Wow! After such a long spell of absolutely perishing weather we’ve actually had a day where the temperature made it into double figures at the right end of the thermometer! Being able to walk without being swaddled in scarves, hats and gloves made an extremely pleasant change – as did the fact the heavy rain we’d had the other day had washed almost all of the snow away and the day stayed dry. One was almost tempted to believe Spring may be on the way but it’s going to take more than one day of mild weather to convince me of that. Even so, I’m beginning to think it might be time to fettle the front garden and clear up the garden bench in the hope that we can spend less time cooped up indoors…
Still, whilst we are, I have plenty to keep me occupied. I’ve a stack of articles to write and pictures to scan. One of the latest batch forms today’s picture. I took this shot of the Albert Bridge in London on the 14th January 2001 which was a crisp clear winter’s day with some glorious low winter sunshine. The Albert Bridge is of a rather unique design, although it’s been modified a couple of times since it opened in 1873. Along with Tower Bridge to the East it shares the distinction of being one of only two Thames road bridges that have never been replaced.
Seen here from the North Bank of the Thames, the slender Albert Bridge is an attractive and graceful structure.
When I’ve finished editing the newest scans from London later this week you’ll be able to find them in this gallery on my Zenfolio picture library website.
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
Sorry folks, it’s been an odd day so there’s no preamble (or ramble) from me today. There’s just a picture instead. This is one from the latest batch of slide scans. I took it on the 15th December 2000 from Greenwich Park in London, looking across to the burgeoning blocks of Canary Wharf where the new city was rising. Strange to think how confident and outward looking the UK seemed in those days – long before the introspection and madness of Brexit.
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Well, the year may be in its final phase but it’s finally taken a turn for the better. OK, apart from the weather which remains resolutely crap here up in the Pennines, but after the warm glow from last week knowing that the orange shit-gibbon has been ousted in the USA we’ve now had the good news that a vaccine for Covid could be ready before the end of the year. Needless to say, the financial markets reacted very positively as businesses have been given the hope that normality may be resumes sooner rather than later. How all this may come to pass is speculative at the moment, but after a constant battering from bad news, it’s good to hear some optimism for once.
My day’s been spent holed up at home, knuckling down in order to get the last album of old rail slides scanned before the end of the week, thus ending a process that’s taken decades. I’m trying to get them done before Friday as that’s the day we’ve completed our self-isolating and are free to venture out again – so we’re going to make the most of it – whatever the weather!
Today’s picture has been chosen from one of today’s scans as it’s a view that’s changed completely since it was taken. This is a view of Battersea power station with the approaches to London Victoria in the foreground. I took it on the 25th February 2001.
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
Today’s hardly been the most exciting of times. Instead, it’s been one spent glued to a computer screen in order to add 250 plus pictures from my recent travels onto my Zenfolio picture website. They fall into all sorts of categories (rail, travel, shipping and the building of High-Speed 2) so if you want to gave a browse and find out which galleries they’ve been added to – follow this link. I’ve also used my time to email out the latest batch of winning bids on eBay, I’ll be restocking my site with a lot more old pictures and railway memorabilia this weekend, but there’s still a few hundred pictures and badges remaining from the last batch. Here’s a sample.
Unfortunately, the weather here in the Calder Valley’s not particularly conducive to great photography right now, but I’m hoping to get out and about to get some pictures this week before the clocks go back and the day get too short for travelling for – that’s if we’re even allowed to…
So, without further ado – here’s today’s picture, which I took one bright spring morning way back in March 2001 whilst I was walking through Green Park in London. The building behind those park gates is Buckingham Palace…
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
I’m currently on my way back to West Yorkshire after escaping the latest London ‘lockdown’ as I stayed over in the capital after my trip to the isle of Wight – or ‘littler Britain’ as it could be called. To be honest, it was a lovely trip with perfect weather and a blog about the unique Isle of Wight railway will follow later in the week. In the meantime, here’s a taster. This was the view from my hotel window yesterday morning. We couldn’t have asked for better weather either!
