14th December 2008
From the grass triangle to Forest Row.
We planned this as an easy end of season morning-only walk, and it worked! Almost everyone turned up, parked cars in Forest Row and we drove in 2 cars to the famous grass triangle. The first section from there was along a winding narrow road. Every now and the n a car came through - it wasn't comfortable but didn't last long. After that most but not all of the walk was on hardish surface, so although the ground was wet we didn't get too muddy.
In all we walked about 4 miles, had an agreeable and fun lunch at the Swan in Forest Row, joined by goddaughter Lucy and her boyfriend Alex - aren't they all called Alex? The pub meal featured the option of cooking your own meat on hot stones (Pierette) which some did. I ate too much turkey, but it's nearly Christmas and we all had a good time. Home again around 5 after dropping Peter D at his house in Wimbledon.
So now I have done the distance from home to Forest Row, which when you drive it, seems like a good long way.
The next walk will be on 29th March 2009. We all agreed that January and February are not good for this activity, and in any case I will be away in New Zealand and Australia for most of the intervening time.
Sunday, 28 December 2008
Friday, 28 November 2008
Walking to Equiqueville 3
28th November 2008.
Yesterday I spent a day in the country.
As the walk organiser for Sunday I hadn't felt confident about a number of things - where to park cars and whether the lunch venue would be too posh for us among them.
Parking cars isn't an interesting subject in itself, but it's surprising how seeing the ground solves the problem. In any case I was happy just to be out and about, and the winter countryside had that misty moist look that makes the inside of a pub (or in this case riverside brasserie) seem very enticing.
The people at Haxted Mill could not have been nicer - they said just leave boots at the door and did we want roast beef. So hopefully everyone who has confirmed will actually turn out on Sunday. So now I've sent off the e-mails with copy maps attached and we'll see how it goes. the weather doesn't look too good for the weekend - rain forecast and cold. Walking's probably the best thing to be doing on days like that.
Yesterday I spent a day in the country.
As the walk organiser for Sunday I hadn't felt confident about a number of things - where to park cars and whether the lunch venue would be too posh for us among them.
Parking cars isn't an interesting subject in itself, but it's surprising how seeing the ground solves the problem. In any case I was happy just to be out and about, and the winter countryside had that misty moist look that makes the inside of a pub (or in this case riverside brasserie) seem very enticing.
The people at Haxted Mill could not have been nicer - they said just leave boots at the door and did we want roast beef. So hopefully everyone who has confirmed will actually turn out on Sunday. So now I've sent off the e-mails with copy maps attached and we'll see how it goes. the weather doesn't look too good for the weekend - rain forecast and cold. Walking's probably the best thing to be doing on days like that.
30th November 2008
It was worth doing the recce on Thursday - both parking places and the lunch worked out well.
Left home in the early morning in cold drizzly weather and got to the start point near Limpsfield with no improvement. Everyone turned up on time and at 9.30 off we sloshed up the road and onto the path. It was very muddy but the cold was less intense although my map and printed out instructions were getting soggy. We walked through Limpsfield Chart which suddenly looked familiar from earlier walks - we must have gone through on a cross track on the Greensand Way a few years ago.
Walking through drizzle tends to mean that landscape features are blurred as the eyes concentrate on missing the next puddle, but the views across the Weald from Limpsfield Chart are wonderful, even now that the leaves have fallen and the colours are definitely wintry. Although it is of English proportions, therefore spatially small compared with large views in bigger countries, the scope of the Weald seems huge from here and even on damp winter days the far horizon a long way off.
The grumpy conversation of the group reflected the conditions - there hasn't been an economic crisis like this in our experience, and the Government's attempts to help and to take the credit (for what?) are the issues. I feel unable to change anything about the problems themselves or the Government's handling of them, so I listen. Once I ask what would be the better policy, or path, or idea, for our leaders to follow. I don't think anyone knows, and it feels increasingly desperate. The pace is good in spite of the mud - everyone striding out - and I begin to think we might be early for lunch.
At that moment the description of the route on my bedraggled piece of paper ceases to correspond with anything in our surroundings. We are supposed to go over a stile into a small wood containing a pond. There are lots of things to be seen from where we mill around, but no stile, no wood, and no pond. This kind of milling around hoping we won't have to go too far back before we find the route again is seen by the others as a way of building in a small delay so that we arrive for lunch on time. This time it seems serious enough that we might actually be late for lunch. I need to check my emotions at this point. Why does it matter so much to me to be on time?
Some people don't seem to mind about time in this way without being seen as irresponsible, and in any case it's not usually seen as a sign of serious incompetence to arrive for lunch 15mins after the appointed time. In fact the restaurant people expect you to be late. For me it matters some visceral way.
Milling around continues but by tracing back along the map we realise a mistake we made just a few hundred yards back, so we get back on track. We are down in the valley of the River Eden, damp under foot but now the rain has stopped and a watery sun hovers in the sky. the last mile to Haxted Mill is along a road. I never enjoy this as windy country roads aren't safe for cars and walkers to share, and the tarmac jars my knees. We got to Haxted Mill at 1220.
Lunch was booked for 1230. By the time we'd got our boots off and look decent it's 1230.
Haxted Mill is not the sort of place where we normally stop for lunch on these walks. A village pub is upmarket enough. On this route there are not many and around here none at all without a 3 mile diversion. If we don't divert for the railway, it doesn't make sense to go far out of the way for lunch.
The group historians remind me that on the first walk (the Thames Path in 1997/8) the norm for lunch was already the pub - we were never picnickers - but we would order sandwiches, even if some of those pubs along the Thames were a little smarter than village pubs generally. Now the average order is past the peak it reached a year or two ago - where a main course and dessert plus coffee accompanies by a couple of pints of beer became the norm. We are largely down to one course each plus a pint and a half of bitter, and perhaps a coffee. We also think we have been to over 60 pubs in the course of our walks since 1997. Can't remember a bad one. Even if I can remember the good ones I would never be able to find them again.
Being the organiser means that you take a lot of notice of the detail. For most of the walks I have been a member, so apart from parking my car wherever asked, I often don't have much idea where the walk takes us.
With a proper restaurant it would have been sad not to enjoy what was on offer, so people had a great variety with only a couple of us going for the traditional beef roast, which was as tasty as they come. never mind - what I meant to say was that we drank 3 bottles of red wine between 6. Somehow the afternoon walk did proceed OK, but perhaps that was a lot. the people who ran the place had a quiet conversation about whether we were going to walk further after lunch. there was a choice as one of us had left a car at the restaurant so as to get to a family tea, but the 5 remaining decided to walk off the lunch.
The afternoon was where my exploring on Thursday again paid off. After a long and soggy climb out of the Eden valley up to Dry Hill Farm I knew there was only a mile or so to go, and we got to the car at 4pm - right on the dot, or so I let it be thought.
In no time we had driven back to the start, it was now full night and time for home.
