train – derrickjknight

“Look, He’s Posing”

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This morning Jackie drove us to Lymington for me to take photographs that might be suitable for the walls of Lal Quilla restaurant. Raj had asked me for some a couple of days ago.

I began with a few featuring the building itself.

Gosport Road

The surrounding area includes Gosport Street, and

Quay Hill,

Painter Quay Hill

where the painter working on Sophie’s stopped to pass the time of day with a passer-by.

Quay Hill 1

The King’s Head stands on the corner diagonally opposite Lal Quilla, at the point at which the High Street turns at right angles into Gosport Street. The tavern’s website tells us that

‘Despite dating back at least 300 years, many of the original features of The Kings Head can still be seen today.

The pub is known to have originally also been a bakers back in the day and even now the old bakers oven is still standing, along with the old well which is featured at the centre of the pub.

When you visit The Kings Head you will see the long-lasting beams made from Napoleonic Ships that only add to the character of this old English pub.

The pretty courtyard that we see today was previously used for fish-drying, whilst the buildings adjacent to the yard were an abattoir and fishermans house.

Despite these drastic changes over time, the inside of the pub has remained somewhat the same and the great open fire that cannot be missed is at least 300 years old.

It is these characteristics that, when you visit, make it easy to imagine the pub back in the 18th Century as a regular haunt for the smugglers and sailors that would frequent this famous sailing town.

Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you may even see one of the old regulars who used to pick up pots in exchange for ‘grog’ as he has been said to return occasionally as the pubs very own friendly ghost…’

I doubt that Raj, the manager, would want all the pictures I have produced, such as those of two alleys that can be seen from inside the restaurant, but I did need to indulge myself.

Quay Street lies at the bottom of Quay Hill. The driver who left his van at bottom right of the second picture was to be disappointed when he attempted to deliver a package to a closed shop. Winter hours in these establishments are somewhat restricted. The Boat House Café featured in the first scene is where we brunched,

People on bench

after I had wandered along the quay photographing a row of people seated on a bench;

Young woman on wall

a young woman crouching cross-legged on a concrete wall;

Shadow of young woman

and another casting a long shadow as our paths crossed.

Train crossing harbour

The train aiming for the Isle of Wight ferry traversed the harbour.

Lymington Quay 1

A pair of oriental tourists walked towards The Ship Inn,

the windows of which rippled in the water.

We drove on through the forest and found ourselves at Pilley Bailey, where, knee deep in water or autumn leaves, a group of ponies enjoyed their alfresco lunch.

Pony crossing road

One of these animals decided to cross the road. As I turned to watch it, I noticed

a trio of alpaca and dog walkers.

Alpaca walkers 4

One of the ungulates stopped still, staring in my direction. “Look, he’s posing”, cried his guide, as she strained at the leash.

We were a little late to catch the sunset at Barton on Sea, but the bank of clouds resting on the horizon gave a differently dramatic effect.

This evening Jackie, for our dinner, produced roast chicken, mashed potato, green and runner beans, cauliflower, carrots, and ratatouille. She drank sparkling water and I drank Chateau Bonhomme Minervois 2016.

A Rapid Change Of Light.

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Early this morning we had an avian visitor, in the form of a juvenile robin looking wistfully through the kitchen window, during intervals between frantic flapping. Jackie lifted it up and set it free, but didn’t wait for me to get in another shot.

Unbeknown to us, when we visited Lymington Quay a little later, we just missed Frances and her friends Dave and Kay who also spent some time there.

Initially oblivious of the hydraulic load-lift behind him, a young man dozed on a bench

against the backdrop of the Ship Inn,

with its lichen painted roof.

Tourists gathered around The Boat House Café,

waited for the cruises to begin,

or travelled on the ferry port train.

while more regular visitors prepared the rigging of their boats,

and a pair of kayakers set off between moored hulls.

As the quayside filled up and the hot sun rose in the sky, we set off for the cooler, less crowded, forest.

At East Boldre an imperious boxer dog occupied his own personal observation platform. (See comments from arlingwoman and 10000hoursleft below. The dog is an Old English Mastiff)

Cyclists enjoyed their track around the Ladycross Estate near Brockenhurst

where dappled sunlight played on the woodland trees,

and Jackie saw a dinosaur emerging from a dried up bog.

