The old year and the new

2nd January 2014.

Having suffered the death of a daughter in law in March it was our misfortune to have the remaining d.i.l suffer a boating accident which resulted in serious injury to one leg and ankle requiring difficult and clever surgery.   That has been done and she is back at work, driving too but walking with a slight limp at present, another few weeks and she will be back to normal but carrying some extra weight around one ankle.    We were not the only ones to suffer a death, my old friend Michael P had a son in law die shortly before Christmas, his family will have to come to terms with that as we are.
The proposed meeting of old scouts took place with one member of the youth club attending, thank you Sylvia.   We now have to try to assemble a few more but the difficulty is that at our age people die off or become infirm or move away long distances.

Meanwhile I wish you all a happy and prosperous New Year and above all else a healthy one.

Still alive

For those of you desperate to know why I have not posted for a long while the reason is that I have not had a lot to say.   Life has not proceeeded normally and the serious illness of our beloved daughter in law, followed by her recent death has upset the whole family but we are now slowly coming to terms with having to  live without her .   She had been a family member for some 30+ years and that is a long time.

That said I have re-connected with a friend of my teenage years, Michael P and we have met up a couple of times recently not having seen each other since 1953.   He has had his problems, like the rest of us but we have decided to have a reunion meeting of as many as possible of the boy scouts we knew in 1944-50.

As part of this reunion which is scheduled to take place in Church of the Ascension, Hanger Hill, Ealing on Saturday 19th October 2013 at about noon I am writing to as many old boys as possible and as an act of unbounded generosity we are including WAGs and girls (now ladies over 75 but as lovely as ever) from Mrs Willments youth club from the same era.

If you are interested and want to come along please leave a message on

cryogenic@clara.net

Good luck to you all.

Back Again

November 28. Having spent some 4 hours in Clubland meeting a friend from my teens and twenties I decided to walk across the park to Lambeth to have a look at my birthplace. This involved another trip over my river, walking from Big Ben over Westminster Bridge to Lambeth. By chance whilst near Pall Mall I dropped in to the Stephen Wiltshire Gallery and bought a post card showing the bridge from the air. This artist has made some amazing views of parts of London as well as many 'Cityscapes', mainly black and white they are not everyone's cup of tea but well worth viewing on his web site.
My birthplace, St. Thomas's Hospital has changed a bit in 83 years and the record I wanted is either destroyed or with London Metropolitan Archives. It is just over 3 years since I was by Westminster Bridge and little has changed except a cabin is missing in 'The London Eye' and a piper, bagpiper that is, was playing on the bridge, it was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey but he played on.

Return to SONNING on Thames

Sunday 3rd July 2011.
This was a place where EG and I stayed one night, very old pub but we missed our way leading to an extra 10 minutes walk and I wanted to find out why. Instead of going up the path top left in int right hand picture, we SHOULD have turned left and the pub was about 20 yards ahead. Note the brick wall going off right, it was built from bombed out bricks taken from east London in 1945
You can see the pub above. It is one of the few pubs to be owned by the nearby church. This is because it dates back to about 1300 and was then the lodging house for some visitors calling on the Bishop of Salisbury who lived in a palace about 200 yards away. He later transferred his residence to Salisbury and the palace became a ruin. Just like that!
Sonning was at one time recently the home of the Palmer family, as in Huntley and Palmers biscuits. The palace site is now a school.
The walk along the river in the wrong direction was quite pleasant, far too many people for peace but if you go out on a Sunday you have to expect that.
We had a large lunch at the pub, The Bull, very satisfying, i recommend it but tall people (over 5ft6) should watch out for the low ceilings.

Return to THE RIVER

11th June 2011
M and I returned to The Olde Bell Inn at Hurley, Berks where E and I had eaten some 3 years ago. Another delightful day and VERY good food taken indoors after a walk down to the lock and along the riverside for about 1/2 a mile. A really lovely place to spend some easy time, the only road in the village leads to the river so there is little traffic, only 2 shops and not many houses so again little traffic although this day there was a wedding at the church (dating back to 633 AD in places) with the recption at The Olde Bell. A nearby house (Lady Place) is said to have been a US Intelligence HQ in WW2, a house next to the Inn was used by The Prince of Wales (later Edward VII,NOT to-day's Prince Charles) to meet a 'friend'.
Whilst walking beside the river came across a chestnut tree recently fallen, one that Edie hid behind no doubt.
If you go to the pub/inn try the green pea soup flavoured with Loveage, it turns a dull dish into a winner.