There's a childhood feeling in this activity - is it the beginning of the second one? Walks after lunch on a Sunday? Isn't that the England of my childhood? When the doctor said I should know by now that a rest after lunch is important, didn't I think of matron? I know that Dr Popelyk, about whom I have youthful fantasies, has never hear of matron. I may be that in the Russia of her childhood there were matronly characters at party youth camps who made the young comrades have a lie down before strenuous physical exercise in the afternoon.
I decide this is not the onset of second childhood, and that it's the most likely thing to keep it at bay.
Thursday, 20 November 2008
Lime Juice
St Enoch Station Glasgow
Lime Juice 1968 and 1969 - Part 1
Arbuckle Smith did me proud on my visit to Glasgow.
I found my way into the city from the airport and presented myself at Mr Aitken's office. He was obviously delighted to see me, not because of me particularly, but because he could see, or at least hope, that my visit was going to solve a problem for him.
Hence the lunch at a famous Italian restaurant, and the warm welcome. I must admit right now that I found the whole situation and my involvement in it such a joke that I enjoyed my day rather selfishly without giving much thought as to how I was going to solve Mr. Aitken's pressing problem. So by the time I was on my way back to the airport I felt that Mr. Aitken was increasingly sounding like a man with a threat up his sleeve. I remember that I had an entrecote pizzaiola for lunch which was new for me, red wine, whisky no doubt and very little time back at the office before it was time to get back to the airport. It was also amazing to me to fly anywhere in those days.
I should mention that with me on the back seat of the taxi on the way back to the airport was a clinking cardboard box containing small bottles each one half full with a sample of lime juice. I doubt if anyone but an expert could have identified what the liquid was. The colour varied from black (quite a few) to yellow (one or two) with the majority various shades of sludgy grey. Each tidily-corked bottle came from a numbered barrel and was also labelled with the barrel number. When I got back to Golders Green later in the evening my flatmates and I had a good look at them but nobody was tempted to taste. the steward on the BEA Vanguard had been very doubtful about having them in the hat rack. he thought it might disturb the electrics - so I had them on the floor of the plane next to my seat.
When Mr Aitken and I first planned my visit to Scotland the idea had been to get rid of the stuff by dumping it and claiming the insurance. Mr Sosnow did not like this idea at all, he was mightily opposed to it, he told me to find a commercial buyer for it. I did think this was far-fetched, but then my opinion didn't count for much, even with me. Hence bringing the samples back south.
But the most amazing part of the day was the after lunch visit to the underground cavern where the barrels of lime juice themselves were stored. You would have never guessed that this vast space existed under the red brick (and derelict) edifice of St Enoch station, Glasgow's St. Pancras in style and the northern terminus of the 'alternative' route north. This was the Midland railway from St Pancras via the Settle and Carlisle and Glasgow and South western railways to Glasgow St Enoch. Beeching had had a good go at that, hence St enoch's then status as a car park with undisclosed wonders under the floor.
Mr Aitken told me when we came out of the daylight into this Victorian brick vault that this was a whisky warehouse and the bottling plant for the famous Cutty Sark whisky. Why was it being used for storing lime juice? I asked. Well it's because you (i.e. me) hadn't wanted to pay the duty on the imported juice until a buyer was found, hence the need for a bonded warehouse. And what are bonded warehouses on the Clyde mainly used for? Whisky of course. I now know, and this is knowledge of a very recent date, that the duty of whisky is not paid until it is bottled, so the operation taking place under St Enoch station was a very sensitive one indeed.
We had a brief pause to shake hands with the Cutty Sark foreman. He said he was glad to see me as my visit meant that 'that rubbish' would soon be shifted out of his way. I felt slightly offended by his suggestion that the material I had stored in the warehouse was somehow inferior to his. But it was; lime juice is inferior to whisky in every way, unless you've got the scurvy. Mr Aitken now shepherded me to the dark vault where my cargo was resting.
Stacks of oil drums lay up against the brick wall and on the floor a dark stain was spreading. the area occupied by the drums was large enough, but, as Mr. Aitken patiently explained, some of the barrels were leaking. the lime juice spreading across the floor was partly absorbed by the brick and grew an unpleasant black mould wherever it lay. This, and Mr Aitken's voice became more forceful as he spoke, was constantly encroaching on the whisky storage area and reducing the profitability of that venture. So something had to be done. What was it going to be.
A picture went through my mind of myself standing in front of Mr Sosnow's desk the following day suggesting that we would have to pay more for the storage as the leaks meant we were effectively using more than our share of the space. I turned off this in-skull movie just as Mr Sosnow stood up to address me.
Lime Juice 1968 and 1969 - Part 1
Arbuckle Smith did me proud on my visit to Glasgow.
I found my way into the city from the airport and presented myself at Mr Aitken's office. He was obviously delighted to see me, not because of me particularly, but because he could see, or at least hope, that my visit was going to solve a problem for him.
Hence the lunch at a famous Italian restaurant, and the warm welcome. I must admit right now that I found the whole situation and my involvement in it such a joke that I enjoyed my day rather selfishly without giving much thought as to how I was going to solve Mr. Aitken's pressing problem. So by the time I was on my way back to the airport I felt that Mr. Aitken was increasingly sounding like a man with a threat up his sleeve. I remember that I had an entrecote pizzaiola for lunch which was new for me, red wine, whisky no doubt and very little time back at the office before it was time to get back to the airport. It was also amazing to me to fly anywhere in those days.
I should mention that with me on the back seat of the taxi on the way back to the airport was a clinking cardboard box containing small bottles each one half full with a sample of lime juice. I doubt if anyone but an expert could have identified what the liquid was. The colour varied from black (quite a few) to yellow (one or two) with the majority various shades of sludgy grey. Each tidily-corked bottle came from a numbered barrel and was also labelled with the barrel number. When I got back to Golders Green later in the evening my flatmates and I had a good look at them but nobody was tempted to taste. the steward on the BEA Vanguard had been very doubtful about having them in the hat rack. he thought it might disturb the electrics - so I had them on the floor of the plane next to my seat.
When Mr Aitken and I first planned my visit to Scotland the idea had been to get rid of the stuff by dumping it and claiming the insurance. Mr Sosnow did not like this idea at all, he was mightily opposed to it, he told me to find a commercial buyer for it. I did think this was far-fetched, but then my opinion didn't count for much, even with me. Hence bringing the samples back south.
But the most amazing part of the day was the after lunch visit to the underground cavern where the barrels of lime juice themselves were stored. You would have never guessed that this vast space existed under the red brick (and derelict) edifice of St Enoch station, Glasgow's St. Pancras in style and the northern terminus of the 'alternative' route north. This was the Midland railway from St Pancras via the Settle and Carlisle and Glasgow and South western railways to Glasgow St Enoch. Beeching had had a good go at that, hence St enoch's then status as a car park with undisclosed wonders under the floor.
