We had a really goods night sleep, but woke up to a rainy day, then Helen realised that she had bought 2 bottles of shampoo rather than one of shampoo and one of conditioner, it meant a trip to the shops. Not such a bad thing when it is a rainy day, we could take the opportunity to to take a drive out and visit an I outdoor venue whilst the could see emptied themselves. We decided that we would take a look at St Ives at least for the morning.
It did not take long to get to St Ives and we took a chance on the parking, we passed a parking at the top of the town but decided to try for one in the town it self. Luckily for us there were two spaces in the small car park almost opposite the Tate St Ives. We head straight for Sid gallery paid our £11 entrance each and headed up to the cafe for a coffee. The view from the cafe is great it is just about above all the roof tops and you can see both sites of the St Ives peninsula. After a coffee we heard down the stairs to the galleries. As you expect from The Tate the art is modern which I find difficult to understand, but we liked some of it and even saw a scheme that might work as a feature wall for our kitchen. Interestingly we got a book in the gift shop with the title “WHY YOUR FIVE YEAR OLD COULD NOT HAVE DONE THAT – modern art explained”.
St Ives viewed from the Tate Gallery
Suitably cultured we headed into town which was easier said than done as the streets are narrow and despite restrictions there is quite a lot of traffic vying for space. We did eventually make to the quay side which was heaving, with people out shopping, or just aimlessly walking about like we were. Helen made a couple of purchase and I bought and artisan loaf of bread for sandwiches at lunch time. It went well with the Cornish blue I purchased on the way down.
We stopped off at M&S on the way back for a couple of evening meals, had a sandwich then headed out for a local walk. There was a sea fret moving in so even though I took my camera I did not have much hope of many pictures. We headed across the black to the far end then headed inland following the Red River, then around a small nature reserve, until we arrived at the village of Gwithian. We had a look around a art exhibition in the village hall, then a quick look at the village church. One thing I notice about the churches is that the bricks are not worn because they are made of granite rather than the chalk around Buckinghamshire, it seemed rude not to have a half at the Red River inn. I had the local summer ale which was Devine.
It was a short walk back to the hut for some more relaxing and dolphin watching. The sunset was stunning.
We booked the the four days following the late bank holiday, but we did not realise that it was half term too, so not only did we pay over the odds for the rental cottage, we would also Ben on Cornwall with a lot more people that we thought we might. We decided to set off at 06:00 to get ahead of most people.
Helen was up at 05:00 and I was up soon after, and we managed a coffee and some toast before leaving the house about 06:05, the planned route A41, M25, M5, finally A30 to the Lost Gardens of Heligan. The roads were quite congested when we got to Bristol then more so later on when we got onto the A30. Whilst on the M5 we spotted a Bat mobile on the back of a trailer which we guessed was heading towards a car show, as we saw a few more shiny cars heading in the same direction.
Beach at Gwithian Cornwall
A quick review of the map and we had and alternative route heading south cross country on B roads to St Neot. Taking the B road allowed us to see what appeared to be the Lake District of Cornwall with lakes and rolling hills it was beautiful and an aspect of Cornwall I have never seen before. We noted some horses we guessed were similar to the the ones you see on Dartmoor.
The traffic was quite heavy again on the local roads but we got to the Lost Gardens of Heligan at 12:00. Heligan is a gat place to visit, and have a wander around it is set in a damp valley that is sheltered enough to grow some fairly exotic plants, as well as a lot of rhododendrons which unfortunately we’re past their best by a week of two. The gardens are fairly extensive but principally set in to two distinct areas one is a jungle in the damp valley and the other is formal gardens and vegetable plots. For lunch we had a sandwich each from the Stewards cafe, then it was exit via the expensive farmshop on site and back on the road destination Gwithian via Truro and Redruth.
Sunset Gwithian Cornwall
At some point we passed through some towns and villages with interesting names; Fairy Cross, London Apprentice and Probus spring to mind. We drove through Truro and then stopped at Redruth where I managed to get an long over due haircut, Helen got a watch battery and we found and evening meal for later at the local Tesco. To get to the chalet we rented you have to go to Hayle then turn towards the sea and head back the way you came, the at the end of a two mile road is a group of beach hut like homes ranging from large beach huts to modern takes made mainly from wood.
We took a walk on the beach the weather was warm enough to just need a tshirt. Then we went back to the hut to have something to eat and settle in to watching some Madmen episode on the Amazon Firestick we we had bought with us and connected up to the wifi. Whilst we were watching with a view of the Sean through the windows behind the TV we saw a pod of many Dolphins pass by heading east. We were early to bed it had been a long day but don’t before watching the sunset.
