12°C, grey gray day
To celebrate the end of term:
Just ordered this, by the lead vocalist in Arab Strap. The sound clips are promising, click the picture to go to the Amazon page with the samples on.
Into The Woods
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Monthly Archives: Mar 2007
Don’t look right
8°C, cold NE wind, warm sun and a struggle between them to decide the temperature. C=69 miles
Pain in the neck: it could be a pulled muscle, trouble is it locks solid when I look over the right shoulder so I have ot look well over the left instead.
Isle of The Dead: this Böcklin painting came to mind when I rode past a small fishing lake today. See the photo below. It might be a picture depicting the River Styx with the character Charon in the boat in white, but then maybe it’s not.
iPod clone
9°C, dull grey clouds.
I have it: a 4Gb mp3/4 player. It’s half the price of an iPod, stores twice as much and will play wma sound files as well as video, text and photos. the downaide is the very awkward controls, changing album folders, or modes is the oddest process- it makes no sense at all.
Here’s a good animal story.(click the picture)
Ofsted away
9°C, rain
IWM, Manchester: Trip with school to visit the Imperial War Museum, Manchester. There’s a good way to avoid ofstead. It is indeed an excellent place, but are we facing loads of Video capture ( there were 8 cameras issued to the group). Below is a photogrph from the Shard Tower, since it was such a dull day, turning it black & White is an obvious thing to do.
Just think: I can play video games again, paint pictures again and look forward to my new mp3 player. I decided it was worth getting an upgraded one, it’s light, holds plenty and will be useful for shutting out distractions while working. I distract easily, not to mention procrastinate.
Finnessy, Frith and Fear
3°C, more fresh wind and hailstorms, some with thunder!
New stuff today:
Too busy to even play it right now. Oh well, life can resume at the end of the week.
Today: Llanbedr
2°C, strong winds, hail & some snow.
Continuing the story from last night as it happens with the drive from Bewys-y-Coed. The sun set and the rain got heavier as I drove towards Harlech. Most of my clothes were wet, the car heater set to 23°C. Eventually I got to the caravana and set up- ma..an it was cold. The rain beat on the caravan and it shook, quivered and creaked all night against the storms arriving down the northerly approaches.
This morning, I woke at sunrise and decided to go home as soon as possible. The rain had eased but the temperature dropped during my sleep. After coffee and cerial, there was time to grab a quick visit to the beech. White foamy waves crashed just behind the dunes, unheard because of the wind blasting everything with sand. No flat beech was visible there.
After setting off south I called in at Barmouth, in the summer months a very busy town that has all the kitch of British seaside resorts. In the winter- it’s worth a stop. There must have been some money here in late victorian times, there are fascinating houses on the hillside. The wind was able to lift the sand higher here, it filled everything, got everywhere. My scalp had a layer of sand, my ears and under my eyelids. That still stings when you look in some directions.
Home to worry about work, and fix the fence that blew down in the gales before it gets dark. Not enough time.
Yesterday: Climb Snowdon
9 to 2°C, wind, sun and hailshowers.
3 Peaks: we climbed Mt. Snowdon yesterday, what an adventure!
After 3 hours driving from home, we met up at Pen-y-pass which was full- that made parking tricky. Anyway, we took the Miner’s track to the summit which was an easy way to start, but once past the last lake (Glaslyn) the terrain got far more tricky. It was steep and heavily obstructed with bolders and other rocks that were very angular (and colourful I may add). The last 300m of altitiude was covered in cloud and reaching the final ridge was an extrodinary experience. Both sides were a sea of light grey cloud that concealed enormous drops- the thought of them takes your breath away- think of that Victorian notion of the “sublime”.
We had to contend with strong winds from the NW but loads of people were also there- from the other 3 main routes no doubt.
The plan was to take some photos at the summit and then climb back down a short way to a sheltered corner to eat our lunchpacks. By the time we got there the cloud had gone down so we continued. Sitting still in cloud eating is a quick way to get cold and below the cloud layer, there was rain. The rain got heavier the further we descended. Somehow, I didn’t mind that, at one point my comment was
“I wonder if I would be enjoying this as much if the weather was good?”- I was not being facetious.
The return route was along the Pyg track. We all agreed that though this was shallower it was far more difficult, there were few runs of smooth path that you could set a pace on. The rain got heavier too.
The whole walk took five hours, too long really so we’ll stick to the Miner’s track both ways even with that very steep descent to Glaslyn.
Later we met up for shopping at Betws-y-Coed for a bit of shopping and a cafe stop. There is a nice bizz in that town, not like other parts of Wales which can seem rather run-down. I got a better rain-coat and a drinking bladder thing for my rucksac. There we all parted, most going home while I went west to my Mum’s caravan near Harlech. That was an adventure in itself, more possibly on that later, for now, there is a photo of rough seas taken from my overnight stay.
Ides of March
11°C, cloudy afternoon
Utterly: thoroughly and profoundly tired, right down to the bone.
Another picture from last Saturday. Snowdon – the day after tomorrow.
WMDs
11°C, clear
Trident: latest news: the UK labour Govt have decided to buy new weapons of mass destruction. It’s not clear who they will be aimed at, or what the Gov’t will say to Iran , or Nth Korea on the matter. Something bad seem to happen to parties that get into power in the UK. The plans made during electioneering seem to get shelved along with Britain’s independance. Could there be some secret binding reason why our Prime Ministers, one after another, drop independant thinking after gaining power and meeting with the US president?
It pays not to look to long at governments as it erodes your faith in human nature.
Snowdon: climb on Saturday, that will be fun. I may even stay overnight and make the cliumb again on Sunday. Umm… what to do?
A Whale’s revenge
11°C, clear.
BBC news story of a panicing Whale, lost in inland waters News Video. Nature takes its revenge! Japan has resumed Whale hunting and the civilised world has taken a step backwards.
Micycle 