Mr Aitken told me when we came out of the daylight into this Victorian brick vault that this was a whisky warehouse and the bottling plant for the famous Cutty Sark whisky. Why was it being used for storing lime juice? I asked. Well it's because you (i.e. me) hadn't wanted to pay the duty on the imported juice until a buyer was found, hence the need for a bonded warehouse. And what are bonded warehouses on the Clyde mainly used for? Whisky of course. I now know, and this is knowledge of a very recent date, that the duty of whisky is not paid until it is bottled, so the operation taking place under St Enoch station was a very sensitive one indeed.
We had a brief pause to shake hands with the Cutty Sark foreman. He said he was glad to see me as my visit meant that 'that rubbish' would soon be shifted out of his way. I felt slightly offended by his suggestion that the material I had stored in the warehouse was somehow inferior to his. But it was; lime juice is inferior to whisky in every way, unless you've got the scurvy. Mr Aitken now shepherded me to the dark vault where my cargo was resting.
Stacks of oil drums lay up against the brick wall and on the floor a dark stain was spreading. the area occupied by the drums was large enough, but, as Mr. Aitken patiently explained, some of the barrels were leaking. the lime juice spreading across the floor was partly absorbed by the brick and grew an unpleasant black mould wherever it lay. This, and Mr Aitken's voice became more forceful as he spoke, was constantly encroaching on the whisky storage area and reducing the profitability of that venture. So something had to be done. What was it going to be.
A picture went through my mind of myself standing in front of Mr Sosnow's desk the following day suggesting that we would have to pay more for the storage as the leaks meant we were effectively using more than our share of the space. I turned off this in-skull movie just as Mr Sosnow stood up to address me.
Mr Aitken and I then spent the next hour carefully siphoning off a sample of each barrel into the glass bottles which I would later take back to London on the plane. The colours varied but very few resembled my idea of lime juice. No wonder the airline steward had been concerned about its effect on the plane.
Walking to Equiqueville 2
2. Vanguard Way East Croydon Station to Oxted
19th October 2008
The Vanguard Way is a long distance path, about 50 miles long, crossing part of London, Surrey and Sussex, between East Croydon station and Newhaven. The guys who first put the route together from a collection of local footpaths called it the Vanguard Way because they found themselves travelling back to London one day on a crowded train - in the guards van.
The group which collected at East Croydon station at 9.30 that morning was not large - only 3 of us. That meant that it wasn't necessary to book somewhere for lunch and we could use trains for transport, or almost. Engineering work on Sundays is a fine British tradition, so that a car left at Oxted station was useful.
The early part of the walk was skillfully put together from parks, green lanes, and playing fields as we gradually worked our way out through the suburbs. In fact it was surprisingly pleasant and hilly, as would be expected with the North Downs. the route description from the website was incredibly detailed, so it took a while to get used to the idea that we were being told not just to cross a road, but where to cross it, and to press the button and wait for the green man as well.
We had lunch at the Bull at Chelsham Common, just outside Warlingham. As we got there shortly after 12 the landlord said the spuds had just gone on for the roast and we'd have to wait 40 minutes for the Sunday lunch. We said ok a bit reluctantly, but soon the landlady came over and suggested we go for ham egg and chips instead. This was a good idea and we went for it. After that we felt so happy that we had the apple pie and custard as well - rather stodgy but the real thing, and then coffee. (Not to mention 2 pints of something or other.)
I should know by now what happens to me if I walk at a pace after such a heavy lunch, and it did. There were only about 3.5 miles left to go after lunch and the first was steeply downhill. Then it was steeply uphill along a bridleway leading out of Woldingham up Greenhill Shaw and my heart began to race in familiar fashion. I slowed right down and the other two went on ahead. In the end after periodic rests I got to the top of the hill and my system settled down. My doctor told me to follow Matron's advice. No exercise for a half our after a heavy lunch, or better still a light lunch. There's nowt like an owd fool.
Glad to say the others weren't phased by my slowness, and we got up the pace again. The views across the Weald from Flint House at the end of this bridleeway were stupendous, as was the noise from the M25 at our feet.
We scrambled down the steep slope and joined the road under the motorway and into Oxted, where it seemed that the station had moved to the other end of town as we plodded along pavements to get there. Eventually fell into Chris's car and got dropped at Redhill, really happy to get home by train.
Now 20 miles nearer France, I am beginning to think if there's a more homemade way to cross from Newhaven to Dieppe than the ferry. My boat SHAMU is in Cornwall, so that's out. I wonder if a friend who is restoring a classic Hillyard in Newhaven might fancy a trip over to Dieppe sometime in 2009. Dieppe to Equiqueville is about 12 miles, so that should be do-able in a day. Worth thinking about. Next section is on 30th November and I expect it to feature a posh resturant for lunch. may need clean footwear to change into. Wonder how that will go down.
19th October 2008
The Vanguard Way is a long distance path, about 50 miles long, crossing part of London, Surrey and Sussex, between East Croydon station and Newhaven. The guys who first put the route together from a collection of local footpaths called it the Vanguard Way because they found themselves travelling back to London one day on a crowded train - in the guards van.
The group which collected at East Croydon station at 9.30 that morning was not large - only 3 of us. That meant that it wasn't necessary to book somewhere for lunch and we could use trains for transport, or almost. Engineering work on Sundays is a fine British tradition, so that a car left at Oxted station was useful.
The early part of the walk was skillfully put together from parks, green lanes, and playing fields as we gradually worked our way out through the suburbs. In fact it was surprisingly pleasant and hilly, as would be expected with the North Downs. the route description from the website was incredibly detailed, so it took a while to get used to the idea that we were being told not just to cross a road, but where to cross it, and to press the button and wait for the green man as well.
We had lunch at the Bull at Chelsham Common, just outside Warlingham. As we got there shortly after 12 the landlord said the spuds had just gone on for the roast and we'd have to wait 40 minutes for the Sunday lunch. We said ok a bit reluctantly, but soon the landlady came over and suggested we go for ham egg and chips instead. This was a good idea and we went for it. After that we felt so happy that we had the apple pie and custard as well - rather stodgy but the real thing, and then coffee. (Not to mention 2 pints of something or other.)
I should know by now what happens to me if I walk at a pace after such a heavy lunch, and it did. There were only about 3.5 miles left to go after lunch and the first was steeply downhill. Then it was steeply uphill along a bridleway leading out of Woldingham up Greenhill Shaw and my heart began to race in familiar fashion. I slowed right down and the other two went on ahead. In the end after periodic rests I got to the top of the hill and my system settled down. My doctor told me to follow Matron's advice. No exercise for a half our after a heavy lunch, or better still a light lunch. There's nowt like an owd fool.
Glad to say the others weren't phased by my slowness, and we got up the pace again. The views across the Weald from Flint House at the end of this bridleeway were stupendous, as was the noise from the M25 at our feet.
