Today’s not entirely gone to plan, but t’was ever thus. I’ve had a busy month that’s involved a lot of walking – especially when carrying my camera bag which isn’t the lightest of things. The result of which is that I find myself suffering from an old knee injury I picked up from the days when I used to cycle to work across London back in the 1990s. Needless to say, that has cramped my style a bit today. I suppose I’ve only myself to blame. I’ve just passed 65 yet I treat my body like I’m a damned sight younger (because in my mind, I am). Most of the time my body plays ball, but occasionally it says ‘oi! – which is where I find myself now – wearing a knee brace and dosing myself with Neurofen whilst restricting what I do. I’d all sorts of plans for this weekend but the reality is I’m pretty much confined to barracks today and tomorrow in the hope I can recover in time for Christmas. In some ways that’s no bad thing as I’ve a shitload of things on my ‘stuff to do’ list.
This morning Dawn left to drive down to Surrey with her parents for a Platt family Christmas. I hobbled around to help her pack the car and see her off with the intention of joining them on Monday. The rest of the day here at Bigland Towers has mostly been spent in a horizontal position whilst listening to the gales and rain beating on the cottage windows as we suffer from the latest storm to hit us. The weather really has been crap over the past couple of weeks. I’m not sure I ever remember such a prolonged period of high winds. Rain? Yes – as this is the Pennines after all. On the bright side, today was the winter solstice, so we’ve reached the darkest times and the days will slowly start to get lighter – although that’s no guarantee the weather’s going to improve in the era of climate change. All that I can do is keep my fingers crossed that nothing goes tits-up on Monday when I head South myself.
Right now I’ll leave you with today’s picture, which is from yesterday’s journey home. Here’s a look at Kings Cross station, one of London’s most iconic railway termini.
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We’ve had another thoroughly miserable day (weather wise) here in’t Pennines. The rain beating on the window and the high winds battering the house in the early hours made me decide that discretion was the better part of valour, so I canned my plans to get out with the camera and worked at home instead which gve me chance to edit some of the pictures I’d taken yesterday on a little trip up the West Coast Main Line as far as Carnforth. I should have written a rolling blog but I was too busy trying to keep up with other stuff – hence today’s reprise of events.
My first stop was Preston. An obvious choice as I had to change trains there, but also because the December 15th timetable change has seen Northern’s Class 323 trains working in pairs through the town on Blackpool North – Manchester Airport services. Some of these nippy units have been cascaded from services around Birmingham – hence combinations like this.
Ex- West Midlands 323206 along with original Northern unit 323224 are seen at Preston whilst working 1Y65, the1225 Blackpool North to Manchester Airport. Two pairs of these units were out on this route yesterday, supplementing 3 and 4 car Class 331s.
On the way North I stopped at Lancaster where the station’s having a bit of a revamp. Story rail are refurbishing the station canopies on behalf of Network Rail at a cost of £9.5m. You can learn more here.
Yes, the picture’s taken from the disused platform which was where the electric trains to Morecambe used. It’s not open to the public but an old friend was on duty and very kindly arranged access for me.
Next stop was Carnforth. Home of the famous tea rooms which featured in the classic 1945 film ‘Brief Encounter’. Whilst the tea rooms are remaining open the adjacent museum closed its doors for the final time in October. The tea rooms remain bus and looked rather festive yesterday.
On my return via Lancaster I popped into a rather more modern refreshment room, the Tite and Locke on Lancaster station. It’s a wonderful addition to station bars which can be found on the Northbound platform. Roof restoration means that the outdoor area on the platform’s rather cut off, but the multi-room bar is still as welcoming as ever.
Choose your Christmas cheer…The entrance to the bar and the first of many rooms…
Much as I’d liked to have stayed I had to head home after a ‘swifty’. Hopefully I’ll have more time to explore next year.
Now I’m prepping for the next few days and decamping to Surrey for Christmas, but first I have a couple of days in London. Tomorrow I’m at the annual railway carols service at St Mary’s Somer’s Town, Eversholt Street, London NW1. The lessons will be read by: Ruth Cadbury MP, Chair of the Transport Select Committee; Rob Morris, Managing Director of Siemens Mobility; Elaine Clark, CEO of the Rail Forum; Mark Phillips, CEO of RSSB; and Maggie Simpson, Executive Director of the Rail Freight Group. If you’re in the area, why not join us? There’s mince pies and sherry to be had in the refectory afterwards.