In this weather, ponies tend to shelter under trees, utilising their fly whisks.

It seems they have learned that those in white clothing need less shade.

Even before we arrived home, we could see mist rolling in from the sea. I didn’t need to suggest we went and had a look at it. My Driver just turned away from the house and made straight for the coast, where

the Isle of Wight was invisible,

and a light pall lay over those on the beach.

This afternoon we received a delightful surprise when the three people we hadn’t known had been at the quay arrived for a visit. We spent an enjoyable few hours together, naturally involving highly satisfying admiration of the garden.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s splendid chicken jalfrezi and savoury rice.

Not a bad day, really.

P.S. Barrie Haynes put the following additional information about the lifting device on my Facebook page: ‘As an amendment to that, the heavy duty ones (as in this case) do use oil when going down. It is released through a small orifice, thus making the tail lift go down slowly and safely with a heavy load and taking the stain of up to a couple of tons off the operating mechanism. So you were right after all Derrick it’s Mechanical (two big chains) Electrical (separate battery on lorry) and Hydraulic (for safety). For anybody reading this, never use a tail lift on a hired vehicle unless you are happy you know exactly how to do it. They can remove fingers!’

Where’s Sheila?

A prolific red climbing rose was becoming a hazard as it stretched across the front door. It needed tying up. But there was no trellis left available. Fortunately we have found a number of large pointed metal spikes rather like giant Meccano struts, in various parts of the garden. I banged one of those into the stony soil with a heavy mallet, threaded garden wire through it, and used it as a hawser.

Just after one p.m. Jackie drove us to Brockenhurst to collect our friend Sheila who is spending the week with us. Whilst waiting for Sheila I saw my first ever bearded sparrow perched on a Leyland cypress apparently watching the trains go by. I wondered whether it might be collecting train numbers, as I had done in the 1950s along the railway path between Wimbledon and Raynes Park, clutching lists published, I think, by Ian Allan Publishing. Chris and I would eagerly check off in the books the numbers carried by the trains that would pass our house. As I pondered this and walked onto Platform 3 to meet Sheila’s train, I noticed one of those very numbers on the rear of a Lymington link service waiting for the late arrival from Clapham Junction. I don’t have those books any more, so I couldn’t check it, but the railwayman on the platform assured me it was unique to his carriage. I wonder, are they still published?

Beside the railway stands a carriage which has seen enough days to perhaps have featured in one of my old lists. It now appears to house a cycle hire firm, offering a way of exploring The New Forest.

I had plenty of opportunity to memorise number 158888, because her train was late and Sheila wasn’t on it. With an hour to kill before the next one, we repaired to the Forester’s Arms for lunch. I enjoyed fish, chips, and peas, and most of a pint of Ringwood’s Best. Jackie’s Baked potato with tuna and salad was equally to her taste.

Afterwards we returned to the station in good time for the next train.

Sheila wasn’t on it.

Now what? I thought as I climbed up this steps from the platform then turned right towards another set that would lead down to the car park. I then stopped, turned round and walked the other way towards the stairway to the ticket office. I thought there could be just a chance that a lost lady might be lurking there. And there, as I descended the stairs, was Sheila in a phone box, about to make a call to our home which would have been unoccupied because we were at the station waiting for her. She had, having missed the first train, decided to come by a different route, arriving on a different platform.

We then had a pleasant drive through country lanes back home, spent an afternoon catching up with each other, and then enjoyed the culinary skills of the head gardener. Succulent sausage casserole, crisp mange-touts and carrots, and creamy mashed potato and swede, were followed by a lemon cake that Sheila had brought, with evap. Hoegaarden was imbibed my Jackie, the rest of the merlot by me, and lemonade by Sheila.

Sun And Wind

Jackie provided her usual chauffeur service to and from New Milton for my London trip.

The four coach train was as packed as usual. One gentleman kindly removed his luggage from one of the few available seats so that I could sit down. The gentleman opposite me was fast asleep. His baggage lay between his feet which stretched under the window seat. Settling one buttock on that and another on the centre one I fitted my legs around the somnolent passenger as demonstrated in the photograph. He woke with a start at Brockenhurst and asked where he was. When told, he relaxed, but didn’t change his position. This group disembarked at Southampton Airport. They were replaced by others, but the newcomers had to fit round me, which was preferable.