We scrambled down the steep slope and joined the road under the motorway and into Oxted, where it seemed that the station had moved to the other end of town as we plodded along pavements to get there. Eventually fell into Chris's car and got dropped at Redhill, really happy to get home by train.
Now 20 miles nearer France, I am beginning to think if there's a more homemade way to cross from Newhaven to Dieppe than the ferry. My boat SHAMU is in Cornwall, so that's out. I wonder if a friend who is restoring a classic Hillyard in Newhaven might fancy a trip over to Dieppe sometime in 2009. Dieppe to Equiqueville is about 12 miles, so that should be do-able in a day. Worth thinking about. Next section is on 30th November and I expect it to feature a posh resturant for lunch. may need clean footwear to change into. Wonder how that will go down.
Walking to Equiqueville
The walking group I belong to has kindly put me in charge as organiser for a walk of, probably, five ten mile sections which will take us on the occasional Sunday from East Croydon Station to Newhaven. In the write-up of this walk, the Vanguard Way, there is a list of connecting walks. One of these the Wandle Trail starts in Wandsworth where I live and one of the others is in France, starting at Dieppe.
This gave me the idea that I could add these extras to the Vanguard Way and actually walk between our houses in Wandsworth and Equiqueville.
Stage 1 - Wandle Trail - St. Anns Hill to East Croydon station.
19th. November 2008.
I had tried to canvas some of the group to join in this section but it's mainly of local interest, so I set off from home at 9 am and picked up the trail in St Georges Park. Some Travellers have set up home in the park and I had to struggle with old codgerly feelings about them messing up the soccer pitches with their 4wds and other, more 'live and let live' views - why shouldn't they live as they please? I decided it was best to put all this aside as I picked up the river bank. The Wandle is a surprising peaceful river considering that it is surrounded by suburbs and light industry, and was once the base of a substantial industry itself, with over 90 mills along its short length in its heyday.
I found it slightly irritating that there is no way through the railway embankment between Earlsfield and Wimbledon stations so there is a long walk down Penwith Road to Earlsfield station, which I reached half an hour after leaving home, although it is only 10 minutes walk by the direct route down Earlsfield Road. Even before reaching it I had seen parts of my borough I hadn't seen before and thoroughly appreciated the size and scope of St Georges Park.
Once past Earlsfield the trail follows between the river and the back of all sorts of industrial units but with enough green in the form of trees and grassy banks to help keep up the feeling of a rural river, well rural-ish.
After Plough Lane the trail goes along the back of the Vauxhall garage but soon becomes quite isolated for a long stretch, then though some pleasant new housing developments to reach Merton High Street and the shopping centre there.
This was the site of several important former historical enterprises. The first was built by William Morris of the Art and Crafts movement to print his famous wallpaper designs. Only a plaque commemorates this now. This was replaced by the New Merton Board Mills, probably in the 1890s. This plant was still in existence with its original machinery in 1969 when I made occasional visits there to the young man who was engaged in reorganising that company's transport fleet, Mr Joe Morgan.
His office was in a creosoted hut in the yard of the factory, where he wrangled with the question of whether a leased vehicle fleet or a wholly-owned one would be the most economic way of distributing the company's product. This product was strong cardboard. At the time new uses were being sought for it, including making furniture in modernistic 60s designs and colours, quite in keeping with the Merton tradition perhaps. I don't know if Joe solved these problems. I would be there because I had arranged a meeting in the area which would happily end at around 1230 allowing us to go off for a quick lunch in the pub.
I was there because I worked for Mr Sosnow at the time. Among our many enterprises we imported from South Africa a product called Wonderstone. It was an amazing substance - a naturally-occurring hard ceramic which could be machined and fired and had extraordinary heat and electric insulation properties. However there was only one company in the UK which could do the machining and firing, the downside of Wonderstone being that this needed very specialised skills and equipment. This company was also alongside the Wandle and opposite New Merton Board Mills. My involvement with Wonderstone caused me quite a lot of anxiety at one time, but that's another story.
Having concluded my business I would drop into Joe's shed and off we would go to lunch. This was always excessively boozy and I often made little attempt to go back to the office in Oxford Circus afterwards. It was a long way back on the Northern Line. The Emma Hamilton was the pub of choice, a reminder of Merton's other claim to fame as Emma's 'Paradise'. There is no sign of Merton Abbey where she and Nelson lived.
A little further on is Merton Abbey Mills, some buildings still standing now forming a craft market. This was the calico bleaching and printing plant of Liberty of London, where the famous Liberty print was born.
Soon after I crossed the tramway into Morden Hall Park, where we have walked occasionally, but always driven there - unaware that the best walk would be to walk TO it from home and get the tram/train back.
Ravensbury Park was next, very beautiful in the autumn sunshine. On this section of the river the water is held back by a weir and resembles a lake which is home to a lot of water birds. It was very peaceful and tranquil under the trees, impossible to believe that this is in Mitcham! Crossing London Road and the border between Merton and Sutton boroughs I stopped at the petrol station for a bottle of water and a bite to eat on the hoof. This part of the walk parallels the road we always take to get out of London to Brighton, Gatwick or Newhaven, but it seems like another world.
At Wilderness Island I took the shorter route, thereby missing Carshalton Ponds which is one of the sources of the Wandle, crossed our Brighton route at last and entered Beddington Park. This is a large well-kept open space with some lakes and the Wandle as its centrepiece. At the far end were Carew Manor (now a school) and St Mary the Virgin church, both reminders that this was not always suburbia.
After the park the rest of the route follows the river (now tiny) up to Beddington Mill where the millstream branch emerges from under the building. Just before the tunnel there is a tiny house on the opposite bank covered in flowers even in Autumn with its own tiny bridge across the stream. Fairyland among the mills.
Just before this house but on the same section was a sailing boat (about 24ft with cabin) parked on a trailer, again on the opposite bank. I tried to imagine sailing her up the Wandle - impossible - in any case she has a serviceable trailer. She looks terribly neglected, all grown over with green slimy stuff, but probably fundamentally sound. However all that is not to the purpose. What is striking is that she is the 'Pepper' out of Sausalito in California, and still carries her California boat registration number. I am so curious to know how she ends up where she is, but the explanation's probably very simple, so I won't follow it up.
Alongside Beddington Mill the other branch continues to Waddon Ponds,which is the other source of the river. Again this is a pleasant patch of green trees and grass and dark water with lots of birdlife among the factories and bungalows.
All that remains, now that there is no river to follow is to walk along the streets to East Croydon station. Although hard on the feet, there is a lot to see. The street which slopes uphill towards the station is a market area and there are traders from any country you care to mention with piles of anything you might conceivably want for sale. And best of all, it's a pedestrian street except for the trams which thread there way though the people. What a great investment this tramlink system has turned out to be. I don't know if it has paid for itself yet, but the trams are always full and the boost it has given to Croydon in terms of character and trade must be enormous.
