Sausages

"Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made." - attributed to John Godfrey Saxe C19th American poet. I don't care. This weekend I will be eating sausages made by EW Revett & Sons, a butcher in Woodbridge, Suffolk, which makes the finest sausages in the world.

Hooray for the NHS

Nick and I are due to fly to Northern Norway in a fortnight for 3 weeks of ice climbing, first on Senja island and later around the Lavangen area, not far from Tromso. Yesterday we drove down to the Saltdean chalk cliffs for training. Here's Nick making shapes. Not long after taking this photo I pulled a lump of chalk off the cliff with my axe. The lump landed on my knee. After I got over the initial pain I found I could stand, so thought nothing of it - until a couple of hours later by which time the knee was swollen and wouldn't support my weight. After a painful night I hopped into the Accident & Emergency at Whittington Hospital this morning where I was xray'd and told I have no fractures or torn ligaments. Nick is mighty relieved that the trip is still on. He hasn't taken out any insurance yet.

This land is your land

Nothing much to add. I like the message on Woody Guthrie's guitar, too.

The snowman cometh

A big dump of snow is forecast for London tonight. Combined with Rhiannon's 30th Birthday party, mad fun is bound to ensue.

Sometimes when you run

Sometimes when running you can be surprised by a feeling of pure joy, which bubbles up from nowhere and comes from simple pleasure in exercise in the fresh air. At other times you can come out in goosebumps at the beauty of what's around you.

Running along the bund separating Southwold harbour from Walberswick marsh this evening I felt both. Later in the run I saw a Muntjac deer bounding ahead of me through the heather on Walberswick heath. It kept ahead of me for a while then stopped and watched me as I ran past, about 10 metres away.

Street food in Kolkata

Here's a mad and beautiful little gem from Mongo Denoon and the ok catering success.

Chilled pet #1

Chilled pet #2

Dry-tooling at the Westway

Last night we participated in a Fig Four dry tooling competition at the Westway. Nick's friend Ramon had signed us up to take part. Somehow we'd got the impression that this was just a bit of fun and that plenty of the participants were, like us, new to dry-tooling. So our hearts sank yesterday when we read on the Westway website that the competition would feature "elite climbers" and take place on the "super-steep" outside wall. Gulp. The less said about my attempt the better, a complete debacle. Nick did much better. Here's a clip of his first go. Ramon and others climbed superbly. As Nick put it, our effort compared with Ramon's was like watching Rotherham play Barcelona.

Roller-skating Santas

Not quite sure what these two were up to, but they made me smile.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

I took this photo yesterday after seeing the new le Carré film at the Barbican. The film is excellent. This scene seemed to match the mood.

Proper adventure climbing

Here's a video of Alex Honnold, James Pearson, Renan Ozturk and Mark Synott new routing and adventure climbing in the deserts of Chad.

Flags and fireworks

Southwold being Southwold there are flags and bunting everywhere. It's good that events like the Royal Wedding are helping to rid the union jack of its Nationalist and Hard-Right taints. There’s nothing very threatening or exclusive about a flag that’s got a picture of Wills and Kate grinning in the middle of it.

There were fireworks last night on Gun Hill.

It was a clear night and a strong north-easterly wind made for some interesting effects as it blew the light trails inland.

New camera

I’ve only ever owned Point and Shoot cameras, but last week I had a rush of blood to the head and went out and bought a good digital SLR. Over the last couple of days I’ve been taking my first steps into a whole new world: of shutter speeds, lenses, light sensitivity, metering, apertures, white balance and so on and so on. It’s dizzying, but exciting too.

Yesterday I packed the camera and cycled over to Reydon Wood. The wood is well known for bluebells at this time of year, and there were a couple of serious photographers already wandering its paths, carrying large tripods and enormous zoom lenses, when I arrived. As one of them passed me, he remarked “too little sun, too much wind”. I mumbled something in agreement, feeling a complete charlatan.

Anyway, a couple of the photos came out ok.

I cycled on, further inland to the small old flint church at Blyford. From a previous visit I remembered clear glass windows and a whitewashed interior, which I thought might offer good light for a photo on a cloudy day.

Someone had put flowers in an alcove under a window, for Easter:

On my way back to Southwold I passed a pig farm, and a cock pheasant in a field. The photos I took aren’t very good but I’ve posted them anyway. Some of you may be getting a little bored with all the flower shots.

East Suffolk at Easter

I’m up in Suffolk for a few days. The long weekend has been sunny and warm, without a cloud in the sky.

I got up early on Easter Friday and saw the sun rising over Bramfield church. Double-click the photo to see the rabbits in the field.

The Suffolk landscape is at its best just now, with bright green spring growth and flowers everywhere.





The apple tree in R and C’s garden is in bloom.

Early on Easter Monday, R and I took Poppy for a walk across the heath land and through the woods around Westleton. We heard a nightingale singing in a gorse thicket.



Being with a dog makes walks a lot more fun.