View from Oban Bothy

View from Oban Bothy

Tuesday 5 March 2019

Midgebite Ceilidh Band in action, Saturday 2nd March

It's always great fun to play with Midgebites: the band has fun - therefore the audience has fun....and the whole thing escalates until we reach critical mass..

What's not to like?

This was Saturday's ceilidh in Stretford, a young lady's birthday celebration.

L>R: Bill, Brian, Emma, JW, JJ

I let a young lady member of our audience take a few photos with my Lumix TZ70....she did a far better job than I could have.

The band in action (inaction?)



All very great fun - I can't wait for the next one!

Tuesday 26 February 2019

Favourite Photos

Over recent years I've categorised many of my photographs as my 'Favourites'.

Here are some of them, in no particular order.  Quite a lot them actually.





Cameras used have all been digital, including: 

Olympus mju400 (weather proof, poor low-light performance),  

FujiFilm Finepix S1500 (unreliable, eventually scrapped) 

A very forgettable Canon compact (very prone to moisture ingress and dreadful battery life, eventually scrapped)

Two bottom-of-the range Lumix compacts (both good)

A Lumix TZ70 (quite good, but not as good as I was hoping) 

A Lumix G3 (good)

Friday 22 February 2019

A 12 mile Plodders Walk

The good folk of the East Lancashire LDWA have recently re-started their 'Plodder' walks, shorter walks of around 12 miles.

This particular walk kicked off from outside a pub (obv) in Ringley, to the west of Prestwich / Whitefield.. The pub, The Horseshoe, was a Thwaites house, just in case you were interested....which you probably were.




18 walkers, well it was 20 walkers if you counted the dogs, gathered at the appointed hour and we trundled off at a brisk pace.

It always surprises my how easy it is to follow 'green' routes, even in well populated or industrial areas, and so it was.

We crossed the River Irwell and then walked through Clifton Country Park, heading in a south-easterly direction, through a lovely green corridor, to Clifton Junction and then to Prestwich Forest Park. All really quite nice.

The route passed some interesting features relating to the mining history of the area.





It was good to catch up with East Lancs once again, they're a great bunch. There were a few new faces in attendance, the group doesn't have any problem attracting new members. It's a very friendly and active group. I really should get out with them more often.

The lunch stop was in a park where we had the luxury of park benches to sit on. Nice.






Suitably fed and watered, we were off once again, now on the return leg, heading.through Philips Park and then picking up the Irwell Sculpture Trail which followed the course of a disused railway for some distance.




Then it started to rain. Oh well.

We were soon back on tarmac and within a few minutes the Horseshoe pub hove into view. This suited many, the rain was properly raining now and many dived into the pub for beer and shelter. Not me though, not this time. I needed to get back home.

Thanks to East Lancs for a nice little walk, I'll be back for another one soon.

Where we went (anticlockwise):


 Around 12 miles.
 

Thursday 21 February 2019

A night with a Madwoman. And a gear test.

It was all a bit last minute. I needed to get out for some serious brain-straightening peace and quiet, plus I had some new(ish) kit to test out.

I packed my rucksack and travelled by train to Edale, alighting in the late afternoon. I scuttled up Grindsbrook Clough in the failing light and once at the top, headed east (East is good) along the edges to a nice little spot by Madwoman's Stones.

It was dark by the time I was putting the tent up, but the sky was clear and the moon was shining brightly - and it was damned cold. I grabbed a couple of litres of water from the trickling stream at Jaggers Clough and got my tea on the go

My Plan, given the lovely clear skies, was to spend a bit of time taking photographs by moonlight. The Plan, like so many plans, failed. By the time I'd eaten and sorted my kit out it had clouded over. And then it started to rain. And then it got very windy. VERY windy.

Ho hum.

I was checking some new kit out: a NeoAir X-Therm, a down-filled balaclave (for sleeping in) and down-filled socks.

The socks and balaclava all came from AliExpress for around £15 each.


Balaclava: 85gms, Down socks: 105gms


All this kit worked superbly well, I spent a very warm and cosy night in spite of the horribly cold conditions. I was so warm that I had to unzip my sleeping bag and remove the balaclava during the night.


 My wind-battered Akto

Leave no trace




 My water source at Jaggers Clough....a bit peaty!
Jaggers Clough

 Descent into Edale

Next morning I headed down by Ringing Roger, back into Edale for my train home.

Good bits:
a) All the kit I took out for testing worked well
b) I had a nice overnighter.

Bad bits:
a) I forgot to take a compass (tsk).
b) I've decided that my Caldera Cone meths stove really isn't up to winter camping trips.
c) I missed my intended train home 'cos of phone call...so I had to drink filter coffee in the cafe by the station....so it wasn't ALL bad!

Breaking News… 21st Feb 2019

Open LiveWriter and Blogger are once again talking to one another

A blessed miracle!

Almost. Photographs won’t post.

This was better than last week when NOTHING would post.

Tuesday 5 February 2019

Test Post, images added in Blogger

Test post to try to identify the latest Open Live Writer / Blogger compatibility problem.

Original post was text only and posted without problem using OLW.

If I try to post with images from OLW the post is rejected (Error 400).






Text in between two added images


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