Luckily the Caffe Nero was just before the station and I was ready to relax for a moment before getting the train back home (10 mins to Clapham Junction plus another 10 on the 77 bus). My watch said it was 1.25, so I had taken 4hrs 25 mins for the approximately 11 miles.
Got the train home, and the bus, feeling a bit stiff, but it's still a lovely sunny autumn day. As I walked in though the door someone shouted after me. It was a motorist who had been cleaning out his car by dumping the ashtray and assorted sweet wrappers in the street. He called me a 'silly old so and so'. I don't think so.
Thursday, 30 October 2008
Retrospective - Patagonia and the South Atlantic Islands
People have been interested to see again (and some for the first time) my e-mail postings from this Spring's journeys around the world.
I'm going to start by pasting the actual postings, and then add photographs, until the whole thing loooks like an untidy work in progress, which is absurd since it is already 6 months since these events took place. My only excuse is I didn't open a blog before I left.
Here goes:
January 23rd 2008 - Buenos Aires
We had a planned stopover in Sao Paulo on the way down - BA load reasons - checked into a hotel near the airport for 2 nights and decided to veg out at the hotel on the intervening day because it was wet and grey and the guide book inspite of best efforts couldn´t really suggest anything to do in Sao Paulo. In order to break the day up we walked downto a Wal Mart we could see from the hotel window. After a very short time comparing grocery prices we found the TV department. As their demo they were showing a dvd of Schreck3 and there were a couple of chairs around so we spent part of the first day of this epic trip watching Schreck in WalMart with Portuguese subtitles. That will soon be forgotten as Buenos Aires is as impressive now as ever. We have walked our feet off today visiting museums ships docks streets and a really wonderful underground train unchanged since 1914 with wooden carriages and excellent airconditioning -windows wide open. So glad that the health and safety culture has stayed well away from here. The people are still very smart like Italians and strolling around seems to be a major occupation. And of course a superb piece of beef for dinner - I won´t even try to describe it. If you´ve been here you know. We have two more days here and then off to Tierra del Fuego. No shortage of things to do here, and obviously the tango comes into it somewhere. As for other things I couldn´t help noticing that Lyndy looked a bit anxious when I discovered the national railway museum. Haven´t been to it yet. Perhaps I´ll miss out on some window shopping.
January 24th 2008 - Buenos Aires
It was good to get some encouraging feedback, and advice. Thank you, and it´s true that I forgot to mention that the red wine is excellent, with my preference being for Malbec. There won´t be enough time to try them all, sadly, but you can rely on Lyndy (and me of course) to do our best. In the old port area of La Boca are streets of brightly-painted corrugated iron houses. Apparently this started with poor immigrants using ships paint for their houses, and bits of ship, to build them, which was all there was. Now it is a lively area dedicated to visitors with cafes art shops and tango demonstrations. In spite of it being a tourist magnet it is really colourful on the people front as well, especially the tango demonstrations. There´s no doubt that the tango is really sex but standing up and wearing a hat and in public which probably makes it more elegant. On a hot afternoon in the open air just watching was quite enough, thanks. We´re so attached to the city that we´ve talked ourselves out of going on side trips, either to an estancia for more beef, or to Uruguay across the River Plate. So I´m confidently expecting to get to the railway museum tomorrow morning. I think we´ll get to an estancia when we´re ´down south´. It was hard to find Evita´s tomb in the cemetery. Its whereabouts were the professional property of the guides, so I´m afraid I can´t say whether we found it or not. However the cemetery was amazing. Each family had what amounted to a small house made from marble with angels atop, often two storeys above ground and of course a cellar with all the ancestors in it. Time for a filet mignon and a bottle of Malbec.
January 26th 2008 - Ushuaia
Have just returned to dry land after an outing on the Beagle Channel. Had not expected snow covered peaks on either side of the waterway, nor that it might be even warm. I brought my possum scarf etc for this part of the trip, and Lyndy several layers, but it´s only hot in the sun. Underlying temperature is cold. Ushuaia is the southernmost city in the world. It´s a sign of local politics here that Puerto Williams in Chile, which is even further south (on the other side of the Beagle Channel) is only the southernmost town in the world. It feels as remote as some of the distant parts of Australia, Derby or Broome say. We only arrived this morning and have already walked up to a glacier and been on the boat trip. Tomorrow we´ll take the most southerly steam train in the world up to the national park. That probably means there´s one even further south in Chile, but it´s not steam. Which reminds me that we got to the railway museum in Buenos Aires which was very interesting and needs some money spending on it. The ancient gentlemen who run it were charming and informative. Luckily for the future of this trip I only noticed that there is also a tram museum in Buenos Aires when it was too late to go to it. And Welsh Patagonia? We flew over it this morning. It would have been a long diversion to visit the El Boyo tea shop, so that´s also for another time.
January 29th 2008 - Ushuaia
When the taxi driver at the airport says ´welcome to the end of the world´ it makes you think that this may really be it. However we´ve now travelled on the train at the end of the world and we still seem to be here. Only just however after a long coastal walk yesterday - it said it was 6km but it was double that - very beautiful and lonely walk with lots of upas and downs. The far end of the walk was also the end of Ruta Nacional 3 (at that point a dirt road) 3700km from Buenos Aires and also the end of the Pan American highway10800km from Alaska. The local museum is very interesting with accounts of early settlers and their efforts to convert the local Fuegian tribes, naval excursions, shipwrecks, etc. They mention Meagellan, Drake, Bougainville, Cook, Darwin and Fitroy among the navigators, but I think they must have missed out a Belgian expedition somewhere. There are so many empty moules shells around that the Belgians must have been here. This place was a prison colony until about 1940, but is now the busy terminal for cruises to the Antarctic. we feel young compared with the cruise passengers. I haven´t been to northern Norway, but the town i`painted in bright colours which may be similar. We are leaving this afternoon for El Calafate where there are lakes and glaciers.