I was at a loose end and decided it would be interesting to see if any of my photo’s from Flickr appear on websites other than my own, i.e. were being used without my permission. It turns out is is pretty easy to check using Google image search. All you need to do is grab the URL of the image you want to search for then click on the camera in the image search box paste the URL and Google will return information about the image; whether it is appears elsewhere and images that are similar.
First find your image, then (in Flickr) click on the download icon then right click on the link to the original and select “copy link address”.
Get URL of image
The go to Google image search click on the camera icon (which is search by image) and paste in the URL you copied in the previous step and click on the Search by image button.
Google will return the search results. In the example below you can see that if found no other sizes of the image, but was able to find matching images. In this case the matching images are not the same image they are photo’s taken from the same spot but on different days.
At the bottom of the search results you get the opportunity to see visually similar images, in this case the images all have grass at the bottom, sometimes a building in the middle and all have a blue sky with white clouds.
On Page two of the search results I noticed that the image was mine.
I have a new Gadget a Ricoh Theta it is capable of taking full 360 degree panorama with one shot. It does this by have two lenses pointing in opposite directions, each one with a slightly more than 180 degrees view. The camera then stitches the two pictures together in the camera. The resolution is not great at 3584 x 1792 but they are good enough to publish on web pages as you can see from the example below. The camera have been out for over a year but have they are quite a niche thing and not that easy to get hold of. You can get them new on Amazon and eBay for about £320, they come from Japan, but I spotted a second hand one of eBay I put in a bid for just over half the new price and forgot about it. Next thing I know I have won the auction and a proud owner of a Ricoh Theta. I checked out the images on the camera when I got it and get the impression that the person that had it before had not used it much there were a dozen photos on it starting with some test ones I’m guessing it probably only ever took the 12.
I have been carrying it about for a few weeks now in an attempt to get get a feel for what pictures work and what does not. You need to be a bit careful with which way you point it because you can end up with side dark and one light, so I try to keep the sun to the side so that each camera get the same amount of light. Another issue is that it is impossible to take a picture that does not include your arm, hand and thumb on the camera button, but there are a couple of solutions to these issues, the first is to get a selfie camara holder basically a telescopic stick with a tripod mount on the end, this puts you further away from the camera so taking up less room in the picture, the other method is to use the phone app to take pictures remotely using wifi.
I have an Android phone and there is an app in the Play store for the Theta, which appears to be pretty robust. The Ricoh Theta has built in wifo and acts as an access point, which you pair with your phone then you can access the theta to download and share your photo’s. You can also take pictures remotely, and have a choice of Auto mode, Shutter priority and ISO priority and you can adjust the exposure -2.0 to +2.0EV in 1/3EV Steps. You can also do interval shooting which would be useful for timelapse or hyperlapse sequences. As I said the resolution is not great especially when you view the images full screen but it is really convenient and I and sure to have some fun with it, and the price was good.
I also create panorama pictures by stitching together photo’s using a product called PTGui, my strategy is to take three sets of photos, 6 around at 60 degree intervals and then one up (the zenith shot) and one down (the nadir shot), the sets are at different exposures -2.0EV 0EV and +2.0EV then the software stitches them and uses the exposures to produce an HDR image. The best way is to take the pictures using a tripod and a special bracket which allows the lens to be rotated around the Nodal point of the lens, which avoids parallax issues. However carrying around a tripod is a pain so I also carry a plumb bob and use that to get as close as possible. I have the Pro version of the software so I am able to make corrections for the view point of the camera, which is needed for the plumb bob method as well as the Nadir shot of the tripod method if you want to avoid having the tripod in shot. The brackets can be expensive circa £250 but I managed to make a reasonable one from an ABS pipe coupling, and a tripod and a quick release adapter.
Finally I needed a way to be able to easily display the panorama in all their glory on my site. You may have noticed that in a previous post http://neilbaldwin.nettarka-trail-bike-ride/ I had embedded some photospheres from Google which had contributed to Google Street view, I did not like the way that they were presented and they don’t always work on iPads etc. I have been looking for a pure HTML 5 solution for a while now. There are quite a few commercial packages with lots of features but I just wanted a simple solution, and the other day I found one it is called Pannellum it is open source and free of charge and does the job nicely. It took me a while to get it sorted working out what should go where and the best size for the images. One thing that threw me was that images on flickr threw an error but it turns out that Flickr is the one at fault because they return a strange thing in the get requests which makes the browser complain about a cross site scripting error. Anyway it turns out that images on Google work fine and I publish my photospheres there any how.