I’ll add a rolling blog tomorrow. But right now it’s time to call it a day…
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Apologies for absence these past few days. It’s because of a variety of reasons which include work, the weather and my father-in-laws 90th birthday party. Like Royalty, he’s had two birthdays, the official one (his date of birth), then on Saturday he held a party for family and friends at a local cricket club. Dawn and I stayed over at Platt Mansions so there’s been little time to blog as I’ve had so many pictures to edit from various events. Yesterday, I’d half-hoped to have headed up to Ashington in Northumberland for the reopening of the railway line to passengers after a gap of 60 years, but the weather and intermittent trains here in West Yorkshire dissuaded me. I’m really not too bothered about first and/or last events anyway. I’d rather pay a visit when the service has settled down to see how well it’s being used.
Unusually, I never even set foot outside the house yesterday as we’ve had several days of gale-force winds and driving rain. Instead I decided to put my feet up, recharge my batteries and clear the picture editing decks. Dawn did much the same (bar the picture editing of course) which led to a relaxing day. Now it’s the start of a new week and I’ve various things planned that’ll see me out and about to make up for my indolence. I’ve not ventured far today other than a trip to the local shops as I’ve been waiting in for a new battery for my laptop to arrive. It was ordered from China a couple of weeks ago and finally arrived today, just in time for Christmas. The last one was 5 years old and life expired as it wouldn’t hold a charge longer than 45 minutes. Now, with this new one installed I’m getting indications that it’ll last for around 7 hours or more, which is plenty of time when I’m travelling and takes away the anxiety of getting caught somewhere where I can’t plug it into the mains. It’ll also mean that I can hang onto this laptop for a little while longer before I renew it as it’s still a fine machine for my requirement. Now I just need to replace/upgrade my mobile which is also reaching the end of the line…
OK, it’s time for me to go as I’ve more writing to do before the evening ends. I’ll leave you with today’s picture, which is one I took whilst I was away in Wales. We had some incredibly moody light over the Brecon Beacons, as this shows.
Looking North into the Brecon Beacons from atop GCRE’s Nant Helen opencast site. GCRE liked this picture so much they’ve posted it on their LinkedIn page!
You can find more scenic pictures from my Welsh travels here, whilst the rail orientated one can be found here.
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Apologies for absence these past couple of days but it’s been a busy time due to the fact that on Thursday my father-in-law had his 90th birthday. So, on Thursday the Platt family had a gathering to celebrate. Thankfully, John had bounced back from having had the lurgi just the week before, showing that he’s incredibly resilient from someone of an age where many people expect you to be a gibbering wreck that spends all their time sat in front of the TV. That’s never been John’s route. He’s probably more active and fitter than many men 20 years younger – as you’ll see later…
The full Platt family (and me, as an honorary member) went out for a meal at the Manor House in Lindley, on the edge of Huddersfield and I have to say, the food didn’t disappoint. Dawn had taken me there several years ago for my birthday so we knew what to expect, whilst the rest of the family had never visited. The food, service and ambience were all top notch. As both Dawn and I enjoy cooking we sometimes find eating out a disappointment as we know we can cook just as well, if not better. But the Manor House is in a different league.
Friday saw me working from home as the weather’s been bloody awful and it’s not been any better today as we’ve caught the end of storm Darragh. High winds had already caused chaos in the area, bringing down a huge tree in our local woods on Thursday night, but today I had to venture over to Huddersfield for the annual Honley male voice choir Xmas concert. Dawn had driven over earlier in the day so I elected to get the train. I thought I’d be clever and go from Sowerby Bridge to Dewsbury, then catch a Trans-Pennine Express service into Huddersfield in order to get a view of progress on the Trans-Pennine Route Upgrade (TRU). I didn’t need to be at the concert until 15:00 and left in plenty of time, so what could possibly go wrong? Bloody trees down on the line, that’s what…
My 10 minute connection at Dewsbury turned into a 55 minute fester. The only small mercy was the opportunity to have a swift pint in the West Riding refreshment room on the station. Thankfully, I made it to the Lawrence Batley theatre in Huddersfield with just a couple of minutes to spare before the concert started and took my seat with Dawn and her mum. Remember I said my FiL isn’t one for vegetating in front of the TV? Not at all, instead – he was singing in the choir he’s been a member of for 38 years! So, today’s picture is of the concert. John is on the bottom row, second from the left.
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As expected, we’ve had a quiet day here at Bigland Towers, although the mild weather’s been a boon as it’s allowed me to spend more time preparing the gardens for winter by cutting back various plants and shovelling bags of dead leaves to prevent the back of the house (where there’s lots of cobbles) becoming a skating rink. Another positive is that Dawn’s finally on the mend, shaking off the lurgi that’s bedeviled her these past couple of weeks, which is good timing as it’s her fathers 90th birthday next week.
