I bet you thought you were going to see pictures of Big Ben, Buckingham Palace and the usual boring tourist icons from London. Well, surprisingly enough, there's a lot of Britain that's actually outside of London.
I went to London in March to see my parents whom I had not been able to see in seven years. While I was there, I tried to resurrect my old PC to get them online so that they could send me emails and possible do video Skype with me across the Atlantic. Sadly, I failed. It was simply too elderly. The 4 gigabyte hard drives are totally laughable these days as terrabyte hard drives are now standard. It reminds me of what the computer technician in college once said, holding up a 40 megabye hard drive that was very heavy and quite large. He said "in ten years this will be the size of a postage stamp and will contain ten times the memory". How right he was.
 |
| Local vegetation - Gorse. |
Now this is a plant that grows wild. I wasn't there in time to capture photographs of the flowering Foxgloves. Now the foxgloves are what I gather they make heart medicine from. Their Latin name is Digitalis or something similar. This, however, is gorse. This plant grows into thick bushes and has green triangular spine-like leaves. It is not something you want to encounter as it is very sharp. It's not as sharp as rose thorns but you certainly don't want to fall in it. Having said that, I fell into a big bush of this when I went skydiving. I went into it at about 40mph but because it was so darned springy, I bounced and emerged unscathed bar the fact I was picking gorse spines out of my skin for months.
 |
| The marsh |
Not far from where my parents live is an area of marshland. Most of it is owned by a combination of the local farmers and the local water company. It's covered at high tide with seawater. The horses that live there are the descendants of the old pit ponies from the old mines in the area. When the mines were closed, the ponies were turned out to roam.
That marsh has an interesting history. During the second world war, it was a test-firing range for experimental munitions. After the war, a lot of old munitions were just dumped there. Most have become inactive now though every now and then, there's a bang as a horse treads on one and sets it off. Perhaps more darkly, there are anthrax pits on that marsh. During the war, experiments were made with anthrax bombs. These were buried on the marsh but exactly where is now long forgotten.
 |
| Bus shelter |
Getting around Britain involved using public transport. I was there pretty much solely to spend time with my parents. I did get out a few times though. This is a bus shelter and this particular bus shelter is brand new. There was originally a concrete shelter that had a little window through which you could see an approaching bus and another bigger window that allowed more light in. Neither was glazed. There was a nice wooden bench inside and people could shelter from the rain while waiting for their bus. It used to be quite pleasant. Sadly though as more people began to use cars, the less social elements began to congregate there. Eventually the bench was removed in order to make it less attractive to the antisocial elements. Then the front wall was removed to make it open to the world. Finally, it was demolished and replaced with the above metal and plastic window structure.
As a child I wrote on the wall of that bus shelter - in chalk that "Mairock loves Abigail" to annoy another boy in my class whose nickname was "Mairock". Anyway, that graffiti ended up remaining on that wall for 20 years before the shelter was demolished. "Mairock" meanwhile went off and joined the RAF regiment and was a Military Policeman. He had the distinction of being in Berlin when the wall came down.
 |
| The old dock |
Around the back of the bus shelter is a listed earthwork. There was an old dock here that was simply dug out of the marsh. An old canal went right along the dock close to where the ships would have berthed. It's almost all filled in now and hard to see.
 |
| Horse on the cyclepath |
As you can see - this is a horse. It is one of the wild horses from the marsh. Somehow it has climbed over the fence or got through a gate that somebody has left open. The farmer has a full-time job to keep the fence erect and the gates all closed. It's walking along the cyclepath that runs along a former railway-line. That line was closed sometime in the 1950s which was a shame. After that went and the pits closed, there was nothing really in the area for people to do so the whole area became a dormitory for the nearby city. Unemployment skyrocketed and crime became a major problem.
 |
| New business |
I wandered around my old haunts. On one of them, a new business seems to have sprung up. It's a commercial greenhouse though what they're growing I'm not entirely sure. I did meet the people and they were very nice. They did tell me what they were growing but sadly I have forgotten. They invited me to wander around but I had my city shoes on and didn't want to get them too dirty. I'm afraid I have become more of a city-boy since I came to America.
 |
| Old and new industry |
The old brick pillar in the middle of the image is one of the pillars that used to support a railway line. The vegetation to the right is covering another such pillar. Apparently that line was used to transport waste from a colliery a mile or so to the right to dump on the left of the image. This whole area has layers of history going back thousands of years. Not far away it's possible to fine collapsed iron-age bell-mines. I'm not sure what the metallic structure on the left is but it is part of a modern development.
 |
| Recycling in action |
To some, this might appear to be a bath just dumped in a field. In actual fact this is an old cast-iron bath that is now being used as a water trough for the farmer's sheep. In Wales, we're practical like this. It might not look pretty but it has function.
 |
| Bus timetable |
On most bust stop signs and most bus shelters in Britain, there is a timetable posted of when the busses will be stopping. It's really quite useful and they seem to be embracing modern technology with text messaging too.
 |
| Bus timetable |
As can be seen here, there is no Sunday nor any public holiday service and the bus schedule is very limited. It starts about when most people have to go to work and stops just after most people finish work. If you do a mid-shift then you're out of luck as are night-shift workers. This sign like most in Wales is bilingual in both Welsh and English.
 |
| Old WW2 building |
This is an old WW2 building. There are many in the area. This is the only one I could get to easily to take a photograph in my city shoes. I had been an avid photographer when I was in Britain but since arriving in America, I went digital. I doubt I could now even get the film and batteries that my old film cameras used. I did consider selling them but the prices I'd get for them is now so low that I will just keep them as memorabilia. I'm talking in the region of pennies for what I paid hundreds for.
As it was only a flying visit to Britain and as I spent so much time with my parents, I didn't get out much to take many photos. These are the highlights though. I will be back.
Comments
Post a Comment