.

This one is taken from a similar place in October. It’s hard to compare them as I was looking at different things when I took each photo.

Now will y'all stop nagging. I've given you your fix for today.

cheers

Madeleine

Monday, 8 December 2008

More Winchester

2008-12-02T19:10:00.001+09:00

Winchester Cathedral has a number of special happenings during the Christmas season. While we were there, they had a market with all sorts of stalls selling crafts and goodies. Not much different from the markets we have in Australia in what they sold. What was different was that each stall had a wooden chalet, each one the same.

All this scene needs is some snow falling and it would be perfect I reckon.

This is Winchester Cathedral.

Not bad for an old lady (or man).

They had also set up a skating rink. I thought about going but then couldn’t be bothered with waiting in the queue to get on the rink and the inevitable cold wet bum when I fell over. But here’s a photo of the rink area. This is 4 photos together. Looks pretty good, if I do say so myself.

In amongst all the craft items was an area that was selling food. I mentioned that I had never tasted roasted chestnuts, so K bought some for us to try.

As far as the taste goes. They are all right. Nothing special for me. But for someone who grew up on them, they would mean Christmas, winter, all sorts of connotations. A bit like vegemite to an Australian.

This one was taken inside the cathedral

And then looking straight up

This window was interesting. Apparently the original window was destroyed by a bomb during Oliver Cromwell's time. People pieced together the bits of coloured glass and ended up with a mosaic of stained glass instead of religious pictures.

Apparently

The cathedral's huge west window is made up of fragments of medieval glass put together randomly, in a manner something like pique assiette mosaic work. The original panes were deliberately destroyed by Cromwell's forces following the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642. Soon after the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, the broken glass was gathered up and used again.

As this display in the cathedral visitor centre shows, the original pictures were not reconstructed, as was attempted at St Peter Mancroft in Norwich. Perhaps the damage at Winchester was just too great for a "jigsaw" approach. Out of necessity, the cathedral pre-empted collage art by hundreds of years.

http://www.thejoyofshards.co.uk/visits/southtrip/winchcath2.shtml

The photo above gives an idea of the size of the window. This is a close up of one section. I just can’t imagine the amount of work that must have gone into recreating this window.

If you look closely, you can see a head in this one, but the rest are just bits of glass put together.

We had dinner/lunch (couldn’t decide if it was going to be linner or dunch) with K’s cousin who lives in Winchester. However by the time we got there, it was definitely dinner time and we were all tired and hungry. When we headed back to the car, the streets were much quieter and I took a couple of shots of the Christmas decorations all lit up.

Then we hopped in the car and came home, ending another journey.

Madeleine

Tuesday, 2 December 2008

Great Story – Winchester Cathedral

2008-12-01T23:32:00.001+09:00

On our travels this last weekend, we went to Winchester Cathedral. We had a local (K’s cousin) who took us around and gave us some of the history of the Cathedral. One of the stories she told us was the one of William Walker (diver) and his contribution to the Cathedral.

I have been doing a bit of research since I’ve been back and here is the story.

The cathedral had originally been built in the 11^th Century by Norman Monks. It had been added in the 13^th Century and in the late 19^th century it was discovered that these additions had begun to subside. Apparently, they had been added on the top of a peat bog.

“Although parts of the building were reasonably well supported on chalk and flint infill, other parts had been constructed on an intricate raft of tree trunks that virtually floated on the water table. A partial drying out og the area due to drainage works carried out in later years had resulted in subsidence and rotting of this wooden foundation.”

http://www.urgdiveclub.org.au/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=2Q89yRCk2gU%3D&tabid=59&mid=391

(BTW I copy and pasted this, including spelling errors)

With limited methods of rectifying the problem, a diver, William Walker, was sent to remove the water an shore up the foundations of the cathedral so they could be fixed properly.

This is how his work was described:

"At this point Walker, in his helmet diving dress weighing 200lb went into the pits and working in completely inky, foul water with absolutely no visibility began to remove, bucket by bucket, peat and rotted wood. He worked entirely by touch, wearing gloves to protect him from the water made septic by nearby graves in the Cathedral grounds. When he had completely removed all the unstable filling and was down to firm gravel base he then proceeded to build up layers of cement bags. This procedure was repeated day after day, week after week, in the many pits around the walls, all the time in danger from a possible wall collapse."

http://www.urgdiveclub.org.au/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=2Q89yRCk2gU%3D&tabid=59&mid=391

Now what a story is that.

But this is not the end.

