Almost every one of my trips to London ends here. Now and again I might leave in a different direction, but mostly it’s on one of the half-hourly Leeds services: we all watch the departures board over there, to see if this will be one of those times where LNER give us all more than about eight minutes’ notice. (Today, they did.)
Anyone prepared to do some detective work, based on the evidence of the road sign in the background, could perhaps work out where this was taken and maybe even the service on which we were travelling. But I’m sure for a summer Friday afternoon, this is too much to trouble with.
There are many worse ways, and places, to spend a Thursday. Taken from the Howtown to Pooley Bridge ‘pleasure steamer’ service, following a good walk up Place Fell; soon to be duly recorded on the Wainwrights blog.
My summer holiday has finally started, and being the type of person that I am, I went exploring, going to Dudley in the West Midlands largely because it was somewhere I had never been before, with not just one but two County Tops (report to follow). And it gave me the chance to walk 1.7 miles, more or less (2,776m according to the sign at the entrance) under ground, through the Netherton Tunnel, which accommodates a branch line of the huge Birmingham canal network, and was the last major canal tunnel ever built in Britain, opened in 1858.
This was taken as I approached the south entrance, which for me was the exit. A bit damp, but by no means an unpleasant experience, though the distant sound of many voices screaming that reverberated down the tunnel towards me for a few minutes — either a school sports day, or the tortured souls of Hell — was a little eerie.
Don’t read the time from the light here. Victoria station is much improved from twenty years ago, when I first started using it, but platforms 3-6 are still mere warrens, skulking under the overhead bulk of the Arena. Dark holes in which one can wait a while to find out if they’re running your service today.
I’ve lived on this road for nearly twenty-two years now. Look at its characteristics narrow, steep uphill, winding course, and the residents have nowhere else to park cars other than on the side. It’s manifestly unsuited for huge container lorries — not to mention the fact that on the other side of the hill (namely Oxenhope), all the characteristics are repeated. Yet still they come, waving a sat-nav as evidence of their rights. And then we wonder why it needs repairing every few years.
I’m back in Cambridge, one of Britain’s foremost centres of academic excellence, which, clearly, is why I’m here (yeah yeah). It’s proving difficult to present photos of this place that don’t have punts in them — this is the third (after my visits in January 2016 and November 2016 respectively). But it looks a nice way to travel and certainly pulls in the tourists. The metal bridge is something of a harsh contrast but that’s deliberate.
In terms of its aesthetics I quite like Blackburn station — at least at platform level (the subway below has been choked by excessive and largely non-functional ticket machines, though). The clutter of modern life throws off the symmetry of this shot but I gave it a go.
A trip out to the furthest south-western extremity of the British Isles (assuming we treat Ireland as separate) — namely the Isles of Scilly, a hundred or so lumps of granite stuck thirty miles off Land’s End, of which five are inhabited. The ‘capital’, Hugh Town, is located on St Mary’s island, and built on a narrow isthmus, which is apparent here thanks to the houses having blue sea behind them as well as in front, which is why I chose this picture — that, and the profusion of coloured things (buoys?) in the sea.
That’s one of the harder-to-reach County Tops bagged as well. There were lots of photos from the day I could have chosen to give an impression of this distant part of my country, but see the other blog for more.
And here’s what more-or-less the same part of the world looks like in the morning — pointing the camera in the opposite direction. Seems an OK place, Penzance — attractive, plenty of pubs — but it’s a long way out, and typical incomes in Cornwall are among the lowest in the whole UK. Being peripheral is not an economic asset these days: but the thing is, in some ways this is the centre of things. More on that tomorrow (if I remember).
Being 42 