It’s an extremely short blog from me tonight. I’ve had a lovely day out around West Yorkshire catching up with and acting as a tour guide for old friends. Now I’m back at home editing a few more pictures before having some chill-time with Dawn. So, here’s the picture of the day which comes from Norwich. As shop names go…
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There was no blog from me last night as the pair of us were having a convivial night round at the house of friends. Tonight, Dee’s out with friends whilst I’m ‘billy no mates’, sat at home working and trying to catch-up with writing and picture editing, along with a few household chores. Not that I’m complaining. After my time in Germany/Holland it’s nice to have some time not lugging a heavy camera bag around all day. Instead, I get to sit at home in the warm, do some work and observe (via the internet) the Truss government implode. Sadly, that’s not all that’s imploding, the FTSE100 and the currency are too. I always suspected Boris Johnson’s reputation of being the worst Prime Minister we’ve ever had was going to be short-lived, but I had little idea Truss would be so quick to steal that mantle. After all, she’s only been in the job for a few weeks! Today she gave a series of BBC local radio interviews which were excruciatingly painful as it was obvious how ill-prepared and wooden she was as she responded to some very pertinent and hardball questions – or rather, didn’t respond, as time and time again she came back to her script rather than answer the actual questions but doubled-down on her economic madness which immediately caused more damage to the pound and the stock market!
I’ve avoided talking much about politics recently, but the events of the past week have left me both angry and fearful as it painfully obvious the swivel-eyed loons of the libertarian right are in charge now and seen hell-bent on wrecking the country as they apply their economic theories, no matter what.
The result? A sense of disbelief across the country as this shitstorm is engulfing everyone. It may be dogmatic theory to Truss and her Tufton St cabal but ordinary people are genuinely worried about how they’re going to keep a roof over their head and feed themselves and their loved ones. Forget the lie that Truss told that no-one will pay more than £2,500 for heating bills this year. As many others have explained, either she doesn’t understand her own policy, or she just outright lied about it. Meanwhile, the very real threat of massive interest rate hikes could see many people losing their homes which is a far greater worry than paying to heat a house you no longer have.
The upshot of this is that the Tories are tanking in the opinion polls. One (YouGov) put Labour with an unheard-of lead of 33 points! Others had more modest but equally ‘wipe-out’ territory leads of 17-19 points. Next week’s Tory party conference is going to be a very ‘interesting’ event as many Tory MPs arses are going to be twitching like a bunny’s nose. They know they can’t depose another leader and get away with it, nor can they survive the levels of public outrage over her policies. All they can do is try and persuade her to change her mind (or what passes for one) but as she models herself on Thatcher the lady ‘who wasn’t for turning’, that’s going to be a massive challenge.
If it wasn’t so damned serious and affecting us all so badly I’d be happy to sit back with some popcorn and watch the Tory party tear itself apart. They’ve got themselves into the mess, sadly, the rest of the country will be collateral damage.
Right, enough for now. I’ve got to go back to writing for a living. So, here’s today’s picture which was taken on our recent Suffolk holiday but is with others in the queue for editing and adding to my Zenfolio website in the future. This is the rather elegant National Trust property called Blickling Hall.
I hate to think what their energy bills are going to be this winter…
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We’re back at home after a few days in London but for me it’s a brief visit. Being back in London was lovely but what a strange time to be there. It’s certainly not the city I used to live in for so many years – for a whole host of reasons.
Right now it’s time to regroup and prepare to head off to Germany tomorrow. I’m looking forward to my travels as I’ll be exploring some places I’ve not been to a very long time (and can’t really remember) as well as new destinations and the landscape in-between. As the trip involves avoiding flying it’ll take some time – but that’s part of the fun.
Keep an eye out for the next week’s rolling blogs – starting tomorrow as I head for Harwich and the ferry to the Hook of Holland. In the meantime, here’s the picture of the day which was taken at London Kings Cross station this afternoon just before we headed back North.
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Today’s been my last full day here at Bigland Towers for quite some time, so I’ve been making the most of it to catch up on a (long) list of household chores, paperwork and picture editing, as well as getting stuff in place for heading off to Europe on Sunday. Even the weather Gods have played ball, gifting me some wonderful autumnal sunshine to accompany my afternoon stroll and break from staring at screens.
Now it’s time for a quiet evening at home before we’re up early to get ready to head down to London for the next couple of days. I’ve no idea what to expect as these are unusual times. What I do know is that the capital will be busy but I’ve no idea how that will play out. Will the new Puritanism that’s seen so many places close as a ‘mark of respect’ for the passing of the Queen have any impact on life in London, or will Londoners simply treat it as just another event in a very crowded history? We’ll soon find out.
My blogging will be mostly (but not all) confined to pictures and explanations rather than a magnum opus or running commentary. We’re there to enjoy ourselves after all. But I hope to give some insights into my old hometown – even if those days do seem like a long time ago now.
