Birds and camera lens

Just a quick catch up blog. Nothing much happening at the moment. Planning out the veg garden for the summer. Looking forward to that.

Bad news is that my telephoto lens on my camera is broke. Don't know how it happened, just tried to use it at the weekend and it wouldn't zoom. Going to have to save my pennies to get a new one.

Spend Saturday at Sue's parent. Whilst Sue was doing her good daughter bit and gave her mum an hour long lession on how to use a PC, Sue's dad and I sat watching the birds. They have a few feeders in their garden which use almost constant use. Even the local male phesant came up to pick up the scraps. What a beatuiful birds when you light shines on it. New birds to add to my Hampshire 2008 list were Marsh Tit, dunnock and partridge.

Sunday was pottering around the house. Didn't get anything like I wanted or should have done. Did set up the new bird feeder station that Sue gave me for Valentines day. Put out some Nyger seeds in a feeder. Now I'm not sure if its connectied but within a few hours we had a new visitor to the garden. A grey wagtail. First one ever in the garden that we've seen and a new addition to my Hampshire 2008 list, which now stands at 59. Only 20 below what I'd seen in the whole of 2007!

The Kindness of strangers

A funny thing happened on the way to work yesterday. I missed my normal trail (0648 Eastleigh – Bournemouth) and I was cursing my luck when it was announced that there was a broken rail at Brockenhurst and that replacement buses were being arranged. Oh great so I’m going to be well late for work. Caught the next train to Southampton, well OK not the next one as it was full, so I caught the one after. It was only 2 mins behind and joined the waiting throng of passengers stood outside Southampton Central waiting for the bus to take us to Brockenhurst where train were running again down Bournemouth and beyond. There must have been 200+ people waiting. Some getting rather annoyed. I just hoped that there was going to be a fleet of buses as we all wouldn’t fit in one vehicle. Train staff came out and said they were looking for the passengers that was on the 0601 service from Southampton. That’s the one an hour before the one I was supposed to be on but missed. People started to mutter about how those people must have been waiting for two hours for a bus. So maybe us later passengers were not so badly off after all and it made no difference at all that I missed the train Or maybe it was a ploy by the train staff… They are good at that sort of thing these days. One way to calm down a group of disgruntled passengers is to point out that there are other passengers who are worse off? Perhaps? I wouldn’t put this past South West Trains to do this. Did you know that research has shown that if the announcement that the train is late is done using a woman’s voice then there are less complaints. Something South West Trains knows all too well and will try to use a woman to announce train delays. Crafty buggers aren’t they.

Anyway there I was at Southampton when I should have, just wondering when a bus was coming. When a elderly gent in Range Rover pulled up. Wound down his window and said to a group of us that he was heading off to Brockenhurst, we any of us like a lift. The guys either side of me jumped in. I jumped in. Then two people, obviously work colleagues, argued about who was going to fill the last place in the car. I’ll wait said one, no said the other , you go on I ‘ll wait.. I insist that you go, I don’t mind and so it went on. All very British. Still one eventually jumped in and off we went to Brockenhurst. Turns out the guy had just brought his wife up to Southampton to save her waiting for the bus and he decided he might as well give a couple of people a lift back to help them out. Very good of him. Really kind. Top man. Makes you have faith in human nature again.

Anyway got to Brockenhurst where the trains were doing a sort of regular shuttle services down to Weymouth, no hint of a timetable.. I arrived at work only 15mins after I would have done if my later train had run. And nobody at work suspected that anything was wrong and that I had such an adventure getting there that morning..

Viva the revolution

Gosh, its been far too long since my last blog. Sorry about that dear reader.

Well my biggest news is that I’ve been out of the country again. Plane spotting trip to Switzerland. The annual World Economic Forum was being held in Davos with visitors coming from all over the world. Most of the visitors flew into Zurich and it was here we stayed two nights. Loads of executive jets were around. We had a spot of bother once when all us spotters got move away from the end of the viewing area. The Pakistani President was just about to get on his place, which was parked very close to the viewing area. So close that when he arrived and got off his plane, a group of people were spitting at him from the viewing deck. So rather than move him and his plane away from the building, its us poor spotter that got moved. I ask you, is that fair? Viva the revolution!

One further night was spend in Geneva, where there was also some great aircraft, but on route we visited the Balloon Festival at Chateaux D’Oex What a great day this was picture at Air-Britain Photo Site . Up in a valley in the Swiss Mountains, some snow on the ground. More snow on the top of the surrounding mountains. Together with lots of interesting Hot Air Balloons all making for a good day out. The action lasted all day, rather than the UK versions where there is a more and evening lift, with very little in between. Also noticed that in a UK event, the balloons are tied to a shed load of 4x4’s which the balloonists insist on. In Switzerland only the retrieval crew had a 4x4, OK they need one.

Apart from that things have been going on as normal. Nothing much to report. Planning out the veg garden for the summer. Looks like we’ll get our driveway and front of the house sorted out, which will give me some extra plots and possible a greenhouse, when I can afford it. Haven’t done any bird watching recently, though I did add a new species to my life list on the aforementioned trip to Switzerland. Just south of Strasbourg was a White Stork. Nice one.