The Cathedral was fixed and all was well and eventually someone decided that they needed a statue of William Walker to commemorate his services to the cathedral. Which was duly done. Imagine the horror when the statue was unveiled and turned out not to be William Walker’s features, but Sir Francis Fox the engineer involved in the project. Apparently the sculptor had been given a photo of the two men and had picked the wrong one.

Now how embarrassing would THAT be !!

The error was eventually fixed and I took two photos of two different statues and I’m not sure who they are of. I think they are both William Walker but who knows.

This one was inside the Cathedral. The sign under it reads: William Walker – diver 1896 – 1912 And I can’t read the rest.

This statue was outside between the shop and the cafe and looks like him as well.

The sign under this statue says:

Now apparently Norman Pierce was the man who did a bust of the real William Walker – diver. However, this one was tucked away in a corner outside the cathedral, and the first one had pride of place inside the cathedral. So whether I am right in my assumptions I really don’t know.

Madeleine

Monday, 1 December 2008

Stonehenge

2008-12-01T20:42:00.001+09:00

It’s hard to describe the setting of Stonehenge. It is on Salisbury Plain – 300 square miles of flatness. There was no way I could get a photo that did justice to the size and scale of the setting. I took a photo from the car window as we were leaving but all it shows is the rain on the window.

Driving down the highway, and watching for signs. Very suddenly there was a sign for the turn off, which we almost missed. A short drive further, and there it was, amongst the flat nothingness of the plain.

It was bitterly cold. Raining. At one stage a drop of rain hit my face and it felt like ice. Do we bother to pay money and wander around in the cold? We had driven a fair way from Southampton to get here. I did want to see it in real life. How important was this to me? It was really, really cold and wet and horrible weather.

K and I decided we would go for a bit of a walk and see what we could see. There was a fence around the whole area. Apparently you could walk under the road from the car park into the fenced area and wander around. We decided to stay outside the fence and just see it from a distance. In spite of the distance, this is what I saw.

Even through the fence it’s kinda kewl, now isn’t it?

However, when I zoomed in, I was more able to get a feel for what they felt like close up:

Wow!!

How incredible.

They are ginormous.

To give an idea of the size of them

This photo gives an idea of the weather as well. So I took a close up of the people and the umbrellas.

That’s why we didn’t go any closer. For almost £7, I didn’t think the effort was worth it. There was a path around the stones. You can’t get close enough to touch them.

Over the years, tourists have written on them, taken bits from them and generally defaced them in every imaginable way. In the late 1960s when I was in the UK, you could walk amongst them. I wish now I’d managed to get to see them and get some photos then.

The path around them is quite long and wide around the stones. Probably gives a great sense of the scale of both the plain and the stones, but for me, it wasn’t worth the cold. I’d seen enough from my side of the fence.

Madeleine

Monday, 1 December 2008

Phone Call

2008-12-01T18:50:00.001+09:00

I had a phone call this a.m. Most unusual. I answered expecting it to be someone for M or K and it was for me. It was the house sitting agency. Immediate panic. What was wrong with my fur kids?

Damn !!

Turns out the fridge is not working.

Damn !!

Is that all?

Do I care if the fridge is not working?

Not really.

I know I should, and I guess I do at some level, because I know that Perth, in December, no fridge is a definite problem. Anyway, I think it is sorted.

BTW, the fur kids are fine.

When I told M about it, his first response was: “Oh, no!!” He went immediately into “There’s something wrong with the fur kids” as well.

Madeleine

Monday, 1 December 2008

The Pantomime

2008-12-01T06:04:00.001+09:00

What can I say? Bad jokes. Incredibly bad jokes. Which were so bad and so predicable they were funny. Singing, lots of it. Dancing, yup, that too. So for those who have never seen a pantomime, what on earth is it?

It is a show, singing, dancing, ridiculous jokes, no plot, a hero, heroine and a bad guy. The audience becomes part of the show. So when the villain comes on the scene, the audience boos and hisses. At one stage one of the actors had asked the audience to watch over his fish, and if anyone came to steal his fish, that we were to let him know by shouting: “Wishee Washee, Fishy Wishy” (and yup, that’s for real). So when the villain attempted to steal his fish, the audience was a bit slow in warning him and he came out before we had a chance to cue him. So he looks at the audience, tells them that we had been a bit slow, goes back, and we start again. It was hilarious.

Apparently in every pantomime there is one character played by the opposite sex i.e. a man playing a woman or vice versa. In this one, a man played the central character, a woman, Widow Twanky.