My next project will be to create a PHP function to use the code so that I can publish my collection of Church photospheres on a dedicated website. I want to store the the details in a searchable database so that people can search for churches and then see the inside of them. you will need to watch this space for news of that project, but in the mean time you can see the waiting images on my Google plus site here https://www.google.com/maps/views/profile/116324611784531709687?gl=gb&pv=1&tab=1 enjoy.
We were awake at a reasonable hour and took our time getting up, watching TV in bed is a real treat. Breakfast was not available until 09:00 Sutherland House clearly does not cater for business travellers, well not the business I work in anyway.
The plan for the day was Southwold first Helen was going to do some shopping and I was going to wander round town and take some photographs. Then we would drive round to Warblerswick for a walk around the marshes there.
I went to the reading room first I thought I might try a panorama. When I got there four locals where putting the world to right. I looked around and noticed that there was a sign saying that if you wanted to take pho graphs you had to apply and put the application in the box on the door, very strange. I asked the locals who could give permissions they all looked at the guy who seemed to be holding court amongst the he asked if I wanted to take general pictures or specific ones, I said general and he have the nod. I think he was a bit surprised she got my tripod out and started taking 24 pictures, but if got the shots I needed, left a donation and made a sharp exit.
Life is a stony beach
Next I went to see if I could have a look around the lighthouse but it turns out it is only open certain days and Monday mornings was not one of them, so I wandered down to the church which is quite large and very light inside. I asked out of curtesy whether it was ok to take photos and was told it was ok but a donation was required, I obliged. The church has a very high roof which is painted in blue and good at the altar end and bare wood at the other, the windows are very large so it is very light inside. I was due to meet Helen at 1100 so headed back to the high street to buy some, shoe laces and found a couple of interesting books, then headed to the free car park to meet Helen.
Next stop was Warblerwick we stopped at the church which seemed to have a very interesting history, it was clearly quite big in a former time as there were parts which were falling down, it looked like it was similar in size to the one in Southwold but the used part of the building was now just one of the side sections, the marks on the tower wall suggested there had previously been a central section and two side sections.
We drove on to the quay side where we parked up for £3 then started with a coffee and shared a piece of carrot cake at the lovely cafe on the corner. Then we headed out towards the sea at the beach hits and walked along the coast for a while then headed in land and though the reed beds back towards the church we realised that we would need to get a shift on if we wanted to get to the Eelsfoot before 1400 so we took the short route back, then drove to Eastbridge getting to the pub with 5 minutes to spare. We dumped our luggage then drove back to Minsmere RSPB.
Minsmere beach
Helen had beans on toast for lunch I had coffee and a packet of savoury cardboard triangles disguised as a health snack, which Helen had for some reason purchased for me. The weather was really quite warm there was hardly a cloud and not much of a wind, as a high pressure system was over the UK and was hold off surrounding lows. We had a good look around the north bushes area then headed out to the seaside it was perfect weather for a gentle stroll. At the scape hide there was a lot to see in terms of waders LRP and snipe the highlights. I had not seen a snipe for quite some time it was almost becoming my boogey bird, one that is pretty common but you never seem to see.
We headed on to the Minsmere sluice and had a look at the bushes there was not the usual activity there, so after twenty minutes of sitting around and seeing not a lot we walked back to the visitors centre, stopping off at one of the hides where we spotted Green Shank and Green Sandpiper which were very unexpected. Then it was back to the pub for a east and time to freshen up before a couple of pints and Adnams and some pub grub.
I had nothing to do on Sunday morning then I noticed that the London Triathlon was on so I checked the website they were still accepting entries, excellent my Sunday was sorted, the bike would need oiling apart from that I was ready. Actually Mr T was doing the Triathlon I was going to watch. I had arranged to pick up A at 08:30 and we drove to the Excel Exhibition centre via the M25. The weather was great but a not of a chill in the air at that time. The atmosphere was clear and there were nice white clouds in the sky great for taking some photos.
