Early Risers.

[Purley Oaks]

Ah flights to Oz, we have only been in Economy but we were a lot younger then. One trip was via Japan which was very cheap and included overnight accommodation in Tokyo on way out and Narita airport on way back. Well worth that longer trip just to see Japan.

 

We have use Economy premium across the pond in the past but recently even Economy basic is working out a lot dearer. Our Xmas avoider is over £1k return.we paid less than that for return in Economy plus on Virgin a couple of years ago to same destination.

 

So with current earnings it’s going to be Economy for foreseeable future but carefully picking plane seating arrangement

I think the Xmas fare-hike starts around a fortnight before the day itself, so imagine that leaving a little before would pay off.

[roundhouse]

Same dates as two years ago but about double the airfare.

[Ozexpatriate]

Now to Australian beasties - 

A lot is made of such things. We even have a thread dedicated to them here.

 

Partly I am inclined to laugh them off as a grand exaggeration and partly I am inclined to pile on with tales to frighten the anxious. When I catalog the number of things that bite and sting they do add up.

 

Horsefly bites do sting. Mosquitoes are really annoying and can ruin an alfresco evening

 

I will say that I've never encountered a venomous snake in a well-touristed or suburban area. My dad had quite a fright one day to find a large snake coiled on top of his beer fridge in the garage. (It was not venomous.) We did have a bearded dragon (a lizard about 1.5m long) that lived in the back yard for a while. He was quite magnificent and not at all aggressive when left alone. Caution of course should be exercised when hiking, the more so in less trafficked areas.

 

The cane toads have a 'yuk' factor but unless you try to ingest them they're not a threat. Schoolboys like to say that if you lick the toxins they secrete, they are hallucinogenic.

 

Birds abound. These vary from the welcome (like parrots and kookaburras) to the noisy (myna birds and plovers) to the frightening (nesting magpies). In Australia the 'magpies' are not the same species as Britain but a large form of piebald crow and are very territorial. Being dive-bombed by a magpie can result in bloodshed.

 

Wading in streams in sub-tropical rainforests will very often result in leeches. There are some very nasty stinging plants in the rainforests - those that I am familiar with have broad spade-shaped leaves covered with what look like short hairs. Brushing bare skin across the hairs will raise nasty welts. There are ticks too.

 

Most swimming beaches are fine and some (like the Gold Coast) have nets to mitigate sharks. Shark attacks are rare and usually only encountered some distance off shore where the surf boarders go but not where most bathers go. Frankly the rip tides and undertow in the surf are far more lethal. Care should be taken, and swimming in areas marked by flags and monitored by live savers is recommended.

 

Sometimes there are little jellyfish (we called them bluebottles, with a spherical bell, half the size of a golf ball, and a blue stinger). You can see them stranded at the waters edge if they are present. Sometimes there are sea lice. These can make you itch in sensitive places. I would not swim in the ocean the far north without checking whether the nasty marine stingers (box jellyfish or irukandji) are around. Nor would I swim in any creek or waterhole in the far north that might be inhabited by crocodiles.

 

I've never encountered a redback spider. They like dark, moist places like wood piles and outhouses.

 

I have awoken to the soft thump, thump, thump of a mob of kangaroos completely surrounding my mates and me, sleeping rough in a national park.

 

I have encountered a koala in the semi-wild. It was in a surprisingly exposed place - in a tree with an ocean view directly above a very busy track and quite close to suburbia. It did not however, drop down on the foreign tourists, fangs bared.

[TheQ]

Evening Awl,

 

Coming home I passed the school bus, normally, no problem as its a short wheelbase coach on our narrow windy roads.. This time there was some difficulty, for some reason a full size double-decker was used (possibly it was an old Olympian).

Just getting the car past going the other way meant me pulling half into a driveway.

 

I think the chances of gaining more modelling tokens have fallen, 3 pairs of adjustable boat supports have just arrived, along with 1 roll of marine rope. Unfortunately I've ordered two rolls of rope and both are showing dispatched. I'll leave it a few more days to see if it turns up before bending an ear.. .

 

SWMBO just got a phone call from the docs calling her in. She had X-ray's for her knees a couple of weeks ago, the results show what she knew, her knees are knackered. She was asked to report in tomorrow, but we've just dropped the car off for the MOT. So she's got an appointment for next week, it's not as if it's going go make much difference.