According to my book, there are 4 major elements in a pantomime: music (both singing and dancing), comedy (including slapstick) , audience participation and a traditional story of good and evil.

Our seats were right at the front and we were warned that we were likely to get wet, and at one stage M had his coat wrapped around him and he warned me that this was the point where we were likely to get wet. We didn’t. The funny bit about that scene was where Wishee Washee was being assaulted by various forms of fluid and one of the children came out with a pie, carried very wobbly, and we were waiting for Wishee Washee to wear the pie. He didn’t. You could hear the audience settle and then about 5 minutes later, just long enough for the audience to forget, Wishee Washee wore the pie, much to the audience delight and laughter.

This pantomime was Aladdin and was totally different from any version I’ve ever heard, although I must admit I am a bit weak on my Arabian Tales. The story according to this pantomime, and apparently this is one of the standard English pantomimes, Aladdin is a friend of Wishee Washee and his mother, the Widow Twanky. The Widow Twanky owns the local laundry service. Aladdin falls in love with the Emperor’s Daughter, who cannot marry him cause he is poor. The villain, Abananzer, wants the money from the cave and the lamp, but can’t go and get it himself cause only a brave and honest man is allowed in the cave, so he has to trick Aladdin into giving him the lamp. And so the story progresses from the audience being told that we are not allowed to look at Princess Jasmine or we will all have out heads cut off. So there is much fun amongst the audience, both children and adults, to look at the princess and yet not look at her so we could see what she was up to. To the final where the good guys win out and the local bobby takes Abananzer off to wherever he goes to learn to behave himself and everyone lives happily ever after.

I found it interesting that usually polite, apologetic and adapted Englishers were so free in this instance to shout and hiss and boo at the villain, and to shout stupid things like “Wishee Washee Fishy Wishee”, to one of the actors. The whole pantomime was hilarious.

Including the main characters, there were also 10 children involved in the production, singing as a chorus and I presume, learning their pantomime skills for later in their lives. At one stage they got 10 children from the audience to come up on stage and help, and these children all went home with a little present. At another point in the story they called from a member of the audience to come and sing and the man who they chose just happened to be the little girl sitting next to me’s teacher. So even one of the local primary school teachers was allowed to get involved and behave like an idiot – which he quite happily did.

I loved it. It was silly. There was no plot. The singing was great. The audience loved the whole experience and that included me and M neither of us having every been to one before. I don’t think the Aussies here will understand. I think if anyone had told me, my response would have been, no way, you’ve got to be kidding. It was great.

I wasn't allowed to take photos, so, sorry, no pictures this time.

Madeleine

Saturday, 29 November 2008

Changes

2008-11-28T22:51:00.001+09:00

I was out in the back garden this morning. I have been watching one of the trees in the garden. This is a photo of what the tree looked like in September when I first arrived and as it was today.

The leaves have all dropped off and the tree looks totally bare, doesn’t it?

However when you look closely, this is what I saw:

Now why would this tree have new buds and growth on it at this time of the year??

Just curious.

I will probably be offline all weekend. We are off to Southampton for the weekend. The trip includes: a pantomime in Southampton, Winchester Cathedral, and Stonehenge (the real sized one). So wait for more photos and writings starting on Monday. I’m sure my camera will be very busy this weekend.

Madeleine

Friday, 28 November 2008

Beatrix Potter and Kents Cavern

2008-11-26T20:02:00.001+09:00

One of the decorations around the Kents Cavern building was this sign:

Sign says:

“In 1893 the young Beatrix Potter was on holiday in Torquay with her parents. She had never seen a cave and begged her father to take her to Kents Hole (as it was then known) where he photographed her sitting outside. This experience may have been the inspiration for Mrs Twiggy-Winkles home, since her diary entry about the cave with it’s wooden door “flush into the bank” closely resembles the description in her famous story.”

Guide book says:

On 14 March 1982 a young woman called Beatrix Potter wrote about her visit. She and her parents were on holiday in Torquay and she described her first-ever visit to a cave.

“The caves.. were very easy to explore an only moderately damp. Papa got dirty...[and] slipped off a board into the sticky red clay”

Perhaps her experience of Torquay’s caves inspired her to write the story of Mrs Twiggy-Winkle, who also lived in a cave, a “door which went flush into the cliff”

So I did a bit more research and this is what I found on the net:

"…it is very easy to explore and only moderately damp."
The following is an edited extract from
THE JOURNAL OF BEATRIX POTTER
" I went on one singular suburban drive with mamma….past Anstey's Cove…and through a most dreary suburb named St Mary Church to Babbacombe…. I was so disgusted with my drive that I privately incited papa to going into Kent's Hole next morning by a way of a reviver."