The Emirates Airline (Dangleway) terminus Emirates Royal Docks end
Parking at the Excel wax expensive at £15 but A paid. We wandered to the centre a and grabbed a coffee then contacted Mr and Mrs T who were off the rack his bike and sign in. I went off and took some pictures around the Emirates Airway ( the Dangleway) including some panorama sets. I don’t like to take too many otherwise I have too many to do and sometimes rush them resulting in a far from perfect result. The weather had warmed up and cumulus clouds had joined the cirrus from earlier. All the different elements of the triathlon started and finished at the Excel so we watched the swim the hurried over to where we could see the cycling after one and a half laps of that we headed to the running area then three laps of that and we went to the finish. Mr T did it in about 2 hours 35 minutes and a bit which puts him in the very fits and take it seriously category.
Being home alone while Helen is on a weekend coach trip /song a long I needed Ian Visits website to rescue me by pointing me in the direction of an event to take a look at. 2 things took my fancy a Seeing machine museum in Tooting and the Eid festival in Trafalgar square I had a plan.
I was up early and and checked the logistics as I had breakfast, it turns out the festival starts at 12 and the museum opens at 14:00 not ideal for me I wanted am early start. I umed a and ahed a bit then spotted that the last steam train event on the London underground would be this weekend as part of the 150 anniversary of the tube, I now had a revised plan.
I arrived at Berkhamsted station bought a ticket and the train was already pulled in when I got to the platform perfect timing, the plan was coming together. The 08:31 train was quite busy but not at Berko so I easily got a seat by the window. It was a day train and skipped a few stations on the way in and arrived at 09:05.We passed through some reason on the way but nothing enough to dampen my enthusiasm.
Eid Festival Trafalgar Square London
I was running late the as I only had 15 minutes to get to Moorgate and it helps if you get the Bank line rather the the one that does not go through Moorgate, so I got off the treason that I just managed to catch and starved the journey back to Euston and got back on the Bank branch of the Northern line to Moorgate, once again jumping on just as the doors closed. At Moorgate I headed for the the Hammersmith and City line, the train was running late so I saw it since slowly into the station under steam. There were quite a few train enthusiasts there but not as many as I would have expected. Suitable pictures were taken and posted on Facebook. I had a chat to a policemen who was in my field of view, I had seen him worrying in his now pad and thought he might be a train spotter. My next stop would be Trafalgar square and I figured a trip round the circle line would be best as the trains depart from the next platform over from where I was stood.
After a pleasant journey with a seat I got off at embankment and walked up to Trafalgar Square where the festival was still in preparation. I had an hour to waste so o headed to the National Portrait Gallery I had a vague idea that the BP portrait award was on, I was not to be disappointed. If you are ever in London it is worth a look, it always amazes me how people can paint and it is only when you are within 6 inches of some of the detail that the brush strokes are evident. I have caught it a few times over the years and have always left in awe. I still had time for a coffee before 12 and it was welcome as the last one I had was for breakfast. The National Gallery cafe would be the venue which severed great coffee but tired looking Chelsea buns. The cafe has a queue up part and a table service with waiters in white shirts with aprons, something Helen would enjoy.
London Sewing Machine Museum
I hung around at the top of the square waiting with the masses for the festival to be opened. When it was my first mission was to find something to eat, there were plenty of stalls to chose from I had a Dahl rice and vegetable curry which I eat sat in a cordoned off arrears that the public seemed to think was out of bound but the security guards said otherwise so me and another couple had a whole table each with table cloth and an chiefly view of true stage. The cities were very nice work just the right amount of spice. Google provided me with a bus option to the sewing machine museum, number 88 followed by a 249 to Tooting Bec. The 88 was interesting as it went round the back of Westminster on small streets but past lots of Government offices such as the Home office. I changed at Clapham common, which I had never appreciated the size of it is a massive piece of green real estate. The locals were making the most of it some resting others playing sport tag rugby and volley ball the less common ones that I saw. I got off the bus at Tooting Bec about 20 minutes before it opens. It was not obvious where it was so I had to get my phone out and check the building number.
Shoes at the London Sewing Machine Museum
I went over to the building about 5 minutes early an Asian looking lady was there who asked me whether this was the museum. Then the owner of the museum arrived and said it would be another 5 minutes before it would open. The museum is owned by the the Wimbledon Sewing Machine Co. and is a real gem of a specialist museum. The ate literally hundreds of old sewing machines from miniature ones to industrial table top ones on display in glass cabinets in two large rooms and a few side rooms. I spent so me time looking around an taking some pictures, it was surprising how specialised some of them were built for a single purposes such as joining carpets or stitching eyelets in leather. There were photos and letters on the wall from presidents of sewing machine manufacturers on the walls up the stair way the owner had and/or is a big player in the sewing machine market. The owner looked quite an old and I hate to think what might happen when he is not around to look after it. There should be some scheme like the listed building scheme to preserve the collections that are worthy of preservation. I picked up a copy of ISMACS News the official journal of the International Sewing Machine Collectors’ Society to read on the journey home. By the way if you want to visit the museum is open from 14:00 to 17:00 every first Saturday of the month, its website is here.