 

Just before her call, we got one from the garage, estimate £700!!! As I suspected we've got warped discs, plus brake pipes, service and the mot..

[trisonic]

Afternoon all. 

Just a quick hello.  Anyone who wants the real intel on "Michael" look here: https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/graphics_at4+shtml/152003.shtml?gm_track#contents

 

Amazingly the (then) former Hurricane will be a storm reaching the western approaches by next Monday. If you look at the various pages closely you'll see it will decline in strength fast once over land but will then increase again back over the gulf stream but as an Extra Tropical Storm.

 

In haste, Pete.

[Barry O]

in the middle of our visit to Oz this year (February)..a brown snake (quite able to cause you lots of damage was found in the CBD in Melbourne - not far from one of the pubs we visited.  Not nice!

 

Baz

[Ozexpatriate]

... you'll see it will decline in strength fast once over land but will then increase again back over the gulf stream but as an Extra Tropical Storm.

Coincidentally the term "extra tropical storm" came up on the weather last night. Locally the Columbus Day Storm of 1962, which occurred on October 12 was described as an "extra tropical storm" from the remnants of Typhoon Freda.

 

The ocean here is too cold to support a tropical storm, but apparently the "extra tropical storms" are possible at relatively high latitudes.

[Tony_S]

Wet on Saturday would seem to be the forecast for our weekend. Not too bad on the days we are travelling.

[jamie92208]

Our first stop in Carlisle was at the McVities biscuit factory outlet shop and we bought a ridiculous amount of biscuits for just over £8, although half of them are earmarked for the MRC club nights.

I presume that McVities is what used to be Carrs. Carrs was rail served until the late 60's and had their own fireless loco to shunt the yard. When I was 13 I had a week's railrover for £1 2s 6d and spent an afternoon at Carr's, as a friend of my mother's was the personnel manager. I spent an hour or two with the loco crew. Not for the faint hearted but here is a grinning 13 year old me having just driven the loco.

 

As to my comments about Churchills prose, here is the quote that I mentioned.

From Vol 1 of his history of WW2, The Gathering Storm page 27.

 

 

Thereafter mighty forces were adrift, the void was open, and into that void, after a pause there strode a maniac of ferocious genius, the repository and expression of the most virulent hatreds that had ever corroded the human breast - Corporal Hitler.

 

 

Jamie

[Simon G]

I presume that McVities is what used to be Carrs. Carrs was rail served until the late 60's and had their own fireless loco to shunt the yard. When I was 13 I had a week's railrover for £1 2s 6d and spent an afternoon at Carr's, as a friend of my mother's was the personnel manager. I spent an hour or two with the loco crew. Not for the faint hearted but here is a grinning 13 year old me having just driven the loco.

Yes, it used to be Carr’s, but quite a long time ago now. There is no rail link to it now, and definitely no fireless loco. The last of those I saw was at the Glaxo factory in Ulverston in the late 1970s.

[jamie92208]

Yes, it used to be Carr’s, but quite a long time ago now. There is no rail link to it now, and definitely no fireless loco. The last of those I saw was at the Glaxo factory in Ulverston in the late 1970s.

As far as I know it was linked into the lines at Carlisle Canal. When I was there it was vans full of flour and sugar, in sacks, in and vans full of biscuits out, including emergency energy biscuits for the MoD. I think that the loco was an ex Admiralty one that had worked in an ammo factory. The following day I toured Kingmoor shed as my mum's friend knew the shedmaster and then went down to the Ratty and joined the preservation Society that week and have been a member ever since. I was allowed the freedom of North West England unaccompanied. My parents would probably be in trouble with Social Services nowadays. That was in the summer of 1966 which was the last year that I was eligible for half fare as I was 14 in the October.

 

 

Jamie

Edited October 10, 2018 by jamie92208

[New Haven Neil]

Polly, your drawings are excellent, and the harbourside at Port St Mary is instantly recognisable!  That harbourmaster - a good friend of mine over many years as we met long before we moved here 16 years ago, he is now retired too.  Runs boat trips to the Calf of Man in the summer nowadays.

 

PS - we have had that view of the Ben - from a kayak - eek!

Edited October 10, 2018 by New Haven Neil

[Two_sugars]

Locomotion have a Barclays fireless loco among the collection, from Imperial paper mills I think.