February 3rd 2008 - El Calafate
Two days of close visual contact with glaciers was the menu in the little but fast growing town of El Calafate on Lago Argentino, still in the very southern tip of Patagonia. And it wasn´t just visual. The noise of a glacier is extraordinary. It pops. It drips. And then it explodes, and a big chunk falls off into the lake. These glaciers - Perito Moreno and Uppsala are the biggest ones - have a leading edge like a jagged chalk cliff across a front of 2 or 3 km. The ice at the leading edge is about 300 years old. The colour of the glacier is electric blue, caused by refraction of light through the ice crystals, and the icebergs which result from the bigger explosions float serenely off down the lake like blue bears. They were big enough to overshadow the boat we were in, and there were plenty of them as the air temperature was close to 30deg. The locals don´t like the warm weather, and it must be a sign of global warming. Although Perito Moreno is growing the other glaciers are shrinking. As the all come from the same icefield higher in the mountains the calculation is that the total amount of ice is shrinking. Then a couple of days on the open road in a hire car. We went to a hiking centre called El Chalten which is the setting off point for ascents of some very spikey mountains, especially Fitzroy and St Exupery. Athough known about by Europeans for centuries they wre not climbed successfully until 1922. Lyndy and I were content to walk up to the viewpoint where suddenly the mountains and snowfields are right in front of you - about 5 hours roundtrip - there were lots of professional looking walkers at the hostel, so I felt it right to give them fraternal greetings from the ex BCal managers walking group! The road to El Chalten was paved for about half the distance - the middle part good gravel road - and the country around very brown and barren. The land seems to take in no water from the glacial lakes and streams, so we were followed by a dust trail in spite of all that water around. Half way along the gravel section was an estancia - La Leona - where we turned off for a break. It´s amazing how tea and cakes are part of the way of life in the country in Argentina - we had found the same at Harberton in Tierra del Fuego. You come in off the dusty road and there is a choice of cakes! La Leona is designated a Sitio Historico because in 1905 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid holed up here for a while after robbing a bank in Rio Gallegos. They stayed for a month which I put down to the cakes. We are now in Bariloche which looks like Lucerne or Montreux - Swiss town on lake with chalet architecture - but it´s Argentina. Last night there was a classic match on TV between Boca Junior and River Plate. RP won, but it would probably have been the same whatever happened. The fans celebrated all night and drove around the town hooting, so a bit jaded this (Sunday) morning. Think we´ll just take the cable car to get a view of the lake. After the tiny places we´ve veen in Bariloche seems too big. Off to Chile tomorrow.
February 12th 2008 - Surfers Paradise (re Chile)
It was an amazing contrast to be in the Chilean Lake Distict after the wilderness of Argentina. The landscape suddenly so rich - like the Italian lakes if like anything - and green. We crossed the border using 4 buses and 3 boats across lakes high in the mountains - beautiful scenery and a hot day but not so wild as we had hoped - there were a lot of people doing the same thing. It's peak holiday season in Chile so naturally all Santiago is in the Lakes. We drove to Chiloe - a big island south of Puerto Montt - and then up to Pucon, a very posh resort beneath the active volcano of Villarrica. Everywhere the country was green and cultivated except up the side of the volcanoes. We drove up Villarrica as far as the ski area (closed for the summer) thinking we would walk up to the crater. It was so hot that we gave up the idea - and that was just from the sun! The Lakes in Chile were an area of German settlement and some towns, like Frutillar on Lake Llaniquehue, have a very German feel, with music festivals, half timbered houses and micro breweries. Oh and of course Kuchen, particularly apfelstrudel. So Argentina has cake and Chile has Kuchen. It's also dairy country with very healthy looking cattle; and lots of fruit.
February 18th 2008 - Brisbane
A totally different Australia from any other time I've been here. Cool and rainy is not what you normally expect in Queensland in February but it beats the usual hot humid climate with everybody praying for rain. It came just on time - nobody knew what the next level of water restrictins might be but very serious. They're not relaxed yet but probably soon will be - the dams now 40% full. There is a view that this might be an El Nino effect, and that might tie up with the blazing weathger we had in normally cool parts of Chile. Anyway that's the weather - and the locals love it. We spent a few days at the beach in Currumbin near the NSW border, and even drove down as far as Byron Bay. It was a first for me to see this famous beach town - very stylish and there's also a bijou country town inland a bit called Bangalow. You can see why people like that part of the country - green and hilly with artistic communities. Last night we went to the Australian Outback Spectacular - and it was excellent. It was like going out to a good (if large) restaurant with a floor show - only the floor show in this case was a complete view of outback life including sheepdogs, a bit of history, some fantastic riding, rodeo, and Aussie wit. A great evening. Tomorrow Lyndy and I part company. My flight to South Africa leaves in the afternoon. Lyndy's family have been great as ever, so sorry to leave, but the next bit's going to be good too.
March 3rd 2008 - Saint Helena
I have managed to get hold of the only internet kiosk on the island for an hour. Sorry for the interruption in service - there was no general internet on the ship from Cape Town, and there are no mobile phones etc. That stopped mattering a long time ago as the tropical pace of life takes over (or even shipboard life which is even slower). The ship took nearly six days - everything on board was excellent (it can be measured on the scales) so it sounds grudging to say I was glad to get ashore. Eventually you felt you knew everybody on board, but it was strange that up to the last day at sea people seemed to turn up whom you hadn't seen before. So far out at sea I can't inagine how they slipped on board.
St Helena must be the most welcoming place anywhere - the people who look most like mauritians in colouring and facial features are very proud of their mixed ancestry, to which almost everybody has contributed. Mostly very fine-looking peole when young but tending to live well and get fat later, which reminds me on someone, at least the latter part. The town, Jamestown, is a small Georgian gem - beautiful peoriod houses down both sides of a broad street - but it's in a very narrow gulley so there are bare cliffs of a reddish volcanic colour behind the houses on both sides. The man street goes down to the sea, which gives some air. All the coastal areas are eroded volcanic cliffs - very few roads get to the sea and theer are no beaches. The interior of the island is very lush and green, with deep valleys and sharp peaks. Peter and I have done some excellent walks in the interior. Diana's Peak the highest point at around 800m was covered in mist when we went up on the first day. Everybody was full of admiration that we then walked back on the roads to Jamestown - got really sore and hot from going downhill on the tarmac - so we won't do that again. We have paid our respects at Napoleon's house and tomb. It all looks peaceful and tranquil now with beautiful gardens around, but the inside of Longwood House did feel like a prison. It LOOKS like a fine 18th Century house, which it is, until you notice how enclosed it feels with few windows and a damp feeling. The Briars where he first lived was better. Yesterday we did another walk - after church which everybody went to - very touching when the priest blessed all the people who were leaving the island that day to work in other places. This happens more and more - there is very little for the 4000 people her to do so they work abroad and remit money. The plan is to see all corners of the island on foot, so doing well so far. On Friday back on the ship to Ascension, then 3 days there and the fly home with the RAF. I've been away so long I can't imagine that.
March 14th 2008 - London (re Ascension Island)
Back home now. I messed up my note on Ascension by forgetting that I was using a coin-in-the-slot computer. I had writen 3 paragrapahs when the damn thing switched off. Anyway hope to see you all soon and by then should have the pics. Just briefly Ascension is mostly black or brown volcanic ash with very little growing except at the peak which is green and even had a dairy farm at one time and could still grow vegetables if there were the demand (or the initiative). It was very steep up there and often in a cloud. Two lother things were impressive - green turtles labour up the beaches to lay eggs and the hatchlings leg it for the sea some time later pursued by all sorts of predators. The other - a tiny cemetery among the black ash marked with white stones with the graves of yellow fever victims, mainly off ships working off the African coast in the 1830s to suppress slavery. the disease was caught there and the crews were quarantined at this place called Comfortless Cove, which couldn't be more appropriate. Most of the graves are from one ship HMS Bonnetta.