ISMACS News
I jumped on a bus but then decided that the tube would be quicker and jumped off the bus at South Clapham where the Northern line goes to Euston without the need to change lines. I got talking to a guy who was interested in photography and said I should take some pictures of the people to in the carriage, explained that I preferred landscape photography he seemed a bit out of it and it was hard to hear what he was saying over the noise of the train, so I was glad when he got off a few stops later. I spent the rest of the journey using the Virgin WiFi at each station to purchase a battery case on Ebay for my mobile phone as I regularly run down the batteries on a trip to London because I use the GPS a lot for navigation and use the screen a lot for writing this blog post.
I got the 15:34 from Euston which arrived on the platform at the same time that I did with a fresh coffee. I got a take away curry from Waitrose, yes my second of the day, and went home for an early night, tomorrow I am back in London to watch Mr T do a Triathlon at or around the Excel exhibition Centre.
I had the day to myself so thought it would be good to find something interesting to do. We have been in a spell of hot weather recently but today things are a bit cooler. A quick look at http://ianvisits.co uk came up trumps there was an exhibition all about Japan at Earls Court. I have become very interested in all thing Japanese since Helen and I spend a week there a couple of Yeats ago.
I dropped Helen and Gladys off at church then headed straight for Berkhamsted station, but my timing was not great as I was between trains so had to wait 20 minutes for the 09:39 which was on time. Earls Court is easy to get to BT tube, Google maps offered a couple of options I went for Victoria then Piccadilly. Despite being cooler it was still hot and getting hotter. Entry was £15 and there were no queues.
Japanese pop stars
I was not sure what to expect but was quite surprised when I got into the hall. There was a food area which was expected, a gaming area, Japanese crafts and lots of demos. What really surprised me were the people taking part in Cosplay, lots of people (mainly late teens or early twenties walking around dressed as Manga/Anime characters. It was a bit like I imagined a Star Trek convention would be. I did a quick tour around to get the general layout of the place then started again but in more detail.
The games area was quite interesting seeing all the latest games from Nitendo and Sega, but that is not really my bag any more. There were some martial art demos and I hung around to watch some of the Kendo fighting, which was good. In another corner there was a professional wrestling ring which was fun to watch. Other spectacles weree Japanese pop artists singing their songs I was surprised at the number of your people singing or clapping along there is clearly a Japanese sub-culture going on in the UK I also so a Japanese male performer in a pink kilt, being very energetic on strange running up and down very enthusiastically which impressed me given the temperature in the hall,
Cosplay people
There was a good amount of stall but most of them were of no interest to me : Swords and knifes, Cosplay accessories, games etc, of interest were some of the crafts, t-shirts, and food. Two stall in particular stood out the Bonsai stall which was next to a Bonsai exhibition, which had some trees that must have taken years of care to get them looking so good, and a Japanese puzzle box stall where you could buy wooden boxes that have panels that slide in various ways to eventually allow the box to be opened. I saw a couple of good t-shirts but noting that gave me the desire to part with money. I did buy some octopus balls or Takoyaki as they say in Japan, which I had some how missed when I had visited. They were very hot but tasted great.
By about 13:30 I had had enough so headed back to to Euston to catch the 13:54 back home to watch the Tour de France, but things did not quite work out well. When I got home I put on some washing then switched the TV on but we seemed to have no power or we had partial power I could not work out was was going on. Some appliances where on (or at least had a display) but other not. After some investigation I measure the voltage in a socket we only had 50V, and a quick check with next door they were out too. So I went up to Hillside for a coffee. It turns out the TDF was on live later as they wanted a time that suited TV viewing figures, so I got to watch it anyway.
When I was in London the other day I took a picture of a large motor yacht or Gin Palace as they are sometimes called. Emelina was moored the seaward side of Tower bridge, when I got home I decided to do some investigating to see if I could find out a bit more. It turned out to be very easy possibly because of the unusual name, and the fact that it was a big yacht.