It was a dull, blustery, noon as I approached the Archduke to meet Norman for lunch. Somehow or other, my great friend Wolf had managed to reach the railway bridge between the arches from with the restaurant presumably derived its name to provide the appropriate embellishment.

Maybe he used the crane.

My choice for lunch was the sea trout. Norman chose belly of pork, and we both opted for the pecan pie for dessert. We shared a bottle of Sicilian shiraz.

By the time I emerged from the restaurant to be blown along South Bank and across Westminster Bridge to visit Carol, the temperature had dropped to finger-tingling levels, but the sun had now come out, silhouetting the Houses of Parliament, peeking through crevices in the decorative architecture; outlining the faces of photographers’ subjects; providing side lighting for Gothic greatcoats and the supports of the bridge; setting young girls’ hair alight; and lending a translucence to the glass cases of ornamental lamps.

Jackie and I have recently begun the watch the Father Brown series on television. This is based on G.K.Chesterton’s classic stories of a sleuthing Roman Catholic priest, and has led me to begin reading them. I got through a few on the train today.

Stranded On Bramble Bank

Jackie has been collecting little mice from a gallery in Milford on Sea. Each morning these charming little creatures, noses in the air, have been found in different locations. One of Flo’s Christmas Dragonology books contained a model which could be removed, assembled, and hung somewhere. Put these two facts together and you might be able to work out where the mice had moved to in their nocturnal flit.

This morning Jackie and I drove to Hythe on Southampton Water, and took a trip along the pier:

This antique structure, served by an ancient train, stretches across the sea where a ferry takes over the transport of passengers to Southampton. We took the train on our outward journey, and walked back to the High Street, seen from the pier, and back to our car.

Renovation work on Hythe Pier is a continuing process. Much of the planking has been replaced, although some is still in need of replacement. The waiting room exterior could do with a lick of paint, although the interior has a charm of its own. Older, rusting pier supports are visible from the modern stainless steel railings. One method of raising funds lies in the planking engraving which contains many messages, such as memorials to dead people, marking of visits, and at least one proposal of marriage.

The train from a bygone era, with views across Southampton Water, still carries travellers the length of the structure on its rust-coloured rails, and, of course planes that were not invented when it began its service, cross the skies to and from the airport.

When I overhead a comment in a conversation between two gentlemen walking along the footway, I realised they must be talking about the car transporter ship, Hoegh Osaka, which had run aground on Bramble Bank at 21.30 yesterday evening. The snippet was ‘all the press photographers are on Calshot Spit’. Naturally, we sped off to Calshot where the ship still lay stranded. The vessel had been on its way to Germany, when the grounding occurred and twenty five crew members were rescued.

The small beach at Calshot was swarming with sightseers. Anyone who has followed my ramblings across Westminster Bridge will know that I tend to be more interested in what is going on with the viewing crowds than in the attractions themselves. When, indicating the watchers assembled on the shingle, I offered my observation that ‘there’s the picture’, to one of the photographers, he simply smiled and kept his lens firmly aimed at the stricken vessel and its attending tugboats. This little village was packed with cars lining the roadside and the grassy banks alongside the beach huts, one of which, after Dylan Thomas’s ‘Llareggub’ from ‘Under Milk Wood’, was named ‘LLamedos’. (Read them backwards).

On our return journey, Jackie dropped me at Milford on Sea and I walked home by way of the Nature Reserve, Sharvells Road, Blackbush Road and the back of Shorefield.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s exquisite penne bolognese followed by a choice of syrup or raspberry jam sponges with custard or cream. Jackie’s beverage was Hoegaarden, Ian’s Peroni, and mine the last of the Margaux.