What was also good about the break was that it was planned just before the latest local and national shutdowns were introduced, as it may be some time before we can do such a thing again – because I have no trust in the Government to come up with anything resembling a coherent strategy to deal with Covid. It reminds me of the anarchic 1970s American sit-com ‘Soap’ where the trailer for each episode would include a plot recap and end with the words “Confused? You will be – after the next episode of Soap!” – only in this case substitute Government briefings for Soap…
Leaving London was weird. I stayed in Clapham so wandered down to the Junction to get a train into the city. I’ve never seen the place so quiet on a Saturday. It was the same when I caught the Northern line tube from Waterloo to Euston. This picture was taken on my train between Charing Cross and Leicester Square which is normally on of the busiest parts of the route on a Saturday as its teeming with tourists who don’t realise how close together the two stations are and the fact it’s far nicer to walk!
At Euston I took time to have a look at progress on the High Speed 2 (HS2) railway work around the station and the ridiculous and totally ineffective ‘protection’ camp in nearby Euston Gardens. You’ll be able to find the pictures in this gallery in the next 24 hours.
Right now I’m heading back (stage by stage) up the West Coast main line via LNW trains. Sadly, the weather’s nowhere near as good as it was in the Isle of Wight, but even so, I’ve managed to get some useful library shots and hope to get more when I reach Manchester. Leaving London the trains were very quiet but the further we get from the capital the more people are joining us. Even so, the numbers are abysmal compared to pre Covid levels.
16:38.
After changing trains at Crewe I’m now on my wat to Manchester. Crewe was eerily deserted. The new lockdowns are obviously taking their toll on passenger numbers which had grown over the past few months as restrictions were relaxed. Sadly, as I’ve headed further North I’ve seen more people (almost all young) ignoring the regulations on mask wearing. You can easily spot the stereotype they conform to. Either young girls made up to the nines or ‘chavvy’ young men, both too arrogant and ignorant to consider others.
18:10.
I’ve just walked across central Manchester from Piccadilly to Victoria stations, which was an instrutive experience. The city centre was busier than parts of London! The majority of folks out and about were young and the pubs were doing a steady trade. One thing I noticed was couples where the woman was wearing a mask but the man wasn’t. Is this some bizarre macho thing? On the plus side, more people of all ages were masked as they walked around compared to a month or two ago – so the message is getting through – albeit slowly. Another thing I noticed was more folk up North use disposable masks whilst in the South the pattern is for people to have washable ones where they can also express some dress sense or individuality through the patterns and designs.
Watching people’s behaviour makes me think we’re not going to be out of the Covid woods for some time yet. How much damage it will cause economically, socially and healthwise in the meantime is a question I don’t think anyone can answer.
Sitting on my 3-car train from Manchester to Halifax I can’t help noticing it’s busier than many trains I’ve used today- but then it’s half the size! Even so, there do seem to be more folk travelling in the North.
20:00.
Home again! Now it’s time for me to relax and put my feet up before sorting and editing the hundreds of pictures I’ve taken over the past few days and getting them on my Zenfolio website. Here’s one last taster. Whilst I was at Clapham Junction I caught one of SouthWestern Railways new Bombardier built Class 701 trains out on test. The company has 60 ten-car and 30 five car trains on order which are intended to replace their old BR built fleets. Only they’re late. Very late – and they’re proving troublesome – so when they’ll actually enter service is anyone’s guess right now.
701002 approaches Clapham Junction on its way to London Waterloo. This was the first set to be delivered by Bombardier in June 2020. The whole fleet of 750 vehicles was meant to have been in service by the end of 2020. To date, none have entered public use.
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
Talk about trying to keep too many plates spinning! At the moment I’m constantly swapping between jobs. Trying to keep my (financial) head above water and get articles written, pictures on my website or stuff on eBay and at the same time maintain a home-life whilst trying to keep fit! I’m not the only one of course – and I admire all those people who can do this whilst also looking after a young family (a cat’s enough for me), so excuse me whilst I have a 1st world whinge! That’s when perspective kicks in, isn’t it? You see your own little problems then look around at others and think – wow! I thought I was keeping plates spinning…
As I’ve not been occupied writing today and the weather’s been crap I’ve had time for a spot of decluttering. I’d forgotten how much stuff I’ve had packed away in boxes that hasn’t seen the light of day for decades. It’s those 1st world problems again – we hoard so much crap nowadays – because we can. We have that luxury, which is why when you’re travelling nowadays you pass so many old shipping container farms set up purely to store people’s surplus crap that they’ve run out of space for but refuse to let go of. At this stage of my life I’m trying to take a much more Buddhist approach to these things and letting stuff go. After all – I can’t take it with me…
The memories and experiences I want to want to keep I’m gradually digitizing – for two simple reasons. They’re portable and they don’t take up any space and one day I hope to be able to use much of what I keep in my writing. There’s certainly a few stories to tell when I have time but the ‘chunky’ stuff can go. Mind you, sifting through the ephemera from the best part of 50 years of one’s life can really take you back. Here’s one thing I found today…
Don’t try and draw too many conclusions from the ticket. The next year I was at the (in)famous Stranglers open air gig in Battersea Park!