Emelina is 51 m (167 foot) long and was created by Codecasa boat builders in 2008, it can sleep up to 12 passengers, thats about 3 times the number of people I can comfortably sleep in my house. As well as the 12 passengers there is apparently accommodation for a crew of 10. The twin Catterpillar engines produce and impressive 9788hp and can help the yacht reach speeds of 17.5 kts. I guess this is probably not possible when full oaded with fuel (8o,000 litres) and water (20,000 litres). The fuel can possible allow for a range of 4,000 nm.
A few other facts about the yacht are : it has a Jacuzzi Spa but no helicopter landing pad, the interior was designed by Studio Dellarole and the hull is made of aluminium.
Google also also popped up a link to a site that allows you to see the location of lots of boats including Emelina you can see her current location at the Marine Traffic website (click on the “Show live map button”). When I looked on Sunday she was in Dagenham but now she is moored in Amsterdam.
I did a panorama photo from the riverside which is now on Google maps.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel Rotherhithe Tunnel under the Thames London
Ian Visits came up trumps again the Brunel Tunnel under the Thames is open for the weekend due to a line upgrade to convert from four to five carriages per train. I got in quick and managed to get myself a ticket before that sold out less than an hour later.
I was up early and managed to get the 08:46 to London Euston from Berkhamsted, which unusually had no free seats. On arrival I used Google maps to find out how to get to the Brunel Museum at Rotherhithe. You may not be aware but Google recently announced it had all the public transport times so when you ask for directions not only does it know which trains and buses to use it knows when the next one is. This is a great improvement on trying to read the bus maps that have no road names and then work out the coded bus stop you need to be at. It suggested Victoria line then Jubilee but I fancied the bus so set the options for buses only. 68 then change at Waterloo bridge to the 381. The 68 arrived as I got to the bus stop.
Wapping Tube Station
It was still raining when I got off the bus at Waterloo bridge but there was some sun to the south in the distance which was good because I was lugging three cameras with me. The 381 took me past the Kirkcaldy museum of material testing which I had visited a few weeks before. The bus passed through some interesting areas where you could see that there had in the past been companies that manufactured goods. For example I saw a building with a painted sign for a company that made tin boxes. Further on there is evidence of shipping with old warehouses, pubs with nautical names (The Shipwrights) and even the London nautical school. By the time I got off the bus the sun was out.
Once alighted I followed the signs to the Brunel Museum and the staff there directed me to Rotherhithe station which was the correct place to congregate. I was early but they let me join the queue, but not before I stocked up on batteries for my flash. I would have to wait for the allotted time but thanks to my trusty insulated foam sheet was able to sit down while I waited, all the time the sky got bluer and the clouds more fluffy and white.
Thames Vista HDR
The 1100 tickets were called and we were guided into the closed station, and given blue surgical gloves to put on, then told to gather at the top of the escalators then we were taken down the steps to the platform of the station. First we had to have the obligatory Health and Safety briefing which explained why we had to wear gloves, dirt and weil’s disease so don’t touch stuff and then suck your thumb. We then stepped down on to the track and were led into the tunnel, our guides explained some of the history and features of the tunnel when we stopped every 30 metres. Eventually we came to the next station Wapping where we crossed over and went back up the other side to where we started. Then we left the station via the escalators not forgetting to throw the gloves away and disinfect our now sweaty palms.
As the weather was bright I decided a walk along the Thames path would be nice and provide plenty of photo opps . I followed Jubilee walk which keeps you as close to the river as is possible and you get to see some interesting buildings, most of them dock related so lots of converted warehouses with cranes sticking out of them. Just as it looked like the next shower was due I came across the Design Museum and popped into the cafe for a sandwich and coffee it was pretty average and cost £8.50!
Tower Bridge over the Thames London
Tower bridge was nearby so I carried on and crossed the bridge and attempted a panorama set at the mid point. On the other side was St Catherine’s dock always a good place to take photos so had a wander around. There are old buildings, boats and bridges. From there I headed towards the tower of London, then consulted Google maps for an escape route. At the no. 15 bus stop I got chatting to a fellow photographer who had a spirit level bubble in his hot shoe. I have one but it is a sharp cube that stands proud he had one that was more or less flush. He said he got it from Amazon and with the power of the internet so did I got just £1.99 a bargain.
I alighted at Aldwych and walked over the road and jumped on the 68 to Euston. It was pouring down at Euston and I had 10 minutes to spare before the 14:54 to Northampton . I grabbed a coffee and a paper then headed home to process my photos.