 

 

John

[Simon G]

Guess who struck lucky today! A couple of weeks ago, I booked a Ratty guarding turn for today, not knowing it was going to be such a lovely day. Wall to wall sunshine, nice and warm, what could be better? I had three turns today, all on the diesels, but I still enjoyed every minute.

 

The picture below shows the fruits of the Ratty’s latest driver recruitment campaign, as Ginnie awaits clearance to take the final train of the day out of Dalegarth!

 

[Purley Oaks]

Evening all

 

Very warm here today, too, walked to Sainsbury's at 7.30 this evening in shirt sleeves, almost like southern Spain.

 

This morning we saw our first skein of geese flying in from the north-east to over-winter here - wonder if they were almost tempted to return north again by the heat?

 

Roofer finished, scaffolding down, things looking better with the world.

 

Hope your evenings are going well

 

Mal

[AndyB]

Go on - you know you want to!

 

Update after meeting up with my mate this evening:

Andy: "I got your lad an early Christmas present. Or late/very early birthday present."

Mate: "Ohhh, that's kind. You shouldn't have done."

Andy (sotto voce): "Never a truer word, never a truer word...."

 

So, my conscience is clear. He can't say it was a surprise.  

[Barry O]

Eye specialist quite proud of his laser work. Eye pressures are now normal..but I still need to add eye drops every day until he rechecks  pressures in 3 to 4 months time...

 

Been to the MRS tonight.. lots of new layout building going on...not sure what is happening but it is great to be part of it!

 

Sleep well all!

 

Baz

[PhilJ W]

Evening all from Estuary-Land. The water supply is back on in the clubroom but at very much reduced pressure. The cause is a leak beneath the building and in one of the layout rooms the (concrete) floor is bulging and has a crack due to 'heave'. At least the wooden building has absorbed a lot of movement only a couple of joints have opened. The water company is going to lay a new pipe after which the ground should hopefully settle back. In the meantime we have had to clear the room in question. Hopefully once the new pipe is laid the excess water under the building will drain away quickly. 

[BSW01]

Good evening everyone

 

I had quite a god session in the pool this morning, but it was busier than last Wednesday. Still I managed around 100 lengths, but I lost count after about 30 minutes. I averaged 20 lengths in 15 minutes and I was in the water about 1hr 25 minutes or so.

 

Earlier this afternoon, out of the blue, I had a phone call from one of my former apprentices. We had a chat for a while and she informed me that she’s expecting her first child in February. She’s wanted a child for quite a while and had all but given up hope of ever having children, but she recently met a someone and the rest as they say is history! She joined the company in 2007 aged 28 as an adult apprentice so this may well be her only child.

 

Tea went down well with Charlie, Ava, Evie and Max, everything was eaten, no surprises there then.

[BSW01]

Oops, I hit the post button too soon. Anyway, here’s what I missed off from the above post.

 

I’ve been pondering about a solution to the pick-up problem with the BoB loco I was working on yesterday. I’ve come up with a few of possible solutions.

 

1/ Drill a hole right through the chassis. Solder a fine wire to the pick-ups, pass this through the hole and connect this directly to the chassis.

 

2/ Remove the cast pin on the chassis that is used to transfer the current from the pick-ups to the chassis. Then drill a small hole and insert a short length of brass rod, which would be slightly longer than the original pin. Hopefully this will make better contact with the pick-up’s contact pad.

 

3/ As above, but instead of a brass rod, insert a small spring instead, which will then apply pressure the pick-up’s contact pad.

 

Goodnight all

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[laurenceb]

Night awl

[trisonic]

Coincidentally the term "extra tropical storm" came up on the weather last night. Locally the Columbus Day Storm of 1962, which occurred on October 12 was described as an "extra tropical storm" from the remnants of Typhoon Freda.

 

The ocean here is too cold to support a tropical storm, but apparently the "extra tropical storms" are possible at relatively high latitudes.

Quite right, it depends on water current temperatures. Where you are you get a cold current from the north whereas in the north atlantic the gulf stream still rules - which is why the British Isles do not have such harsh winters as places in Canada on the same latitude.

 

Best, Pete.

[PhilJ W]

Goodnight all.

[southern42]

' Night all and nos da.