Keystone Crescent

While we were wandering from the Canal Museum to the beer festival, we came upon this quaint - and probably very expensive - terrace near Kings Cross station.





























Unfortunately it was 'rubbish day' so the photos aren't that great.















All the cars were very small so as to fit on the tiny parking areas.

There was some amusing (if that's possible) graffiti at the end of the street which simply said 'Location Location Location',

London - Thursday afternoon

Unfortunately, we ended up at the lunchtime session at the London Drinker beer festival at the Camden Centre.
Oh! what a hardship that was.
Very enjoyable beers drunk in very enjoyable good humoured company.










































As mentioned on a previous post - always look up towards the ceiling...

The only 'downside' to the day came when SWMBO discovered a whole new batch of shops at St.Pancras International railway station, so a new dress had to be bought in Monsoon - obviously.

London - Thursday morning

This morning we went to the London Canal Museum which is in Camden behind King's Cross station.
It's actually situated in an old ice house, in Battlebridge Basin off the Regent's canal, which was built to store ice imported from Norway.
All very interesting, and only £3 each - or £3 for two with the 2 for 1 voucher from First Capital Connect.

Must have been good!

You won't BELIEVE what these birds have just been
up to on MY ROOF!
Well, perhaps you will, as it's springtime?
I wasn't quick enough with the camera to capture the
private/public moment but it must have been good
as it's blown her head off.

You can click on the picture to enlarge it just to prove there's been

no PhotoShop nonsense going on - it really is a genuine photo.

Sunny day!

Not a bad way to start your week - sitting in the sun in the jungle that is our back garden. Well it's not so much of a jungle now as we spent quite a while clearing out a lot of the overgrown planting yesterday.















Quite pleased with the photo as it was taken on maximum zoom, and through a window.

If you like cats - especially ginger ones - try this clickylink

There's wonderful scenery from St.Davids in Pembrokeshire and some great photos of cats who seem to go for walks with their 'owners', like dogs.

Almost to France

As you may have gathered from the last post, we crossed the Thames yesterday and went to Kent to visit two of SWMBO's aunts.
Always on the lookout for a good reason to visit a pub, I found
"The Coastguard" on t'internet.




















The Coastguard is at St.Margaret's Bay near Dover and its claim to fame is that it is the closest pub in England, to France.
I dined on freshly caught 'day boat' cod - from Folkestone or Deal I assume - which was fried in Hoegaarden beer batter, and served with 'twice fried' chips. It was hard to remember when I had a better plate of fish and chips. Not cheap as it's a 'Gastro Pub', but very good. SWMBO had fish pie was was also reported to be excellent.















By definition, I guess this is the closest cat in England, to France?

Further details by following this clickylink

This wasn't very well advertised

I found out today that the Dartford crossing is FREE for everyone between 10:00pm and 6:00am - why wasn't this advertised better?

It has been in place since Saturday 15th November 2008.

I guess they are not losing too much revenue because they are no longer having to man all those booths throughout the night.

They were ONLY charging £1 per vehicle at night anyway.

Did anyone know? Is it just me who didn't know?

Further details by following this clickylink

Wonder what frog tastes like?

Poppy 'ginger'ly investigates an intruder in her garden...

Or better still...video of the grateful fish

Photos of the grateful fish

As promised, here are some photos of the Koi and other fish, all grateful to have their filtration plant back up and running. I do have a backup pump in the garage, just in case, but it's not as powerful as their usual one.
The largest of the fish are about 12" long (Fisherman's 12") and were all bought at about 2"-3".
The two fish to the left of the first photo (9 o'clock and 7 o'clock) are fish which were bought for me as a birthday present by a colleague and her husband four years ago. They were less than 2" long when bought and are now 7"-8".

Deadly piece of plastic

This tiny (1.5 cms) crescent shaped piece of plastic to the left of the picture, almost caused numerous deaths yesterday.

It is part of a fish pond pump. Yesterday, the pump which feeds the filter and waterfall of our pond had stopped working. This is usually due to a small power 'blip' which knocks out the circuit breaker for the electrics - you can't be too careful with water and electricity! Normally it restarts when you reset the breaker. Yesterday...no.

Changed the fuse - no. So I stripped the whole thing down as far as normal and found the rotor was stuck solid. Further fiddling about got the rotor assembly apart and there was the culprit.

Trouble is, I don't know what it does! It fits in the hole near the centre of the face plate (the one at 7 o'clock) and generally flops about. All I can think of is that it's to stop the motor accidentally starting up in reverse when the power is applied.

Assuming this was its function I figured out that it wasn't strictly necessary as this was an emergency, so I reassembled it and it's working just fine. Perhaps I'd better try and get a spare though - just in case.

The worrying thing is that had we been on holiday for example, we could have lost all our Koi Carp - as well as the other fish.

I will try to get a decent picture of the grateful fish later...

The Globe - Dunstable

Yesterday I was lucky enough to be introduced to The Globe by a friend. I was told that it was well worth going to, and his opinion was certainly right! - as I expected.
It's only a 'backstreet pub' but it's very friendly and the range of beers is amazing.















There were 11 real ales on hand pump and 1 cider (1 think!). They also stock an impressive selection of Belgian beers as well.
One interesting idea is being able to buy 5 tasters of the beers in one third of a pint glasses.
Obviously with 11 beers it would be difficult to know which one to leave out - or to have a pint of?















Unfortunately, the landlord of the pub died whilst on holiday last year but Shefford Brewery have produced this special commemorative beer called 'Dunstable Giant', so he must have been very well thought of by them, as well as his regulars I'm sure.

Another prize - ho hum

If you recall, we won a night at The Noke Hotel in St.Albans by winning a slogan competition - yes, it wasn't very good (Slogan or hotel).
Well, as part of the same promotion (Residents First Weekend) we both completed a questionnaire which went into a prize draw.
My 'entry' won a prize! It's a £40 voucher to spend at this clickylink Indian restaurant in St.Albans.
It's a restaurant I've wanted to try as they have a chef there who has won national awards - for his curry I assume?
Looking at the prices, we should be able to afford a starter and a bottle of wine.
Still, mustn't complain, eh?

Having just checked out the 'clickylink' above, I see it's a French-Asian restaurant, so no wonder it's expensive? Looks very impressive though - take a look.

And we're still waiting to hear if we have won a share in a new narrowboat.

It's Bradley Walsh!

Just back from The Paper Mill pub in Apsley, Hemel Hempstead.
As we were leaving Bradley Walsh came in the door and held it open for my mother - now's there's something to tell her grandchildren.

Blogfact: Bradley was brought up in Abbots Langley and went to school in Garston.

Exercise more...

I was sitting watching the lunchtime news on Friday when an item was broadcast telling me that it wasn't a good thing to be sitting watching the news on a Friday lunchtime. The message was that starting exercise between the ages of 50 and 60 could give the same benefits as if you had exercised all your life - I went out for a one hour 'march' around the village.

The cricket square has been mowed for the first time, so now I've cut our little patch of grass as well, but it doesn't look this good!

Comfortable?

How can this be comfortable...?















As long as it's warm, it's comfortable perhaps?














Rather out of focus...sorry.

More colour in the garden

After the storms we had last night, I'm surprised anything
survived in the garden - especially these blooms!

More progress at the cricket pavilion

You can read more about the club and the fire by following this clickylink

Spring - has sprung (sorry!)

The garden is bursting into life. Sunny day forecast for today - as you can see. Tomorrow could be wet, windy and wild with possible snow.