Meanwhile, here’s the picture of the day, which is about the future, not the past and about how much the world’s changed in my lifetime. I took this picture of North Greenwich and Canary Wharf in London from the Emirates cable car traversing the Thames on the 20th November 2019.
I remember this area before any of this was built. I moved to East London in 1986 and lived just up the road in Bromley-by-Bow. I watched what was formerly derelict docks transformed into everything you see here – and the city of London beyond, which you can see to the right. The capital’s skyline’s still changing. I left a decade ago and there’s parts I struggle to recognise now! Will that rate of change start to slow now that we’ve cut ourselves off politically and economically from Europe – time will tell…
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
Cor! You can really start feeling the seasons change right now, especially up here in the Pennines. The autumnal nip in the air was very pronounced today and the the leaves are turning into some beautiful colours in our local woodlands. It’ll soon be time to dig my camera out…
Apart from an an afternoon constitutional I’ve spent the day trapped at home writing and catching up on various chores – including packing a large selection of old slides that I’ve sold on eBay which needed dispatching to customers around the country. With us freelances having suffered so badly during Covid the income from sales like this has helped keep the wolf from the door. I’m certainly grateful for having the supplemental source of income – and it clears out a cupboard! Hopefully, with a busy day at home tomorrow the decks will be cleared for some free time as Dawn and I have planned to escape the Calder valley and head to the coast this weekend – if only for a day trip. Whilst I’ve been lucky enough to have travelled around the UK for work recently, poor Dawn has been stuck (landlocked) since before lockdown, so I know the sight of the sea will be a welcome break.
OK, let’s move on to the picture of the day, which isn’t from any exotic beach of far-flung corner of the globe. It’s from London, and for anyone who knows the city well it encapsulates the changing skyline of the capital and just how much it’s changing. I took this picture before lockdown, on the 25th February in fact.
The four iconic chimneys give this building away as being the old Battersea power station on the South bank of the Thames. Having been derelict and gutted for decades it’s now disappearing behind a spiders-web of cranes and new apartment blocks as the abandoned railway yards that surrounded it are converted into a a luxury housing complex that will mostly be bought by foreign investors. Well, that was the plan. Will it still come to fruition? Time will tell…
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us freelances need all the help that we can get. Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs (including this one) can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
So much for Sunday being a day of rest! With Dawn being on her ‘virtual retreat’ we were up at 06:30 and prepped and out walking shortly after 07:00! Our timing was perfect as the weather here in the Calder Valley has been awful for most of the day. By getting out early we escaped the drizzle and later heavy rain that’s persisted right through until the evening.
After our amble down to Sowerby Bridge and home via the canal I’ve spent the day in holed up in the office having a marathon slide scanning session. I’ve hit a personal best as I’ve refined my systems and managed to get 88 slides scanned, edited and added to my Zenfolio website. Admittedly, I now have square eyes, but it’s been a productive day. I rarely use my new scans as pictures of the day, but this one I couldn’t resist. The batch I’ve been doing are railway images from late 2001 – early 2002. They may be nearly 20 years old but it’s funny how many I actually remember taking. This latest batch were all taken in the winter, which is a time of year that’s brilliant for photography. The days may be short but the richness of the colours is far superior to the harsh summer light. Here’s an example. This shot was taken at Clapham Junction station, London, on the 10th December 2001.
The day had been one of glorious (if short-lived) winter sunshine but the sunset was magnificent with the sky above Clapham looking as if it was afire. In this picture an old Silverlink Class 313 waits to depart for Willesden Junction on a shuttle service. Admittedly, this shot was taken on Fuji Velvia slide film which had superb colour saturation but I remember the sky really did look like this and the film managed to capture it – which is why I took the picture. Mind you, in those days I wandered around with a tripod on my back as Velvia was a very slow film (ISO 50) so there wasn’t a cat in hell’s chance of getting shots like this hand-held.