Change of plan

Since my last post almost a year ago many things have happened and EG and I are now investigating the idea of motor boating up the Thames using friends as drivers while we walk most of the day. This has the advantage that the non walkers get a chance to learn how to negotiate the 40 or so locks whilst we get as much exercise as we want and when necessary can call on help from the water bourne people. I have suffered a simple but painful injury whilst EG's friend suffered some sort of fainting trauma resulting in everyone seeing sense and giving up Coast to Coast until the males are fully fit again.
This photo was taken with friends visiting Ephesus and has no connection with Old Father Thames or EG

Back to Old Father Thames

Yesterday, 26th February I revisited the source of the Thames, the point was to see the source when the spring was operating as a spring, in 2008 when EG and I were there the source was dry so I believed that there would be running water because there has been several days of heavy rain.

To make it more interesting I decided to appraoach from the west by stopping at a pub near Sapperton and walking along the disused Severn to Thames Canal for a mile to Trewsbru then dropping across fileds to my destination. The ground was soggy, very soggy and it was hard going but when I got there total disappointment, no water, not even a puddle so I took a few photos and returned to The Tunnel pub to finish my lunch. It has been said that it was only in the 19th Century that Thames Head became known as the Thames source and some consider that this was because there was an artificial spring created from water leaking out of the canal. Those interested should refer to the Cotswold Canal Trust website.

New walking route

Got going about 4pm with a pacemaker thing to indicate my number of steps and new socks, specially made for snowboarders, 'made of wool' said the guy in the shop, when I got in I looked carefully, 8%wool, 59% synthetic, 33% cotton. But they fitted and did me wll for my trial walk which involved an extended walk across fields to a road I know followed by 600 yards as a pedestrian with no footpath, sidewalk or escapes. I survived but I did not like it and must find a better route. 8500 steps, 5.4 miles according to my pedometer, 1 hour 10 minutes, something is wrong there and it is because I have the pace length wrongly set. On flat even ground I can do about 30 inch pace but going up a 45% hill it can be down to 12". Sunday to-morrow, just a dander.

Pre-Plannig

The first steps towards pre-planning Have started, I now have Wainwrghts book and 2 Ordnance survey maps. Some of those hills look quite steep, in many cases over 25% gradient which seems to me on a par with going up Snowdon or Ben Nevis. I managed those without difficulty but of course it was only one mountain in a day, for this walk there will be two or three in a day but Wainwright does a good job in setting out the route with some explanation of what is going on around, however to judge from the DVD made with him the man did not try to do the walk on a continuous basis. By chance I have met up with a lad in the climbing gear shop who plans to be doing the C2C with his father later in the year and I had a long discussion with him about buying a GPS. Four hundred quid seems a lot for a piece of equipment to be used for one trip only, against that must be set the possibility that it could be a life saver following a simple accident. I shall take my car SatNav out for a few trial walks, not quite so convenient but we shall see.

This is the end of the first week of February and I have been walking for an hour or so most days in oto get a suitable fitness level for my next serious walking trip with my Thames companion EG, we are planning to do Wainwrights Coast to Coast walk, St Bee's Head to Robin Hood Bay walking whenever possible on footpaths rather than hard surface. Distance is about 195 miles and since this is serious up and down hill walking the present plan is for about 6 miles per day with the intention of looking at the countryside as well as the marvels of nature. Six miles does not seem much but it can be rough walking and the weather can vary from glorious to blooming horrible. So far I have done no serious planning, such important details as where to stay and how to move luggage have to be thought about and decided. The current plan is that there will be 4 of us walking and we may have a back up pair to deal with luggage moving. There are complications, EG has serious illness in the family, one of the other 2 has a foot difficulty, the other is a busy lady and 30 days away from serious office work may not be possible.