Clapham Common

It was a bright and sunny day for my visit to old friends Wolf and Luci. Jackie, as usual drove me to and from New Milton Station for the train to Waterloo. From the terminal, I took the Northern Line to Clapham Common, along the South Side of which I walked, crossing over to Elms Road, right into Abbeville Road, and left into Hambalt Road to their home. I returned home by the same methods.
Maple leaves were falling on the common where work forces were engaged in clearing them up, mostly with extended ‘big hands’ to aid the process. Blue pigment on a particularly gnarled trunk produced an interesting abstract painting.
Pigeons, rooks, and Canada geese scratched about in well clawed soil, and Bullfrogs overlooked the redundant cattle trough, now planted with flowers.
Also apparently redundant, certainly unusable, is the drinking fountain provided by The United Kingdom Temperance and General Provident Association. This grand sculptured structure, even if it were functioning as it did in Victorian times, would probably be eschewed by the various gentlemen occupying the benches as they glugged alcoholic beverages straight from their cans. The lions embellishing each side would probably never again have their thirsts slaked by the blocked and rusting fountain.
When I lived or worked in London I had enjoyed a monthly lunch with my friends. Unfortunately this frequency is no longer possible but whenever Jackie and I see them it is equally pleasurable, as it was today. Today Luci produced a tender lamb casserole, wild rice, parsnips, and brussels sprouts, followed by her trademark flavoursome crustless pumpkin pie. She and I both drank Wolf Blass red wine, while Wolf drank his customary apple juice.
Luci wrapped up a helping of the dessert for Jackie, who enjoyed it as much as I did. After that superb lunch, I didn’t join my lady for dinner.
On my return home I was greeted by an e-mail from Luci containing very good photographs of Wolf and me taken with her Samsung mobile phone.

I Found The Lady

Jackie drove me to New Milton to catch the London train this morning. Although I arrived about 25 minutes early, it was touch and go whether I boarded the conveyance in possession of a ticket.
There was a traffic diversion in the town because it was market day. This delayed us a little. The ticket office was unmanned for twenty minutes. Quite a queue built up. I bought my ticket after the train had pulled into the station and leaped through the closing doors clutching wallet, tickets, railcard and change as well as my bag. A woman struggling with a wheeled container that wouldn’t fit the narrow aisles somewhat delayed my passage to a seat.
But, no matter, it was a warm and sunny day.
No matter, that is, until it was revealed that the other train that should have been attached to our four coach one at Southampton Central was not ready. We continued with our limited number of carriages. It became rather crowded, and rather warmer.
From Waterloo I travelled by the normal route to Norman’s new abode, and back.

It was quite clear that the concreted strip traversing the John Billam sports ground off Preston Road was a footpath.
There is a notorious scam or confidence trick I once saw performed in Central London. It remains amazing to me that this game still draws in punters, usually in crowded city streets, who believe they can outwit the shyster with his sleight of hand. He will stand by the side of the thoroughfare with playing cards in his hands, using some light, portable platform and encourage passers-by to ‘Find the Lady’. The lady in question is a queen, often of diamonds. Victims are enjoined to pick her out from between two aces. They will already have seen a stooge managing to pull this off and consider themselves capable of doing the same. They part with their stake money, and lose it. Sometimes time and again. Besides the trickster and his accomplice, the team is supplemented by others, strategically placed at convenient corners keeping an eye out for the police. When the law arrives a signal is given, the platform is lifted, and the players disperse.

Not believing I could discover the secret, I kept my money in my pocket on that occasion. However, today, there on the sports field, many years later, I found the lady.
Norman provided a lunch of succulent roast chicken, splendid savoury rice, runner beans, and piquant red cabbage, followed by apple strudel and cream. We shared an excellent 2011 bottle of unpronounceable Greek wine.
When we moved into our new house we stored a number of boxes of our most fragile or precious glassware and crockery in Helen and Bill’s garden shed. Jackie collected it today and I helped her unpack them after she collected me from the station and brought me home.
I have had little time for reading in the last month, but on the train made decent headway into Desmond Seward’s ‘The Wars of The Roses’. When I have finished it I will begin a welcome present that was awaiting me this evening.

Barrie Haynes has sent me a copy of one of his novels, ‘Victoria’s Park’, as a gift for my ‘splendid new library’. He tells me he ‘painted the cover picture using household paint, a plastic knife and half a pasting table’.

Finally, here is another aquilegia from the garden, and two of the myriad varieties of cranesbill geraniums: