Author: Ian

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528km – Part 2 More Fells

While the second day in the Lake District was spent wandering around Maryport on the Cumbrian coast I did learn a reasonable amount about the Romans in Britain. The weather while there was pretty poor with low visibility and often rain.

Maryport Harbour Wall
Maryport Harbour Wall

I visited the Roman museum there and I was going to visit the town’s museum about the sea and fishing but it’s one of those museums that only opens on even numbered days or something like that. There is, nearby, the only discovered remains of a Roman Milefortlet which was a fort placed every Roman mile along the coast to protect the country.

Roman Milefortlet 21
Roman Milefortlet 21

There was also the remains of a salt pan from medieval times.

Salt Pan
Salt Pan

All fish and meat was preserved using salt and much of that salt came from pans like this where the water evaporated leaving the sea salt. This is much like the process used in Maldon. Later that day I drove back to the campsite via Buttermere and the wonderful cake and ice creams that are served there.

Maryport Boat
Maryport Boat

So, my last full day in the Lake District was going to be walking more fells. I decided to try and complete the Langdale Pikes. These are quite close together so once up at height it should be easy to get around. That is if the weather was clear. I started my walk later than normal because the weather was due to clear after midday [it was more like 15:00 but you know, they can’t get it correct all the time]. It’s also worth noting that the temperature at altitude is lower than that in the valleys. So, around 600m up the temp was around 12C rather than the 20C in the valley, along with wind this means clothing must be carried.

I took a route up from the New Dungeon Ghyll hotel up along Mark Gate towards Loft Crag. My first stop was at Thorn Crag, which is written on the map a little way off from where it is and I used a second app on my iPhone for working out where I was with more accuracy. Pretty much all the while I was at the top I was in cloud. This only abated after I had spent a little time at High Raise.

So, here’s the list of fells and pikes reached and where they figure in the Wainwright list:

  • Thorn Cragg  [not on the list]
  • Loft Cragg [number 93 by height – 2270 ft]
  • Pike Of Stickle [number 83 by height – 2323 ft]
  • Harrison Stickle [number 71 by height – 2403 ft]
  • Pavey Ark [number 88 by height – 2288 ft]
  • Thunacar Knott [number 77 by height – 2351 ft]
  • High Raise [number 57 by height – 2500 ft]
  • Sergeant Man [number 69 by height – 2414 ft]

A couple of things stick in my mind; rock climbing up to the top of Pike Of Stickle which was fun but only because I missed the footpath by about three metres. The footpaths were not clear to me at the top an I did a lot of dead reckoning about taking bearings etc. The cloud didn’t help much either. Whenever there was a break in the weather I tried to look for footpaths and remember where they were going.

View From Pavey Ark
View From Pavey Ark

Eventually when I got back down the mountains it was much later than normal for me. I try to walk early in the day to give myself time in case things start going wrong but the weather forced me to walk at a particular time.

Finally I leave you with a picture of a Roman article. I mean, it’s a penis isn’t it?

Snake Temple
Snake Temple
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The Meg

This afternoon I traveled to the Cineworld cinema at Rochester to see The Meg. The tide was high and the Medway looked nice and pretty as I drove by various parts of it. I rated this film on IMDB and you should read about the scoring system in this communication. Here’s my tweet showing my score:

Well, what can I say about a film that is almost an exact remake of Jaws? It’s not exactly Jaws but it’s pretty close. Firstly, before I give spoilers about the film, I want to make a point about one of the adverts. It was for Facebook and it was trying to say that Facebook is sorry for the way they have allowed selling of data and fake news type things. They are trying to rebuild the trust in the company. Look, I don’t want to seem stupid, but Facebook makes its money from advertising and selling your data. If they full stopped your data being used then the company would have to find another income stream. Anyway, they say that they want Facebook to get back to doing what it was originally for. Keeping in touch with families and friends.

Except that’s not what Facebook was originally about. I mean it is for most users but Facebook started as an online way to rate the attractiveness of students at a university. Just saying.

So, the film? It was a pretty good fun film. There were, of course, many moments where I thought it was absolutely bollocks but those were easily ignored because the story was kinda OK.

