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Archives for March, 2015

My Tree

March 21st, 2015

A long long time ago I found an acorn next to the reservoir near our house. I carried it all the way home and planted it in my flower patch at the end of the garden. And now look: it grew into a mighty oak tree!

oak_scale

At the time I planned to build a tree house in it. Unfortunately, the growing process is considerably slower than the planning process.

Although I remember the finding and planting, I had no idea in which year this happened. My mum and I did a bit of detective work using old photographs and it definitely wasn’t there in 1993 but by 1996 it was taller than me. So I reckon it was planted in autumn 1994. Let’s hope it has another 20 years of successful growing…

Aylesbury

March 8th, 2015

Yesterday was unseasonably warm and fine so I headed off for an epic adventure from High Wycombe to previously unvisited county town of Buckinghamshire, Aylesbury. I could have followed the sensible route and headed directly north but that would have been boring. Instead I veered east to visit the pleasant Hertfordshire town of Tring and then tacked back to Aylesbury along an extension of the Grand Union canal.

Unfortunately due to my chronic inability to estimate distance I arrived in Aylesbury rather late and had to rush for a train without exploring, rendering the whole expedition somewhat pointless. What I saw of it appeared to be a larger-than-expected traditional market town. Never mind, perhaps I can return there to start a future adventure: the fabled citadel of Milton Keynes is tantalisingly close…

The highlight of the route was this viewpoint on the top of Coombe Hill. This is the highest point in the Chilterns and you can see right over the Value of Aylesbury beyond. The monument is to casualties of the Second Boer War.

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Another pleasant surprise was Tring reservoirs where I joined the canal and you can see in the last few photos below. Walking along the causeway surrounded by water made quite a change from forests and the whole area was incredibly peaceful at the end of the day.

Nuremberg

March 5th, 2015

So after I’d been to the trade show in Nuremberg I took a day of holiday and did some sight seeing! Nuremberg has a lovely “old” town most was destroyed during the second world war and the rebuilt, although you can’t tell this immediately. Some buildings are original however, such as this cathedral and the merchant house containing the fantastic Stadtmuseum.

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I spent a few hours exploring the castle which dominates the town and also has a pretty good exhibition on the history of Nuremberg as the capital of the Holy Roman Empire. The city walls and moat that surround the town are also very picturesque, but you can’t walk on top of them. :(

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I also visited the toy museum (great) and the Albrecht-Dürer-Haus (probably better if you’re German). Both included in the museum day-pass!

On the way back I had a few hours to spare so I stopped off in Frankfurt and spent an hour wandering around in the dark and rain. There wasn’t much to see: it mostly seems to be banks and other offices. The most interesting building I saw was the office of the European Central Bank. Perhaps symbolically, one of the lights in their logo is broken.

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