Unknown

Nothing to say at present but just want to keep the blog open

Clifton Hampden Bridge

The door is of the church note the two carved faces and the ornate ironwork on what is essentially a modern door. It is a legal requirement that notices are pinned to THE DOOR which is a bit destructive of the woodwork and this parish council has decided on a sensible notice board. The picture of the bridge was taken from the church

Clifton Hampden

I have already revisited Cricklade, Lechlade and Henley on Thames but on 14th March 2009 went to Abingdon to look around the town the EG and I whizzed by. It turns out the town is one of the oldest in England. We, Maggy and I, had lunch at a pub on a midstream island then went on the Clifton Hampden, particularly to see the church redesigned by the father of Giles Gilbert-Scott who also did the bridge. This picture shows a seriously refurbished cottage in the village, if you go back you can see what it was like last August. Note the boards forming the sidewalk just to right of centre, they aree for pedestrians to walk on during a flood, my guess is the cottage floods too.

In the train going back to Richmond

We got a train from Charlton to Waterloo then another to Richmond, had a good clean up and went out for a celebratory dinner.
The next day EG went up north to friends prior to flying to Nice?
We met her on her return to London and took her out to dinner at her Heathrow hotel for her 60th birthday.

It now needs EG to write her story but that is a while off, she has problems at home which are much more important.
Good luck Sis, you were a super companion all the time, I could not have wished for anyone better.

Mission accommplished

You can see the shape of the housing for the motors on the left. EG has a smile as wide as the river, I fear I ws a bit pooped but Maggie was there to greet us....not the Queen, not the TV, not even a friend but that is the way it goes. EG was disappointed that there was no mug or T shirt on sale for people like us who had done the whole trip so unbeknown to her I had a T shirt specially printed with an outline of the river plus her picture and mine.

You will remember that we had to divert outside Oxford and two weeks later I went back there and walked the missed 2 miles, EG had to return to USA and did not make it but when she is over next we will do it together.

Was it worth it? YES, YES, YES.

Would you do it again? Perhaps, but not at breakneck speed, there is just too much to see so close to the river that you could spend days around the London Bridge area alone.
I shall soon be giving a list of books to read and some words about where to stay, meanwhile, Thank you for staying with me.

We made it

This tunnel takes the path across the barrier control systems to parkland on the other side

Modern art...the barrier

The modern art looked like a mess of wire and that could be said of the Millenium Dome project.
The other picture is our first sight of The Barrier, it looks a little like a series of hoods straddling the river.
The Dome was built on the site of an old gas works (vide Brentford) to be a large exhibition hall in south London which had needed one since 1934 when The Crystal Palace was burned down. The Dome was inspired by The Government and as with so many Governmental ideas it went wrong from the start and although finished on time the cost overruns were staggering and then no one could be found to operate the place as intended. That problem has been solved to some extent by having an exhibition arena and associated shopping precincts.

Looking backwards upriver and economically

A large notice stated we must take instructions from the crane operator. Who would argue with that bucket liable to drop half a ton of gravel on you?
It is sad to think that what was once a very thriving industrial area is now either derelict or used for recreational purposes. As a student in 1951 I was walking on the adjacent ground watching real men 'spin' 2" steel plate into saucer shaped dishes 8ft diameter for use in all sorts of pressure vessels to go around the world.
What would Shakespeare have said?

Back side of Greenwich

It is a well laid path, pity about the fencing on the right, however we trundles along, missing the path at one place because the temporary signage was only obvious to those going in the reverse direction.

Trafalfar Tavern, Greenwich

We got a good last supper at the Trafalgar and got going on the last few miles to The Barrier. The Trafalgar is at the edge of a piazza with The Cutty Sark, a windjammer and Lively Lady a yacht sailed round the world solo by the late Sir Francis Chichester. He was knighted by the Queen when he got back to Greenwich, all very symbolic, she used the sword used by Queen Elizabeth I to knight either Walter Raleigh or Francis Drake. Francis Chichester was no mug, he had been flying pre 1939 and knew his way round the worlds of aviation an sailing. About two years later an upmarket greengrocer from Portsmouth with no experience of the seas beyond the English Channel decided to repeat Chichester's feat and he did. He was knighted too, perhaps his was the greater feat, long live Sir Alex Rose, (now dead). After that the word went out that there would be no more gongs for feats of endurance and skill. In fact two have since gone to women for sailing skills.
So off we go, one last great effort to reach our destination.