So, the idea there is a thermal layer below which more species lurk is pretty fine, placing it so far down isn’t though. Ships and submersibles can’t get there. Also, there’s a massive issue with the nuclear submarine at the beginning being so far down, they can’t get there. Along with the idea that they were attacked above the thermal layer by a Megalodon which couldn’t get above the layer or the sub was below the layer but no-one at that point knew about the layer. That occurs in the first few minutes. But, let’s ignore that shall we?

When they track the Meg attacking boats they decide to go and investigate in their own boat. But they had a HELICOPTER on the research platform. Strange choice really.

Their ship can travel faster than a Meg through the water, this seems pretty poor. I love the fact that they had twenty minutes to get to a shallow area to trap the Meg and in those twenty minutes they managed to rig up many extra gadgets to try and kill the shark.

How come when they got to the shallow area it was really deep for the underwater shots?

How come you can see really far in water? Pretty sure you can’t.

Anyway, I still enjoyed it. Those you expect to die, do. Those you want to live, do. They all seem pretty happy at the end of the film even though there has been massive death and destruction. I guess we ignore all the pain.

Right at the end of the film they projected the French word for the end:

Fin

I laughed. I didn’t notice anyone else laughing. Oh well.

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528km – Part 1 The Lakes

Just over a week ago I drove to the Lake District to spend some time camping and walking. My main objective was to escape the 30C heat in the South East and replace it with more normal 20C temperatures in the mountains, well, in the valleys anyway. I camped at Burns Farm camp site and it was well sited, within the peaks of Latrigg, Blencathra and Clough Head.

Burns Farm Campsite
Burns Farm Campsite

In this picture you can see Latrigg and my tent highlighted with arrows.

That first night I drove up to the Under Skiddaw car park and walked the little way to the top of Latrigg. It’s nice to see the lakes from this angle and gaze down on Keswick. Then I drove into town and walked along the banks of Derwentwater. It is so easy to take gorgeous photos of this lake in the sunset.

Derwentwater
Derwentwater

So, on the Sunday I got up and made coffee in my new cafetiere I bought solely for camping trips. The coffee was nice. The previous day I had checked out parking spots for my Sunday walk and I had decided to park at Thirlmere village hall car park where the parking was £2 for the day and the footpath I was planning to use started at that spot. When I got there on the Sunday though there was a notice up saying that the car park was being used for a private event for two days. So I headed 500m back and parked at Legburthwaite Car Park which turned out to be free!

I headed up the mountains via Stybeck Lane and then up towards Brown Crag. Brown Crag isn’t an official Wainwright Fell and so while pretty it doesn’t count towards my total.

From there I walked up towards Whiteside [number 84 by height 2317 ft]. From there it was a reasonably simple ridge walk to the following listed mountains, I used my walking poles for the first time and I found them useful for the open trekking rather than steep climbs.

  • Raise [number 12 by height 2889 ft]
  • Stybarrow Dodd [number 21 by height 2770 ft]
  • Watson’s Dodd [number 40 by height 2584 ft]
  • Great Dodd [number 19 by height 2807 ft]
  • Calfhow Pike – not on the Wainwright list
  • Clough Head [number 74 by height 2381 ft]

I wasn’t sure I was going to complete the last two peaks because there was a very long walk back to the car if I completed those. As it was I chose to do them anyway and the walk back hurt but was nice and fun.

The view from Clough Head was quite stunning.

View From Clough Head
View From Clough Head

There were two choices for the route down Clough Head, one along a very clear footpath [when seen in satellite view] and one down a steep scree path which is much steeper but shortens my walk back by some distance. After chatting with friends I chose the red scree path and it was fine. It was quite steep and thin but it was easily passable. In the picture above you can see a little of the bottom part of the path.

Once I got back to the car I drove the short distance to The Lodge In The Vale and had a lovely Persian cake with a cup of tea. It was very much deserved.

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Freakangel – Zigfrid von Underbelly

Last night coincided with a charity gig in London and so I ensured my position was sufficient to be there. It took place at Zigfrid von Underbelly, in Hoxton Square, which is the basement of a steak house as far as I could tell. There were four bands and the money raised went to the Beat Cancer charity which is a pretty good cause. So, here’s my review:

The first band up played about five songs. It was mostly electronica with some signing. My notes say:

Two blokes, woman green hair. She looked nervous. Electronica. It was ok. Nothing special. Not my stuff but they interacted well.

When I say they interacted well I think I mean the main male signer was busy with the crowd but then he also organised the whole event.

DEP
DEP

The second band were called Room 1985 and it certainly felt like their set was 1985 years long. It was Indie mixed with prog rock and it was pretty boring. There were some lyrics but they weren’t interesting. I was polished but fucking dull. Of note was the guitarist who played left handed and a standard strung guitar upside down, that was quite cool. I did not take a photo of them.

NeonSol
NeonSol

Thirdly were Neonsol a Danish band which was mostly upbeat europop with a hint of electro, it was good dance stuff but not really dark enough. The “drummer” played roughly two pads on the machine and I wondered why he was there!

Finally Freakangel were on. I’d listened to their stuff over the previous couple of weeks and it was pretty good. A decent heavy guitar with aggrotech over the top. The shouty vocals work and I actually don’t mind them in this case.

Freakangel
Freakangel

Things of note were poor sound quality for the first 10 minutes. There was no guitar sound in the beginning and it was worrisome as there was definitely something missing from the sound. Just before the band Smith and I had gone outside to get some air but it was actually colder in the basement with people jumping around than outside [FYI it’s about 30C today]. I don’t know whether to mention the fact that the drummer was female, in this day and age it shouldn’t matter should it? Everyone can do whatever the fuck they want and it shouldn’t be a “thing”. I guess it’s still not that common. The audience was at least 50% female which does not happen within metal.

Freakangel were pretty good and I think I’d like to see them again in a slightly busier dedicated venue with decent sound.

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You’re Welcome

So, while travelling to Maldon, of salt fame, in Essex, yesterday I passed two things that amused me. First we should have a picture of Maldon.

Maldon, Essex
Maldon, Essex

More importantly we should have the things that amused me. Here we have Tom Tit Lane:

Now, Tom Tit is also Cockney Rhyming Slang for shit.

The next geographical amusing thing is Butts Green Garden Centre, again in Essex, although over to the east of the county, which is the weird part of the county.

So, as I named this communication, you’re welcome.

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Therapeutic Massage

A short while ago I wrote about the Maidstone Sports Injury Clinic and Wellbeing, it was advertised at a gym in Maidstone. I explained that most of the stuff offered probably doesn’t work.

Today I look at Therapeutic Massage because I don’t really know what it is.

The Maidstone Wellness thingy has a page on the Massage and it explains what it is:

Therapeutic Body Massage works the soft tissue of the body, where knots, tension and muscle tightness can be found. It is from working into and around these areas that Therapeutic Body Massage can help ease stress and muscular tension.

To me that sounds like a massage. It seems that someone will massage you and you will feel better. I don’t think I have a problem with that unless there are specific medical claims made on the same page.

Guess what? There aren’t any specific medical claims. All the benefits are a bit shit and vague so that we don’t have to worry about them:

  • Reduction in muscle spasm, pain and tension
  • Release of endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers
  • Promotes relaxation, therefore reducing stress and anxiety
  • Improves blood circulation
  • Improves lymphatic drainage
  • Improves mobility

I guess if you stimulate someone then you create more blood flow and most of these claims are probably not too bad. Whether that does any good I don’t know.

I’ve had a look in PubMed, here are some of the results discussed:

Comparison of blood flow changes with soft tissue mobilization and massage therapy.
Comparison of blood flow changes with soft tissue mobilization and massage therapy.

Now, my comments. Firstly this was published in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine so that automatically means it’s bollocks. However, here’s what they found: someone’s calf when rubbed with something warmer than air temperature warms up. The killer line in this study is “a rise in temperature THEORETICALLY indicates increased blood flow”. Amazing!

Therapeutic massage of the neck and shoulders produces changes in peripheral blood flow when assessed with dynamic infrared thermography.
Therapeutic massage of the neck and shoulders produces changes in peripheral blood flow when assessed with dynamic infrared thermography.

I have the same criticisms for this paper. The journal is bollocks and the whole process is bollocks.

The anatomical study of the major signal points of the court-type Thai traditional massage on legs and their effects on blood flow and skin temperature.
The anatomical study of the major signal points of the court-type Thai traditional massage on legs and their effects on blood flow and skin temperature.

This one is from a different journal, this time the Journal of Integrative Medicine, which is a bollocks journal. Note that in the conclusion they state that the results might not be clinically relevant. Quelle surprise.

This next paper seems more realistic although the abstract is barely abstract it does say that it’s all a bit vague really.

The mechanisms of massage and effects on performance, muscle recovery and injury prevention.
The mechanisms of massage and effects on performance, muscle recovery and injury prevention.

Well, it seems that massage and blood circulation are common claims but there isn’t really anything to it as no-one is able to define what circulation means. This is classic alternative “medicine”. They make deliberately vague claims because those claims aren’t medically recognised terms and therefore don’t need medical evidence.

I reckon that having a massage won’t do you any particular harm. It might even make you feel better and more relaxed. Much like reading a book or having a glass of wine. I doubt there are particular health benefits to having a massage but if it feels good, do it.

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Timing

I’m currently working through the tests and track challenges on Gran Turismo. This is largely due to a corrupted save file that lost my 400 or so cars. So, I decided to start again. It amused me that one of my sector times was:

The Devil's Coming
The Devil’s Coming

I was then amused even more when I was typing in “The Devil’s Coming” into the WordPress media file editor the following tweet appeared in my desktop side bar.

The guy’s a lying prick. Ha ha.

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Mission: Impossible – Fallout

My last movie review was a break from tradition and I’m not sure whether to return to a particular format or not. You should probably see this communication on my rating process. I went to Rochester cinema to see Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Now it had been on my radar that this one was the best in the series or something like that. I don’t read proper movie reviews, unless I see a film that has me really confused, or where the score on IMDB was a lot different from the one I gave it. The metascore on IMDB for this Mission: Impossible is 86. That’s an overall review of 86% by critics. So, I have for you my score out of 10:

This film was utter shit. I got really bored. I would have left the cinema if it hadn’t been for two people in the row of seats blocking me in, so that places this film along with Van Helsing on my scale. I spent quite a lot of this film silently screaming:

I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON

I think there might be people who could explain to me what happened and who was dealing with whom and what the politics were and why they were in Kashmir. There were two bombs in the same village? Because there’s a glacier there? I don’t understand. This film was, and I say it again, utter shite.

There was an opportunity for it to be good. Just one though. SPOILER ALERT. Right at the end when the sun shines on Ethan’s face, if that had been the bombs I would have applauded. I would have stood up and cheered. But it wasn’t and so this film was bollocks.

A couple of things I noticed though. Firstly, the helicopter used above London had the registration G-DEUP which I thought was funny because it sounds like giddy-up. I sniggered and nodded at this.

You can buy the helicopter! Click below.

Then there’s the case of the identical women. There was a woman trying to kill Ethan or the baddie, Ilsa Faust. I’m not sure. Then there was the only woman Ethan loved, Julia Meade-Hunt, his wife I think. To me these people looked the same. I couldn’t tell them apart. I was somewhat surprised when they both appeared in the same frame.

I’m not going to say much about the indestructibility of any of the characters except, THEY WOULD ALL BE DEAD after the first impact.

Last thing, microwave transmitters don’t work that way. The film just says microwaves because it sounds like science. They could have said things that really do work but scriptwriters don’t generally do science.

I should suspend my disbelief and that would be fine if the script or story was any good. I love a well made science fiction film. I can cope with FTL travel and time jumps and interplanetary travel. I can cope with aliens. I can even cope with mystical powers and magic. But the story still has to be good enough so that these things don’t really make it onto the radar. Pretty much every stunt in the MI film would have killed Ethan and so it didn’t do well with the story line part. I am still not really sure what happened or why.

I looked at a few of the IMDB reviews from critics to understand what they liked and the three I read all stated that this film was a great summer blockbuster. They did not say it was a good film, just that it was the best action movie for a summer release. Well, that explains a lot I think, it gives you the level of shit this film is.

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Quite Warm

Well, with temperatures hitting 33C today it’s time to write some stuff about this. I mean it’s so hot I have adjusted my plans for the day to keep indoors as much as possible. The hot weather is lovely. There, I said it. I can’t remember feeling cold and I am wondering about all my cold weather clothes, but it is nice to finally have a proper summer.

It feels as though the last many years have had summers where the skies have been mostly grey. While it’s been warm, the cloudiness has detracted from the feel of a proper summer and the country has looked dull. This year, the weather has been blue skies and proper clouds. It’s been good. While I was alive in 1976 I don’t remember anything about that summer. I broke my arm and the plaster kept going soft. That is all I know, but I have zero direct memories. Having looked it up on Wikipedia that summer seemed vicious. Worse than the current one in terms of temperatures.

My main problem with this heat is social. People are going to die. There will be a bump in the total deaths because heat kills people. We know the grass is pretty brown at the moment but those human deaths will come. Whether there’ll be a big news thing about it I don’t know.

The biggest problem with this weather is it highlights the problem of anthropogenic global climate change. Humans are causing a massive change in the way the Earth’s weather systems work and it will quite likely cause wars. The current heatwave pretty much covers the entire northern hemisphere. Everywhere is having a massive issue with the heat. The 1976 heatwave was pretty localised. While weather does not equal climate we should be aware that these events seem to be coming far more prevalent than they were. most predictions tell us that the extreme weather events are becoming more common. So while those stupid fuckers in the right wing press keep saying this isn’t as bad as 1947 or 1976 they don’t seem to realise that isolated events are now more common.

In this country the winters are going to become more extreme along with the summers and it doesn’t really look like there’s a massive move to try and counter this. When we study the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere we can see that we are already past the point of no return. There will be utter damage to the climate. Humans have caused this. Humans have also known for about 50 years that we are causing this. There are heavy metal songs from the 1980s going on about climate change FFS.

Eventually these changes are going to cause a massive change to the way of life. Governments around the world should be preparing their populations for this. Everyone needs nudging in the correct direction. There needs to be less individual transport. Flying needs to be reduced. Consumption needs to be reduced. Power consumption needs to be reduced. It all needs to change. Everyone needs to understand that the things they take for granted and assume they are entitled to will be gone. The world needs to change.

I am not an optimist about any of this. I don’t think that any of the political systems currently in use around the world will do anything because of the way they work. I don’t think anyone is properly preparing for this. If I expect the worst then maybe I’ll feel very slightly less bad when the billion displaced people can’t find acceptance in any country once their land disappears below sea level. I mean we can’t even accept those refugees and asylum seekers currently displaced by the shit in the current world.

Hopefully I’ll be dead before the water wars start.

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About 5 Miles

Spent a lovely time yesterday at the beach at Seasalter. It’s just west of Outer-London-Whitstable. The horizon fascinated me because of the things that can be seen.

Whitstable - the view form Seasalter
Whitstable – the view form Seasalter

Now the iPhone panorama feature didn’t leave the horizon quite as wanted but I have made an annotated version for you to explain what can be seen – just.

Seasalter Annotated
Seasalter Annotated – click to enlarge, should open in new tab

I suggest you get the full size picture by clicking on the picture above and then refer back to this page.

A

Shellness – A beach, a naturist beach,  and some posh houses on the Isle of Sheppey. 3.3 km away. There is a statue here of the Short Brothers, of aircraft fame [note to self – must visit].

B

Shoeburyness and Southend – Towns in Essex across the Thames Estuary. 23.5 km away. Other things of note would be Southend Pier and the Shoeburyness Boom, an anti-submarine device.

C

The Redsands Fort – an Army defence structure in the Thames Estuary, 14.5 km, one of the Maunsell Forts – [note to self – must visit].

"Army" style fort (Red Sands)
By Russss – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

D

The Kentish Flats Offshore Windfarm, 15 km, – a 139 MW wind power generation station, which has produced little energy during this heatwave as winds are too low.

Fort and turbines.JPG
By Charlesdrakew – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

E

Whitstable, 4 km away. The tower is part of Brett Aggregates.

The title of this communication essentially deals with the question of how far you can see to the horizon if you stand on the beach. If you are about 6 foot tall you can see about 5 miles, there’s mathematics to get this.

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