" … I can imagine no more unlikely or unromantic situation for a cavern. It is in a suburb of Torquay, half way up a tangle bluff, with villas and gardens overhanging the top of a muddy orchard and some filthily dirty cows in the ravine below. I was pretty much exhausted when we found it, but by dint of eating cinnamon and the excitement of going into a cave, recovered."

"The dilapidated wooden door was flush into the bank. Outside an artificial plateau or spoil-bank of slate, overgrown. A donkey-cart was encamped and the donkey grazing, the owner a mild, light-haired young man was sawing planks."

"Papa inquired if there was anybody here? to which he replied with asperity 'I am', put on his coat and prepared to unlock the cavern. The donkey was apparently trustworthy, at least it was there when we came out."

"The proprietor ( I have already forgotten his name, which I regret, for he amuse me), hung a notice-board on a nail outside the door, to the effect that the Guide is at present inside the cavern, and scrubbed out certain derisive remarks which had been scratched on the portal during his last descent."

" I shall not go into details about the cave, which is well described in a pamphlet, and only remark it is very easy to explore and only moderately damp."

http://kentscavern.co.uk/visitors.html

The Drive to Babbacombe and St. Marychurch is not as dreary nowadays as it was in her day.

Wrote this just for interests sake. I am sorting through my photos.

Madeleine

Wednesday, 26 November 2008

Miscellaneous Sights

2008-11-25T22:23:00.001+09:00

Browsing my photos, I’ve realised there are quite a number that don’t fit into little stories. So here are some of them.

I spotted this little miss in someone’s back garden in Babbacombe. Check out her bottom lip!!

I walked a bit further and here she was in all her glory.

I like this sign. This is called making sure the kids (or other smart alecks) get the total message.

Oh, yes and for people who are paranoid about germs when they use a public toilet, this is for them.

Just wave your hand in front of the button and the loo flushes itself. For washing your hands, you put your hand in a slot and eventually hot water came out and washed your hands. When the water stops, there was another outlet which blew hot air to dry your hands. I took a photo of the loo button but there were too many people around to take one of the neat little hand washing machine.

I didn’t actually notice this until I looked at the photo. Mama Spire and Baby Spire

When you grow up, you will be as big as me!!

Now this is rather cool. This is an old walking trail half way down the cliff face. The whole face has been blocked off as it is crumbling and becoming dangerous. But you can still see the outline of what appears to be old walking tracks.

Here’s another bit

And this is where they are. Somewhere up the top of this hill (?), mountain (?). It’s not the greatest of photos, but does give an idea of where these pathways are.

The stairs from my room at the top

These were quite scary. Every time I went down, I felt like I was going to fall over the railing. I didn’t. But sure felt like I might.

While I was sitting at Torquay Harbour, I noticed that on the top of most of the poles, was this:

You had to watch where you sat or you would got shat upon. The gulls here were pretty bloody big too so I can imagine the size of their......

I found it interesting that Torquay was called “The English Riviera” and the platform I left from the train station was derelict. There was a building on the platform, but inside was nothing except rubble and rubbish. I do hope this is a winter thing and not what happens in summer when all the tourists come.

This is Tor Bay in Torquay. Nothing in comparison to Australian beaches.

I liked this one as well. A shopping centre. Now is that great or is that great !!

This building has had quite a history. Check out: http://www.torquaypavilion.com/

So that was some of the other sights I saw around Torquay and Babbacombe.

Madeleine

Tuesday, 25 November 2008

Bygones

2008-11-25T03:12:00.001+09:00

My last touristy thing on my list of things to see and do. I’ve still not even touched on Torquay itself, nor any of the scenery around Babbacombe. I might get to that, I might not. You will all just have to wait and see.

Bygones is a replica Victorian street and museum. I didn’t take a photo of the outside of the building for some reason. I walked inside and it was like being taken into another world. The first thing I discovered was:

A man on a toilet. He told me to go away and leave him be. According to the guide book:

“It started life as a broom cupboard but as human nature everyone opened the door. It is now an outside toilet complete with an old cut up newspaper.

The occupant may become annoyed but it is worth opening the door for his comments”

Notice some of the background – the ginormous spider, cobwebs and the lamp.

From there you could see the Victorian street and what was happening on the street.

A family, the old man in a wheelchair, children, a couple of adults and the shops in the background.

All the shop windows had displays of items that would have been on sale in Victorian days.