In the meantime, here’s today’s picture. It’s from a previous royal funeral, that of the Queen Mother on the 9th April 2002. I watched the funeral procession pass Horse Guards Parade and took this shot of the Royal crown atop the coffin through the crowd.
At some point soon I’ll relate the tale of when I met the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh and became a royal photographer. I was tasked with taking their picture along with the staff of the Royal Train at a private event. It turned into every snapper’s nightmare due to a variety of circumstances outside of my control, but it makes a great story!
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It’s been another busy day here at Bigland Towers. Well, for me anyway. Dawn’s been equally as busy but working from the Community Rail Network office in Huddersfield rather than from home so I’ve been the sole occupant of the manse. Editing and sending off the pictures of my recent round Britain trip for RAIL magazine took up a lot of the day whilst sorting out my next work trip to Europe took up much of the rest. Some of the stuff was mundane, like renewing my National Union of Journalists press card. To the NUJs credit they do this very quickly and sent me a useable PDF of my new card by return email. I needed it to gain accreditation for where I’m off to next week – the vast Innotrans railway trade fair in Berlin.
Originally, due to various other recent ‘happenings’ I wasn’t sure I’d be able to attend. Innotrans is held every two years, the last one was in 2018. We should have had one in 2020 but Covid but the mockers on that so this is the first event in four years. I’ve been going since 2008 and was loathe to miss such an important worldwide event in the railway calendar. This week I looked into the logistics and decided that – despite the last-minute nature of booking I could pull it off – and get there in the greenest possible way – even if it will cost me.
I’ll be heading to Europe on Sunday via the Harwich – Hook of Holland ferry. I’ve not used this route since 1981 so I’m expecting it to be part trip down memory lane and also part new adventure as so much has changed since then. From the Hook I’ll be making my way to Rotterdam via the metro, then catching a series of trains that will carry me all the way to Frankfurt (Oder) where I’ll base myself for the next 5 nights. Hotels in Berlin are far too expensive because of Innotrans which is attended by tens of thousands of people from all over the world. It’s OK if you book months in advance but right now hotels are charging anything from £2,000 upwards – which is OK if you’re on generous expenses – but that’s not us freelances! Instead, I’m within 70 minutes commute, which isn’t much different to travelling to work in London from many locations. In recent years the weather at Innotrans has always produced to fine sunny days. I’m hoping this year will be the same. Even if it rains there’s miles to be walked through the vast indoor halls of the Berlin Messe. You certainly use up a lot of shoe leather!
I’ll be attending all four days of the event before retracing my way across Europe by train – a trip I’m really looking forward to almost as much as the event itself. Expect daily blogs and lots of pictures like these from the 2018 event.
Before I go to Germany I’ve one more day working from home, then both Dee and I head to London for a short break, which leads me on to today’s picture which is a view of the city of London (aka the ‘square mile’) taken from the South bank of the Thames by Blackfriars in October 2017. Needless to say, it’s changed a bit since then!
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Another working week begins here in Bigland Towers now the holiday’s over. Well, for now at least. The pair of us have had a busy day keyboard-bashing, photo-editing and researching our next trips in the UK and elsewhere. The problem (as always) is there’s just not enough hours in the day or days in the week to get everything done which can be quite frustrating at times. Still, all will become clearer over the next few days. The pair of us are down in London on Thursday/Friday which is when we were meant to be at the National Rail Awards, instead we’re just going to enjoy a couple of days in the capital although I suspect it may be a rather different atmosphere due to ‘events’. We shall see…
As I’m now bog-eyed from said concentration and staring at screens it’s time for the pair of use to knock off and have some quality time together. We’ve raided the freezer and broken out some home-made urad dahl and chana masala to go with some firecracker basmati rice. Well, the salad days are behind us now after all as Autumn is fast approaching. This means the picture of the day is in the finest tradition of those food bloggers or people who love posting their meals on Facebook! Normal service will be resumed tomorrow when I’ve waded my way through more edited pictures. In the meantime, I’m off to scoff this!
A wicked combination of urad dahl (left) and chana masala (right) on a bed of firecracker rice and garnushed with hot lime pickle and mango chutney. I may need to put a toilet roll in the fridge for later…
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Talk about life comes at you fast! There’s been no lazy Sunday here at Bigland Towers as the maelstrom of events in the real world have kept me occupied most of the day. Planning stuff at the moment is proving to be difficult due to what the late Prime Minister Harold Macmillan famously replied to a question in an interview when asked about what would determine his governments course “Events, dear boy, events.”