There should be a quiz question converning the number of large aerials and other similar structures on Ascension - The RAF, BT, C&W, USAF and other US agencies, and the Ariane project all have pieces of electronics reaching for the sky. It fries your brain - honestly.
Flew back in DC10-30 of Omni Airlines International, a US carrier on charter to the RAF - uneventful flight but the area around Brize Norton this morning looked very odd and there were far too many people everywhere.
I'm going to start by pasting the actual postings, and then add photographs, until the whole thing loooks like an untidy work in progress, which is absurd since it is already 6 months since these events took place. My only excuse is I didn't open a blog before I left.
Here goes:
January 23rd 2008 - Buenos Aires
We had a planned stopover in Sao Paulo on the way down - BA load reasons - checked into a hotel near the airport for 2 nights and decided to veg out at the hotel on the intervening day because it was wet and grey and the guide book inspite of best efforts couldn´t really suggest anything to do in Sao Paulo. In order to break the day up we walked downto a Wal Mart we could see from the hotel window. After a very short time comparing grocery prices we found the TV department. As their demo they were showing a dvd of Schreck3 and there were a couple of chairs around so we spent part of the first day of this epic trip watching Schreck in WalMart with Portuguese subtitles. That will soon be forgotten as Buenos Aires is as impressive now as ever. We have walked our feet off today visiting museums ships docks streets and a really wonderful underground train unchanged since 1914 with wooden carriages and excellent airconditioning -windows wide open. So glad that the health and safety culture has stayed well away from here. The people are still very smart like Italians and strolling around seems to be a major occupation. And of course a superb piece of beef for dinner - I won´t even try to describe it. If you´ve been here you know. We have two more days here and then off to Tierra del Fuego. No shortage of things to do here, and obviously the tango comes into it somewhere. As for other things I couldn´t help noticing that Lyndy looked a bit anxious when I discovered the national railway museum. Haven´t been to it yet. Perhaps I´ll miss out on some window shopping.
January 24th 2008 - Buenos Aires
It was good to get some encouraging feedback, and advice. Thank you, and it´s true that I forgot to mention that the red wine is excellent, with my preference being for Malbec. There won´t be enough time to try them all, sadly, but you can rely on Lyndy (and me of course) to do our best. In the old port area of La Boca are streets of brightly-painted corrugated iron houses. Apparently this started with poor immigrants using ships paint for their houses, and bits of ship, to build them, which was all there was. Now it is a lively area dedicated to visitors with cafes art shops and tango demonstrations. In spite of it being a tourist magnet it is really colourful on the people front as well, especially the tango demonstrations. There´s no doubt that the tango is really sex but standing up and wearing a hat and in public which probably makes it more elegant. On a hot afternoon in the open air just watching was quite enough, thanks. We´re so attached to the city that we´ve talked ourselves out of going on side trips, either to an estancia for more beef, or to Uruguay across the River Plate. So I´m confidently expecting to get to the railway museum tomorrow morning. I think we´ll get to an estancia when we´re ´down south´. It was hard to find Evita´s tomb in the cemetery. Its whereabouts were the professional property of the guides, so I´m afraid I can´t say whether we found it or not. However the cemetery was amazing. Each family had what amounted to a small house made from marble with angels atop, often two storeys above ground and of course a cellar with all the ancestors in it. Time for a filet mignon and a bottle of Malbec.
January 26th 2008 - Ushuaia
Have just returned to dry land after an outing on the Beagle Channel. Had not expected snow covered peaks on either side of the waterway, nor that it might be even warm. I brought my possum scarf etc for this part of the trip, and Lyndy several layers, but it´s only hot in the sun. Underlying temperature is cold. Ushuaia is the southernmost city in the world. It´s a sign of local politics here that Puerto Williams in Chile, which is even further south (on the other side of the Beagle Channel) is only the southernmost town in the world. It feels as remote as some of the distant parts of Australia, Derby or Broome say. We only arrived this morning and have already walked up to a glacier and been on the boat trip. Tomorrow we´ll take the most southerly steam train in the world up to the national park. That probably means there´s one even further south in Chile, but it´s not steam. Which reminds me that we got to the railway museum in Buenos Aires which was very interesting and needs some money spending on it. The ancient gentlemen who run it were charming and informative. Luckily for the future of this trip I only noticed that there is also a tram museum in Buenos Aires when it was too late to go to it. And Welsh Patagonia? We flew over it this morning. It would have been a long diversion to visit the El Boyo tea shop, so that´s also for another time.
January 29th 2008 - Ushuaia
When the taxi driver at the airport says ´welcome to the end of the world´ it makes you think that this may really be it. However we´ve now travelled on the train at the end of the world and we still seem to be here. Only just however after a long coastal walk yesterday - it said it was 6km but it was double that - very beautiful and lonely walk with lots of upas and downs. The far end of the walk was also the end of Ruta Nacional 3 (at that point a dirt road) 3700km from Buenos Aires and also the end of the Pan American highway10800km from Alaska. The local museum is very interesting with accounts of early settlers and their efforts to convert the local Fuegian tribes, naval excursions, shipwrecks, etc. They mention Meagellan, Drake, Bougainville, Cook, Darwin and Fitroy among the navigators, but I think they must have missed out a Belgian expedition somewhere. There are so many empty moules shells around that the Belgians must have been here. This place was a prison colony until about 1940, but is now the busy terminal for cruises to the Antarctic. we feel young compared with the cruise passengers. I haven´t been to northern Norway, but the town i`painted in bright colours which may be similar. We are leaving this afternoon for El Calafate where there are lakes and glaciers.
February 3rd 2008 - El Calafate
Two days of close visual contact with glaciers was the menu in the little but fast growing town of El Calafate on Lago Argentino, still in the very southern tip of Patagonia. And it wasn´t just visual. The noise of a glacier is extraordinary. It pops. It drips. And then it explodes, and a big chunk falls off into the lake. These glaciers - Perito Moreno and Uppsala are the biggest ones - have a leading edge like a jagged chalk cliff across a front of 2 or 3 km. The ice at the leading edge is about 300 years old. The colour of the glacier is electric blue, caused by refraction of light through the ice crystals, and the icebergs which result from the bigger explosions float serenely off down the lake like blue bears. They were big enough to overshadow the boat we were in, and there were plenty of them as the air temperature was close to 30deg. The locals don´t like the warm weather, and it must be a sign of global warming. Although Perito Moreno is growing the other glaciers are shrinking. As the all come from the same icefield higher in the mountains the calculation is that the total amount of ice is shrinking. Then a couple of days on the open road in a hire car. We went to a hiking centre called El Chalten which is the setting off point for ascents of some very spikey mountains, especially Fitzroy and St Exupery. Athough known about by Europeans for centuries they wre not climbed successfully until 1922. Lyndy and I were content to walk up to the viewpoint where suddenly the mountains and snowfields are right in front of you - about 5 hours roundtrip - there were lots of professional looking walkers at the hostel, so I felt it right to give them fraternal greetings from the ex BCal managers walking group! The road to El Chalten was paved for about half the distance - the middle part good gravel road - and the country around very brown and barren. The land seems to take in no water from the glacial lakes and streams, so we were followed by a dust trail in spite of all that water around. Half way along the gravel section was an estancia - La Leona - where we turned off for a break. It´s amazing how tea and cakes are part of the way of life in the country in Argentina - we had found the same at Harberton in Tierra del Fuego. You come in off the dusty road and there is a choice of cakes! La Leona is designated a Sitio Historico because in 1905 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid holed up here for a while after robbing a bank in Rio Gallegos. They stayed for a month which I put down to the cakes. We are now in Bariloche which looks like Lucerne or Montreux - Swiss town on lake with chalet architecture - but it´s Argentina. Last night there was a classic match on TV between Boca Junior and River Plate. RP won, but it would probably have been the same whatever happened. The fans celebrated all night and drove around the town hooting, so a bit jaded this (Sunday) morning. Think we´ll just take the cable car to get a view of the lake. After the tiny places we´ve veen in Bariloche seems too big. Off to Chile tomorrow.