Apart from getting mucky in the garden I have managed to get some photographic work done, filing and editing pictures clogging up my laptop’s hard-drive which are now safely duplicated on several different hard-drives for safety. Modern digital cameras are wonderful things, but file sizes have increased so much in recent years that they soon eat up disc space.
I have had time to peruse social media whilst I’ve waited for stuff to copy. I can’t say I’ve been impressed with what I’ve seen. I used to be an avid user of Twitter, but since Elon Musk bought it he’s turned it into a right-wing cesspit full of conspiracy loons and clowns who’ve paid for blue ticks that spend all their time rage-farming in order to try and make money. The day’s when it was the place to go to for real breaking news are long gone. Now, like millions of others, I’ve set up a new account at ‘Bluesky‘, which is far more civilised as it doesn’t have Musk screwing around with the algorithms in order to promote his own world view whilst supressing real news. You can find me at (@paulbigland.bsky.social). The levels of engagement are far better as a result and the people there are far more reasoned and civil. You can actually engage without getting bombarded by shit-posts from Trump or Farage groupies. I still use Twitter (I refuse to call it X) as there’s still some people who I want to listen to who haven’t made the transition yet, but it’s clear Twitter’s dying bit by bit. Why would anyone want to spend their time in such a depressing place? The other day I saw a post on Bluesky which made me laugh as it summed up the situation perfectly. It said ’25 years ago we used social media to escape the real world. Nowadays we use the real world to escape social media’. So true…
With that thought I’ll leave you with today’s picture, which is another one from the archives as I’ve not been out with the camera for a few days now. I took this at Manchester Victoria station on the 5th October.
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Here we are on the last day of November, about to enter the madness that’s December as everyone gears up for the Christmas festivities and the country goes slightly mad as a consequence. Meanwhile, it’s been a quiet Saturday here at Bigland Towers, the lull before the storm if you like. I still have a poorly Dawn on my hands, hence the day being fairly quiet as Dee’s had a ‘duvet day’ whilst I’ve stayed at home to be on hand. Plus, the front garden needed tidying up for the winter and today was a good excuse for doing it. The garden now looks rather barren with everything cut back but at least it’s not going to be a victim of high winds scattering stuff everywhere.
Hopefully Madame will be on the mend after having a restful weekend. I’ve taken over cooking duties with a few new dishes planned for my own amusement if nothing else. The weather here’s turned mild again so I’m intending to have an active day. I’ve decided that the start of December is an ideal time to ramp up my fitness regime in order to prepare for the festive season which sees us all over-indulge, otherwise I feel like a slug come New Year. Plus, there’s a huge amount of places I want to get to in the UK before the years over when I can start to cast my eyes further afield. I’m looking forward to 2025 for that very reason. But first, there’s December to tackle. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of rolling blogs coming up soon…
Meanwhile, I’ll leave you with today’s picture, which is from a place I’m determined to get back to in 2025.
A rain storm approaches the lush rice paddies and plantations at Tirtagangga. Bali. Indonesia, in January 1995
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Not quite the sort of the day I had in mind, but hey ho.
I’d planned to work from home today as the forecast was suggesting we’d be having snow-showers and all sorts of sh*t today. In reality, we ended up with almost wall-to-wall sunshine. Bugger.
That said, I had plenty of things to keep me occupied with at home, but I couldn’t help feeling it was a wasted opportunity to get out with the camera – but that’s life. In the end It was fortunate that I didn’t as Dawn (who’s still not recovered from a virus) was knocked for six by a migraine, so I ended up donning my nurses uniform once more. Dee retreated to bed whilst I alternated between looking after her and working/cooking/shopping.
Mind you, whilst the weather’s been sunny it’s also been bloody cold as the day’s moved on. The council’s gritting lorries have been kept busy as temperatures hover just above freezing. With those conditions in mind I’ve been kept occupied by watching the birds feasting on the oats I’ve put out for them on one of the shed roofs outside the back of the house. The beauty of oats is that they appeal to a much larger range of birds than if I put out old lentils or other pulses plus, they’re far cheaper than birdseed, which I reserve for the feeders that attract the even smaller birds like tits and nuthatches. That said I had a woodpecker gorging itself on the feeder outside the bedroom window the other day but the damned thing moved too quickly for me to be able to get a picture.
