Hobbies
In the Fens
It takes a week to cycle from Penzance to Berwick. It took me 40 years. Because on the way, I wanted to include every town in England, in what amounted to some two years of [more…]
Travel
20th Century
Postcard From Birmingham, Part Five
There are two schools of thought, volunteer for everything, never volunteer for anything. I knew a chap sent to the South Atlantic. At Mount Pleasant airfield in what the Guinness Book of Records describes as [more…]
History
Postcard from Saint Nicholas
Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat, Keir Starmer is stealing pennies from the old man’s hat, and we continue our journey around the Isles of Scilly. Tresco was once called St Nicholas, or [more…]
Culture
A View From The Greenhouse; Edizeone Apulia (Prima Parte)
And so to Italy, but not before making sure the Buildings and Maintenance team had been fully drilled in the routines required to ensure I didn’t return to any kind of disaster. I needn’t have [more…]
20th Century
European Journey 1953, Part Three – Hamburg
You climb into an aeroplane at Amsterdam Schiphol and as soon as you are comfortably airborne, you order an excellent dry sherry and nibble at a picnic lunch which you don’t really need. You try [more…]
19th Century
Postcard From Birmingham, Part Three
Chamberlain Square Having checked out the Council House and Town Hall during our day trip to Birmingham, myself and Mrs AWS nip around the back and into Chamberlain Square, the centrepiece of which is the [more…]
20th Century
European Journey 1953, Part Two – Amsterdam
I have been watching them all morning; those bicycle wheels going round and round and round the Leidseplein. There is something hypnotic about it. Something a little frightening too. Like watching life on a perpetual [more…]
20th Century
European Journey 1953, Part One – Brussels
A cold east wind, blowing in short, stinging gusts all the way from the Russian steppes, swoops down over Brussels. It sets all the gilded weather-cocks spinning madly, that boisterous wind. It slaps the cheeks [more…]
History
Postcard From Birmingham
Myself and my wife fussed over our Kitkats and coffees and peeled off the Standard Premium antimacassars to make it look as though were travelling First Class. Little did we realise our day trip to [more…]