February 12th 2008 - Surfers Paradise (re Chile)
It was an amazing contrast to be in the Chilean Lake Distict after the wilderness of Argentina. The landscape suddenly so rich - like the Italian lakes if like anything - and green. We crossed the border using 4 buses and 3 boats across lakes high in the mountains - beautiful scenery and a hot day but not so wild as we had hoped - there were a lot of people doing the same thing. It's peak holiday season in Chile so naturally all Santiago is in the Lakes. We drove to Chiloe - a big island south of Puerto Montt - and then up to Pucon, a very posh resort beneath the active volcano of Villarrica. Everywhere the country was green and cultivated except up the side of the volcanoes. We drove up Villarrica as far as the ski area (closed for the summer) thinking we would walk up to the crater. It was so hot that we gave up the idea - and that was just from the sun! The Lakes in Chile were an area of German settlement and some towns, like Frutillar on Lake Llaniquehue, have a very German feel, with music festivals, half timbered houses and micro breweries. Oh and of course Kuchen, particularly apfelstrudel. So Argentina has cake and Chile has Kuchen. It's also dairy country with very healthy looking cattle; and lots of fruit.
February 18th 2008 - Brisbane
A totally different Australia from any other time I've been here. Cool and rainy is not what you normally expect in Queensland in February but it beats the usual hot humid climate with everybody praying for rain. It came just on time - nobody knew what the next level of water restrictins might be but very serious. They're not relaxed yet but probably soon will be - the dams now 40% full. There is a view that this might be an El Nino effect, and that might tie up with the blazing weathger we had in normally cool parts of Chile. Anyway that's the weather - and the locals love it. We spent a few days at the beach in Currumbin near the NSW border, and even drove down as far as Byron Bay. It was a first for me to see this famous beach town - very stylish and there's also a bijou country town inland a bit called Bangalow. You can see why people like that part of the country - green and hilly with artistic communities. Last night we went to the Australian Outback Spectacular - and it was excellent. It was like going out to a good (if large) restaurant with a floor show - only the floor show in this case was a complete view of outback life including sheepdogs, a bit of history, some fantastic riding, rodeo, and Aussie wit. A great evening. Tomorrow Lyndy and I part company. My flight to South Africa leaves in the afternoon. Lyndy's family have been great as ever, so sorry to leave, but the next bit's going to be good too.
March 3rd 2008 - Saint Helena
I have managed to get hold of the only internet kiosk on the island for an hour. Sorry for the interruption in service - there was no general internet on the ship from Cape Town, and there are no mobile phones etc. That stopped mattering a long time ago as the tropical pace of life takes over (or even shipboard life which is even slower). The ship took nearly six days - everything on board was excellent (it can be measured on the scales) so it sounds grudging to say I was glad to get ashore. Eventually you felt you knew everybody on board, but it was strange that up to the last day at sea people seemed to turn up whom you hadn't seen before. So far out at sea I can't inagine how they slipped on board.
St Helena must be the most welcoming place anywhere - the people who look most like mauritians in colouring and facial features are very proud of their mixed ancestry, to which almost everybody has contributed. Mostly very fine-looking peole when young but tending to live well and get fat later, which reminds me on someone, at least the latter part. The town, Jamestown, is a small Georgian gem - beautiful peoriod houses down both sides of a broad street - but it's in a very narrow gulley so there are bare cliffs of a reddish volcanic colour behind the houses on both sides. The man street goes down to the sea, which gives some air. All the coastal areas are eroded volcanic cliffs - very few roads get to the sea and theer are no beaches. The interior of the island is very lush and green, with deep valleys and sharp peaks. Peter and I have done some excellent walks in the interior. Diana's Peak the highest point at around 800m was covered in mist when we went up on the first day. Everybody was full of admiration that we then walked back on the roads to Jamestown - got really sore and hot from going downhill on the tarmac - so we won't do that again. We have paid our respects at Napoleon's house and tomb. It all looks peaceful and tranquil now with beautiful gardens around, but the inside of Longwood House did feel like a prison. It LOOKS like a fine 18th Century house, which it is, until you notice how enclosed it feels with few windows and a damp feeling. The Briars where he first lived was better. Yesterday we did another walk - after church which everybody went to - very touching when the priest blessed all the people who were leaving the island that day to work in other places. This happens more and more - there is very little for the 4000 people her to do so they work abroad and remit money. The plan is to see all corners of the island on foot, so doing well so far. On Friday back on the ship to Ascension, then 3 days there and the fly home with the RAF. I've been away so long I can't imagine that.
March 14th 2008 - London (re Ascension Island)
Back home now. I messed up my note on Ascension by forgetting that I was using a coin-in-the-slot computer. I had writen 3 paragrapahs when the damn thing switched off. Anyway hope to see you all soon and by then should have the pics. Just briefly Ascension is mostly black or brown volcanic ash with very little growing except at the peak which is green and even had a dairy farm at one time and could still grow vegetables if there were the demand (or the initiative). It was very steep up there and often in a cloud. Two lother things were impressive - green turtles labour up the beaches to lay eggs and the hatchlings leg it for the sea some time later pursued by all sorts of predators. The other - a tiny cemetery among the black ash marked with white stones with the graves of yellow fever victims, mainly off ships working off the African coast in the 1830s to suppress slavery. the disease was caught there and the crews were quarantined at this place called Comfortless Cove, which couldn't be more appropriate. Most of the graves are from one ship HMS Bonnetta.
There should be a quiz question converning the number of large aerials and other similar structures on Ascension - The RAF, BT, C&W, USAF and other US agencies, and the Ariane project all have pieces of electronics reaching for the sky. It fries your brain - honestly.
Flew back in DC10-30 of Omni Airlines International, a US carrier on charter to the RAF - uneventful flight but the area around Brize Norton this morning looked very odd and there were far too many people everywhere.
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