Looking at this picture now I’m amazed at how much has changed. The platform canopy remains, but that’s about it. The platforms themselves have been rebuilt. The old trains have gone, so’s the franchise. This service has been absorbed by the London Overground Network. Even the skyline’s changed as high-rise apartment blocks have filled in the background. What seemed mundane at the time is anything but now, instead, it’s become a snapshot in time, but that’s one of the beauties of photography. Sometimes I wonder what the scenes and locations I’ve captured in my modern pictures will look like in 20 years time – if I’m still here to recreate them…
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us locked-down freelances need all the help that we can get…
Today’s not been the most exciting Saturday on record although it has been productive. The weather here in the Pennines hasn’t really been conducive to doing anything terribly exciting as it’s been cloudy but clammy. The sun’s not been able to muscle its way through the low cloud, merely announced it presence in the temperature which has made wandering up and down the valley to go shopping rather a damp experience. On the bright side – who needs to pay to go to a sauna.
As Dawn’s been enjoying another of her ‘tribe’ virtual retreats on’t tinternet I’ve spent much of the day processing dozens more old slides in a valiant effort to get the last few hundred scanned, bringing to a close a project that’s taken me over 20 years to complete. Admittedly, this is just one book of a trilogy as I still have 1000s of travel and social issues pictures to scan. Even so, it feels like an important milestone. You can find the latest batch by following this link.
Unsurprisingly, this leads me on to the picture of the day. I’m really looking forward to being able to get all my old travel slides scanned as the world’s changed so much since I took many of them. Here’s an example. I took this picture looking over the city from the Archway viaduct near my former home in North London back in 2003. If I took the same shot now the whole skyline would have changed.
Mind you, so’s Archway! It was where the charity Actionaid was based and Lynn and I would often meet people in local pubs after work, then cycle home over this bridge. Somehow, I don’t think I’m going to be stuck for a picture of the day anytime soon…
I’ve a favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this blog, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course (although if you did find something that tickled your fancy would be fab!), but the revenue from them helps to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site – and right now (because of Covid), us locked-down freelances need all the help that we can get…
Considering that I’ve had jobs and events cancelled left, right and centre – I should be a man of leisure, but life never works out the way you think it might. Instead, I’ve found myself busy with trying to arrange work to fill the gaps, continue scanning old pictues and (safely) escape from quarantine to enjoy the fact Spring’s on it’s way and enjoy little victories.
Shopping around here is still a bizarre experience. Our local supermarkets have the look of places that have been visited by looters! Today I celebrated a small success by popping into one on the off-chance and being at the right time to pick up a dozen eggs. Sounds bizarre, doesn’t it? A couple of weeks ago, who would have thought that this would even have been an issue? I still can’t get my head around the whole bog roll shortage. Today I was amused to see that the shelves in a local Tesco’s had been stripped clean of cans and bottles of shit lagers, which is possibly an indicator of who’s doing the panic buying. There was still plenty of decent beers, wines and spirits to be had but the piss was in short supply…
Like many others, I’m still trying to come to terms with all this. To put things in perspective, by the end of today there had been a grand total of three confirmed cases of Coronavirus across the whole of Calderdale – out of a population of 210,000. We’re in the group of the lowest in the UK. Sure, there’s bound to be more undiagnosed cases here, but it’s not exactly the Black Death.
I’m not trying to make light of things here, just add some perspective – honest! Let’s face it, we need some humour at the moment and if the likes of Monty Python can’t supply it, who can? With the boot on the other foot I was morbidly fascinated to see how many older people still couldn’t resist the lure of Wetherspoons in Sowerby Bridge earlier, despite all the warnings about gatherings. We could be seeing an interesting experiment in self-inflicted social Darwinism playing out over the next few months.
Back from my mission to buy eggs I’ve been continuing to be productive by scannning more old slides from what now seems a much simpler age to my Zenfolio website. Here’s a couple of samples.
It’s Sunday the 14th April 1991 and Romanian built 56026 keeps UK built 47473 company in platform 7 of the old St Pancras station where they’d been stabled for the weekend. St Pancras was a BR traincrew depot and in those days driver still signed both passenger and freight traction.
Meanwhile, just down the road at Farringdon..
31511 heads up a wiring train at Farringdon on the cross-London Thameslink route. Diesel locomotives were extremely rare in this neck of the woods.
Paul Bigland 