As we needed supplies I did manage to get out for my daily constitutional, popping in to our local supermarket as part of the trip. Oh, and a quick pint in our local pub. Anyone else noticed the paucity and lack of quality of fresh vegetables nowadays? It’s not confined to one chain either. Having secured what I wanted my evening’s been spent productively (apart from the pub, obviously!) making another batch of pea and ham soup for the other invalids in the Platt family, which we expect to deliver as ‘meals on wheels’ tomorrow. Never let it be said that we don’t live the rock and roll lifestyle here at Bigland Towers!
Now for the picture of the day. Hmm, what to choose? I’ve still not finished editing yesterday’s haul, so how about this? The seasons are moving on. I’ve got itchy feet and it’s time leave this septic isle for a while. Here’s a famous feature of a country that’s likely to be the first stop in the new year. Recognise it? You might do if you’re a fan of old James Bond films or you’ve ever been to Thailand…
We were last here in 2017. This is ‘Ko Ta Pu’ otherwise known as the ‘nail’. You can find it in Thailand’s Phang Nga Bay which is off the West coast, not far from Krabi.
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I was going to title that British people but there’s quite a bit of evidence that the latest UK government petition that’s setting the right-wing world aflutter has been signed by a lot of people who’re neither British, or real.
You may ask what I’m talking about. Understandable, if you don’t live in the UK or if you don’t hang around on social media (especially the cesspit that Twitter has become nowadays) as this petition has only really existed in a social media vacuum chamber until the past 24 hours, when the mainstream media (especially the right wing outlets) have decided to cover it. So, let’s start at the beginning.
An e-petition calling for yet another general election was started on the Government’s petitions website 5 days ago, by someone called Michael Westwood. Here’s a link. Now, most of you will remember that we only had a general election back in July. Labour won it with a landslide and currently have a working majority of 259.
The petition would probably have died a death, but it’s been picked up and amplified by Elon Musk and many other right-wing commentators. So, as I type this, the number of ‘signatures’ stands at 2.4 million. It doesn’t take much to sign it. All you need is a UK postcode and a valid email address.
The right-wing are cock a hoop at the numbers and are flogging this like it actually means something. But there’s several problems – not least the fact the numbers are suspect. OK, let’s leave that one aside and pretend (just for the sake of argument) that the numbers are genuine.
In the last general election, 6.8m people were daft enough to still vote Tory. Another 4.1 million even more deluded souls voted for the ‘Fagash Fuhrer’ (Nigel Farage) and his private limited company (major shareholder, N Farage) known as ‘Reform’. That’s 10.9 million right-wing votes. So, less than a quarter of them signing a petition is hardly a popular revolt against the government!
There’s another thing. These petitions are meaningless. It’s clear some clueless souls think they lead to a vote in Parliament with a vote that could order a new general election. The reality is, they’re not even debated in the House of Commons, nor is any vote taken afterwards. They’re held in Westminster Hall and they’re little more than a talking shop. MPs are under no compunction to turn up either, which means they’re often very sparsely attended.
Now, even *if* this petition was debated in Parliament and *if* there was a vote, the Government have a working majority of 259. There wouldn’t be a cat in hell’s chance of it passing.
It seems some people are realising that this petition is pointless and have pivoted to saying it’s sending the Government a ‘message’. They’re not quite sure what that message is of course, but hey ho…
In truth, the message it’s sending isn’t the one they think it is. The real message is one of breathtaking hypocrisy, on several levels.
Remember, in 2016, almost all of these people (well, the real ones anyway) will have voted for Brexit. They’ve spent the past 8 years telling those that voted to remain that ‘you lost, get over it’. According to them, an advisory referendum that was 52-48% (with a huge number of abstentions) is inviolable and written in stone forever more, and petitions like these, which were signed by millions, had to be ignored. Only theirs is valid. Hypocritical, much? Damned right it is.
And yet, the result of a general election that Labour won by a landslide just 4 months ago should be overturned, now, despite the fact there will be another general election in just under 5 years time. So much for the ‘will of the people’, eh?
It seems that for the right-wing ‘democrats’, election results only matter when they win. Remind you of anyone? Oh, yes, the orange rapist and felon who’ll be re-entering the White House next year. And of course, who’s behind amplifying all this nonsense on social media, Trump’s chum Elon Musk! Now, hang on a minute, why are so many supposed British ‘patriots’ so happy that there’s foreign interference in UK politics? Weren’t these the people who railed against the ‘unelected bureaucrats’ of the EU or anyone from another country (Obama, Biden, et al) who had the temerity to opine about what was happening in the UK? But Musk, actively interfering? Come on in! The hypocrisy is weapons-grade.
