Tuesday 31 July 2012

Olympics - Equestrian - Team GB wins silver!

Julia went to see Team GB win its second silver medal of the games today, and almost rubbed shoulders with the future King and Queen too! Here are a few pics from the day.
 




Camilla, Princess Anne, Wills, Kate and Harry




Silver Medal in the (nose) bag

Zara Phillips receiving the silver medal from her Mum! Princess Anne.

Sunday 29 July 2012

Olympics - Canoe and Kayak Slalom

We've gone Olympics mad, and why not, it's probably the only time we'll have the Games in London in my life time. We already have a few tickets for events but yesterday I managed to get some more for today to see the canoe and kayak slalom at the Lea Valley White Water Centre for myself and the kids, and more for the canoe and kayak sprint gold medal races on 8th Aug. Below are a few pics from our fantastic day out. Next Julia goes to see the equestrian at Greenwich Park on Tuesday, me and Jamie go to see the gold medal match of the men's singles table tennis on Thurs and then Sophie's at the men's hockey on Fri. Phew!











Monday 23 July 2012

A few moths from last night

A few pics of just a few of the moths that came to the bulb in my garden between around 10pm and 12am last night. Unfortunately no hawk moths paid a visit but numbers wise it was by far the best night (of 3) that I have had the bulb out in the garden. Unfortunately, with work this morning I had to call it a day around midnight. I am already looking forward to the next session. By the way, I am very new to moth ID so forgive me if I got any any of the below wrong (right) - please let me know.     
 Leopard Moth

 Scarce Silver-Lines

 Great Oak Beauty (?)


 White Satin Moth

 A moth party!



 Help!!
 Swallow Tailed Moth

 Orange Moth (?)
 Large Emerald

Sunday 22 July 2012

Olympic Torch Relay - 5 days to go!

Olympic-mania hit sunny Hornchurch today as the Olympic torch travelled through the London Borough of Havering, on its way to Stratford and the Olympic stadium. Thousands came out and enjoyed the once in a life time chance to see the torch travel passed the end of our street. We're really looking forward to the games now. We have quite a few tickets now, for athletics, hockey, football, equestrian and table tennis, and we are hoping the GB Team can do us proud.
     



Saturday 21 July 2012

Wild Mushrooms - to eat or not to eat?

Found these growing in my back garden and they look tasty to me? I've done a little research online and I think they are fine to eat. The biggest one is about 6 inches across and I bet if fried in butter they'd be delicious for breakfast tomorrow. Any thoughts anyone?   

Olympic countdown - 6 days to go

With just 6 days to go until the Opening Ceremony of London 2012, things are really starting to heat up in and around  east London. My office is just a few hundred yards up the road from the Excel Centre, where many Olympic events will take place, and I can see the Olympic stadium and the Dome from my office window.

The new cable car that crosses the Thames from north Greenwich to Custom House is now open, and being just 5 mins and 2 stops on the Docklands Light Railway from my office I took a ride in the week.   




In Stratford itself Olympic fever is really starting to grip. I luckily have managed to get tickets for a few events and went to pick them up on Thursday evening from the ticket office.


Stratford Town Centre



Most exciting of all was that I was lucky to be able to hold an Olympic torch yesterday. Someone who works in my office ran a leg of the torch relay and brought in the torch for everyone to see.
 
 This is not a great photo but you will see my office with 2 huge cruise liners moored up along side to provide accommodation for some of the thousands of people shipped in (boom boom) to work on the Olympics. Rumour has it that the FBI is housed up in one, as the ships are next to the UEL (University of East London) campus, where the USA Olympic team is based. 


Finally to wrap an exciting few days, Seb Coe, one time Olympic gold medalist and now Olympic Ambassador, paid a visit to our office building to meet some of the staff who will be working 24/7 during the games to help keep the area running i.e. bin collections, street cleansing etc   


Sunday 8 July 2012

Lime Hawk Moth

Last night I managed to squeeze in an hour of mothing, before the heavens opened yet again. Within 5 minutes of putting the bulb on this beautiful Lime Hawk Moth arrived. It was only the 2nd time I have had a chance to use the bulb since getting it a couple of weeks ago, so to ge ta hawk moth on only my second attempt was fantastic. I'm still waiting for my 1st Elephant Hawk Moth, but I am hopefuly if it ever stops raining, I'll have one on the garden list before summer is out.  
 

Tuesday 3 July 2012

You win some, you lose some

Having wasted a good chunk of last weekend not seeing the Little Swift on Merseyside last weekend, I am not going to waste much more time on this post.

Suffice it to say, the bird done the dreaded Fri night flit having been reported all week. Typical.

We (me, Dick and Steve) spent 8 hours on the motorway, intersected by 5 hour mostly spent (with a good 50 others) in Morrisons car park, New Brighton, checking out the same swifts/house martins over and over again, until it became clear that the bird was not there.

We thought we had the bird almost as soon as we arrived. Steve called a bird from the car, over one of the churches. We jumped out as it headed away in the distance. It appeared to have a white rump, and no white belly. We jumped back into the car and pursued it, but lost it almost immediately. Surely that was it we thought. With no photos, and no further sign though, we concluded it must have been a distant housemartin, with the light playing tricks on us.    

Now I am not going accuse people of reporting a bird that they have not seen, or should I say not 100% sure what they've seen, but it was interesting to speak to a local who had been on site every day last week, and he said after last weekend it had not seen it once, despite it being reported from where he was. Interesting?  

Anyway, there's no point getting the hump. There'll be another one, one day. I just hope it is tracked down to a roost and I can get there for 1st light.