I know exactly how he felt – although I’m not facing my own personal Suez crisis. Instead, I’m responding to the events of others. The death of the Queen is the one that’s having the biggest impact on my own life due to the way it’s affecting the rail industry. Outside of that I’m looking at worldwide events and the situation in the Ukraine where the Russian invaders are suffering a humiliating defeat right now. The Ukrainian offensive has recaptured 1000s of Kms of territory and inflicted a rout on the Russian army the likes of which haven’t been seen since the Nazi invasion of Russia in 1941 – but with one huge difference. Now the Russians are the aggressor. Twitter has proved to be invaluable when it comes to accurate and up to date information and accounts like ‘Ukraine Weapons Tracker’ @UAWeapons which documents losses on both sides is well worth following. My hope it that the Ukrainians continue to be supported by the West (including the UK) and that the Russian people begin to wake up from the fantasy they’ve been fed by their leader before more people on all sides have to die.
What I find fascinating about how the internet age and the way various social media platforms are disseminating (often real-time) experiences from the frontline is how it’s made control of the media impossible. In the Vietnam war the Americans learned how a free media was damaging their ability to control the narrative. The public swung against the war because of the scenes they were seeing played out on their TVs most nights. Both the British and the American governments learned from that in future conflicts by ’embedding’ journalists into military units as a way of controlling (and therefore censoring) their outputs. The internet age has destroyed that level of control. Now you can see cameraphone footage as it happens. Troops record and broadcast their experiences (even sometimes their last experiences). The genie is out of the bottle once more and the war in Ukraine is playing out in real-time in a way no other war has. Add in the drone footage of actual strikes and it’s a million miles away from grainy gun camera footage from world war 2 fighter planes.
Meanwhile, remember Covid? It’s still here – even if it’s no longer considered newsworthy. Thankfully, it’s on the decline worldwide, so I’m looking forward to being able resume my international travels soon. But before that I’ve an awful lot of pictures to edit and words to write – and events to attend if I possibly can.
Apropos of that, here’s today’s picture, which is another delve into my travel archives. Here’s a country I’m really looking forward to returning to – Thailand. It’s no paradise (where is?) as it has a military government, but the people are amazing, and the railway system is changing so much. This picture was taken at Hua Lamphong station in central Bangkok 10 years ago. Soon the station will be made redundant by a newer, vaster and more modern multi-level interchange at Bang Sue. It will be fit for the 21st century – but it won’t be the same…
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/
Being back in Bigland Towers seems rather strange after such a great week away. The fact the weather’s so different isn’t helping. After a week in balmy temperatures where I’ve hardly ever been out of shorts and singlets it feels odd to be back in heavier clothing – and enclosed shoes! Not that it’s mattered too much as I’ve spent most of the day chained to my desk in an effort to edit the backlog of pictures that I have to deal with before Monday arrives, and I have to rewrite my diary due to what Harold Macmillan beautifully described as “events, dear Boy”…
This means there’s not much of a blog from me tonight as I’m ‘cream-crackered’ and looking forward to catching up on some down time. There is another chore I’ve sorted out tonight. The next few hundred old rail slides and assorted memorabilia have been added to eBay tonight. Interested parties now have five days to browse and place their bids. You can find out what’s on offer by following this link.
OK, on to the picture of the day which is one more from our trip to North Norfolk. Here’s the superb roof inside the 900-year-old Norwich cathedral.
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/
Today’s our last day here in North Norfolk as tomorrow we head back to West Yorkshire. There’s going to be a very short blog from me tonight as there’s too much to do in the way of packing and also – how do I blog about the events of the week in just a few minutes? A week where we’ve ‘gained’ a new Prime Minister and a right-wing disaster of a government – and also lost a Queen who’s been on the throne for 70 years? To quote Bob Dylan, “the times, they are a changin”…
The UK’s reaching a critical path in its history and I’m really not sure how this is going to pan out, so I’m going to take time to ponder to myself and enjoy the last day of the holiday before facing a new reality. Right now, I’ll leave you with the picture of the day, which is of a place we visited today – Blickling Hall.
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/
We’ve had another great day exploring North Norfolk, made all the better by the fact the predicted rain has only ever dumped on us overnight, then promptly buggered off by morning! Today we revisited some places we’d previously checked out and decided they warranted further exploration – as well as finding new gems. Our first stop was at Walsingham which is a lovely little village that boasts the remains of an Austinian monastery but that’s still an important pilgrimage site for Christians. Moving on we headed for Holt, an upmarket market town whose surrounding wealth is reflected in the quality of its shops. Such a small town that boasts two ‘Joules’ clothing shops (one purely for children) can hardly be called poor.
Next we checked out the beach at nearby Salthouses. There’s not a lot there apart from the shingle beach but it’s provided the picture of the day. As soon we arrived, I spotted this chap relaxing and clearly enjoying his own company.
Solitude…
Making our way back from Salthouses we made our final stop in Cromer where we stocked up on some superb seafood from the local fishmongers before visiting the excellent Red Lion pub (pictures in another blog) for a beer before home.
Tomorrow’s our final day in Norfolk before heading home which is going to be a bit of a wrench as we’ve all thoroughly enjoyed it, yet there’s so much more to see…
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 