PM Sir Keir Starmer has already burst their balloon by pointing out the fact that this “isn’t how our system works.”
There’s another interesting bit of fallout from this petition. It’s demonstrating just how irrelevant the Tory party are now. The agenda is being driven not by them but by constant noise from the right-wing media and vested-interest billionaires like Musk. It’s no wonder politics is in such bad shape nowadays.
I’ve no doubt the froth about the petition will die soon. It’s going nowhere. The right have the attention-span of a goldfish, the bots will be reprogrammed and move on to the next thing their masters deem worth their time. Besides, it’s almost the festive season. The right-wing always get outraged about Christmas and someone trying to ‘ban’ it. Imagine living your life in a state of permanent outrage, the way many of these right-wingers do?
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What a change in the weather! When I opened the bedroom window blinds around 08:00 all I could see was oppressive skies and an inch or two of new snow. The latter was welcome, the dim light wasn’t as I’d half-hoped to be able to get out with the camera. It wasn’t to be. By the time I’d breakfasted, checked in with Dawn and perused the daily (depressing) news the rain had started to arrive. The only sensible choice was to stay at home, catch up on some work and wait for the day to unfold.
Unfold it did. Rain replaced snow. Over the course of a few hours all the snow was washed away. which then left us with another problem. Flooding. The Calder valley’s become renowned for such events and the local authorities issued several warnings, from Todmorden to Luddenden Foot. Thankfully the high water levels haven’t proved to be a major problem.
None of this stopped me getting my daily constitutional and the opportunity to call into my local for a pint. But, as I’ve said previously. If we flood – high as we are above the valley floor – then the world’s in a whole new level of hurt! Looking at the forecast there’s not going to be a bright side tomorrow. Well, weather-wise anyway. On another front I expect to have Dawn home tomorrow, so things are looking up.
With not having got out with the camera today I’ve been wondering about what today’s picture choice will be. As the weather’s been so dismal I’ve decided to delve into the archives to find this. Frankly? I’d be quite happy to escape from the world as it is in 2024 to return here.
Here’s the beautiful and isolated small island of Kanawa, which is off the island of Flores, Indonesia. The picture was taken in September 1998 when we spent a week staying here. There’s several stories I can tell about those backpacking days. One is that you learned never to order breakfast until you saw what the first longboat of the day from Flores was carrying. One day I’ll tell you what happened when someone ordered chicken…
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Well, that wasn’t quite the start to the weekend I was hoping for! Since my outing on Tuesday I’ve been pretty much confined to barracks for various reasons, one of which was the fact I’d a final round of judging to complete for next years Community Rail Awards. Of course, since Tuesday we’ve had almost wall to wall sunshine up here in West Yorkshire and surrounding counties, which has been rather frustrating, especially as the snow as pretty much stuck around in many areas, but that’s life. Then, yesterday we found out that Dawn’s father wasn’t feeling very well. As John’s coming up to his 90th birthday you can imagine everyone’s concern. So, yesterday we ended up dropping everything at short-notice to head over to Huddersfield in order to be with her mum and dad and offer our support. We’d only been with them on Wednesday evening as I’d cooked us all a coq-au-vin for our weekly evening meal get-together (another reason why I’ve not been out much) and John had seemed fine then. Thankfully, it seems that I’d not poisoned my father-in-law and his current hors de combat is due to a virus and not my cooking! Dawn’s remained over at her parents whilst I’ve returned to Bigland Towers in order to be around for other duties.
Right now – I’m going nowhere until things are resolved. Plus, there’s another storm on the way – which might prove to interesting – although I’m struggling to take a storm called ‘Bert’ seriously right now. Whatever else ‘Bert’ might bring it’s seeing an end to the freezing weather we’ve had, which is no bad thing.
So, what’s next? I’m not entirely sure to be honest. I’ve plenty to keep me occupied with at home for this weekend, especially as it looks like I’ll be spending most of it on my own. Next week? well, that’s another matter. In the meantime I’ll leave you with today’s picture which was taken on my visit to the Hope valley on Tuesday.
A snow-covered Back Tor seen from near Edale station on Tuesday. Traversing that ridge is one of our favourite walks, but not in weather like this!
I’ve a small favour to ask… If you enjoy reading this or any of the other blogs I’ve written, 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 me to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site (which isn’t cheap and comes out of my own pocket). Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website – https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/
Paul Bigland 