The toy shop (which particularly interested me). There was quite a number of dolls house displays as well. In Victorian times, girls played with dolls houses and learned their housekeeping skills and boys played with forts and pretend battles.

Around the corner, you could see the boy selling hot chestnuts. If you pushed a button, he would do his spiel to try and sell his chestnuts.

There was also an organ grinder and his monkey. You can just see his monkey in the background.

A penny farthing outside the ironmonger shop

There was also a fantasy land with lots of moving things. Ferris wheels you could make move. This is the Vienna Wheel next to the Eifel Tower, in front of Buckingham Palace

The Gezunda, male and female (it gez unda the bed). Couldn’t resist taking this one. In fact, I learned the name Gezunda when I was first in the UK. Seems like no one else uses it except me, which makes me unique !!

There was heaps more. The last bit went into the war years and there was an Anderson shelter, a WWI trench with soldiers, and an amusement arcade with working machines. If you put a pound in a machine, you could get old pennies to operate the arcade machines.

This I think, is my favourite photo from Bygones.

We are off to Southampton, Winchester and hopefully Stonehenge this weekend so I’ve only got this week to clean up after my last trip and get organised for the next one.

Madeleine

Monday, 24 November 2008

Kents Cavern

2008-11-24T19:21:00.001+09:00

Kent’s Cavern

Well that was an interesting excursion. I arrived far too early. I knew I was too early. The first tour didn’t start till 11 and I arrived at 10. Had a drink and read the souvenir booklet I bought. A bit more excitement when I tried to use my credit card to save the last of my change. It was declined. Three times. Damn! So I used the last of my cash and then worried whether I should have. The problem was I was miles away from any bank and I had walked. I was already starting to get sore and tired, so figured there was something wrong with the machine at the cavern rather than my credit card. I knew there was plenty on the card.

The guide, Alan, was excellent and was able to answer all the questions I asked. He also had some lovely little tricks up his sleeve. Like turning out all the lights and reminding us that this was what it was like for the cavemen and then showed us what they used for lighting. They couldn’t just light fires cause the smoke would fill up the cave.

Sea shells, filled with moss, and covered in dripping from their meat. Two gave a surprisingly good light. Quite amazing really. I’m always amazed at the ingenuity of human beings.

The problem with taking photographs in the cavern was that with having a specific time for the tour, I didn’t have time to set up the shots as I would have liked. So I fuzzed quite a few of them and quite a number didn’t show the scale of the whole adventure. I would have loved to be on my own and taken lots of time with each shot. At this stage I’m only deleting the really awful ones and will see what I can do with some of the others when I have more time.

This is apparently a baby mammoth’s molar. Like children, lose their molars, apparently, so did mammoths. Imagine the size of THAT baby !! We saw a molar from full sized mammoth near the end of the tour. I’ve left the hand in to give an idea of size.

Now that’s one big tooth!!

The bit I like in my souvenir booklet is:

“Throughout that time the local climate was often very wet and layers of silt and mud were sealed in my stalagmites. Discarded and lost debris from ancient visitors became trapped and buried by this gradual filling up of the cave, which thus became a giant sandwich with tools and bones buried in the silt.” Kent’s Cavern Prehistoric Caves, Souvenir Brochure.

So that tooth became part of the sandwich and has been laying amongst the silt and mud for hundreds of thousands of years.

The first people to start to excavate the caves worked with picks, shovels and a donkey. They cut out any number of tunnels, finding fossils. The problem was that in those days, they tended to use dynamite to blast out the harder bits and so probably lost a lot.

This is what it might have looked like.

Apparently some of the places were so small, they had to pick the smallest man, cover him in goose grease and send him through to make the passage bigger. To make sure he didn’t get stuck, the would tie a rope to his leg so they could pull him back if he got stuck. Or that’s the story we were told !!

Over the years, constant dripping water would eventually form stalactites (from the top) and stalagmites from the bottom because of the deposits of calcium carbonate. Eventually, they join together and form pillars. Like this one:

I mean how kewl is THAT!!

This was the only bit that was behind glass. It has been there for hundreds of thousands of years and in another few hundred of thousand years, the stalactite and stalagmite will join and become a pillar like in the previous photo.

We even got a photo of Madeleine in amongst the cave people, snuggling up to her cave sister.

I had a lot of trouble getting down and then back up again. I was worried I would knock and break one of the models!! But there is Madeleine, in Kents Cavern, Torquay, Devon, UK.

Madeleine

Friday, 21 November 2008