Tuesday 31 July 2007

You either love it or hate it

With all the rain and flooding we have had in the last month, the conditions are perfect for mosquitoes and we are in for a plague of the wee beasties.

But help is at hand; the way to beat these beasties is to eat MARMITE.

It seems as holidaymakers in Norfolk are the first to be attacked.

Best get down to the supermarket and stock up; nothing like a bit of panic buying.

It will be interesting to see if marmite sales are up over the next few weeks.

Alternatively take Vitamin B.

For more on this, and a handy cutout and help guide visit here



It must be a slow news day on Fleet Street (I know most of the papers aren't on Fleet street anymore).

Sunday 29 July 2007

T.V. Update

The first episode of Mountain is on tonight at 9.00pm on BBC1. The listing for this episode seem to be a bit confusing, so its either North Scotland or Wales.

This is followed on BBC4 by a new series of Wainwright's Walks at 10.00pm, Julia Bradbury tackles Britain's favourite mountain Helvellyn.

After this Griff Rhys Jones has another show A Pembrokeshire Farm, which is GRJ restores his own farm in north Pembrokeshire.

Monday 23 July 2007

Hunka Hunka - Burnin Love

Finally got my hands on the new Alpkit Hunka bivvy bag.

It look a nice piece of kit and a steal at £25.

I just got to find the time and weather to use it.

Saturday 21 July 2007

New T.V programmes

If work or the weather is stopping you getting out; there are a couple of new T.V. programmes that may be of interest.

First up; the wacky trio from Top Gear are planning a 450 mile trip to the magentic North pole.

Being Top Gear the mode of transport is going to be a little out of the ordinary, Clarkson and May will be using a specially converted vehicle while Hammond will be using a team of 10 Canadian Inuit dogs.

The challenge is to see who will reach the pole first.

This is showing on Wednesday 25, 8pm on BBC Two and Sunday 29, 8pm on BBC Two.

The Second programme is Mountain with Griff Rhys Jones. This is a five part series and Jones will be walking/climbing in the main areas of the U.K. By the look of things two episodes will be in Scotland with the rest in Wales, the Lakes and the Pennines.

There is no confirmed time for this yet but it looks like it will start on Sunday 29 July on BBC One

Post Office Woes

The postman tried to deliver a parcel on Thursday but no-one was home. So I went to pick it up this morning but guess what it hasn't been returned to the depot.

Me : So after two days the parcel isn't back.

Woman Behind Counter: yes; the postman was probably on holiday yesterday and probably stored the parcel.

Me: Stored it where?

WBC: Well; if they are on holiday they stored the parcels.

Me: What they take them home with them?

WBC: No! their not allowed to do that! They stored them. It won't be back until Monday. NEXT!!!!!

So I don't have my
Hunka to play with.

Tuesday 10 July 2007

New photograph pages

My account at PBase has nearly run out; so I`ve decided to move my pictures over to Flickr.



Flickr makes it easier to direct link pictures from there to the blog, so Hopefully it means I won't have to load pictures up twice.



I`ve added a flickr badge to the sidebar and below is the link to the Backpacking pages.

New Photographs page

Ultralight Hiking

A new podcast from Bob/Andy


This is a great podzine hosted by Andy Howell where he talks at great length to Colin Ibbotson (the lightest man on the recent TGO Challenge) and Roman Ackl (lighthiker from Germany) about the ethos, mindset and gear for successful lightweight hiking in Northern Europe.

Available through any good podcast catcher.

110 grammes

Looks like Trail Magazine has a scoop on the newest lightweight tent in town.

110 gm lighter that the Terra Nova Laser Comp.

My guess is that it is still a Terra Nova, judging by the design.




Funny I thought Trail weren't into lightweight.

There is no sound on the video clip

Saturday 7 July 2007

The Grand Depart

I`ve always been a cycling nut.

At School I rode for the school's track cycling team and was always on a bike in my spare time. It was nothing to ride 70/80 miles a day at the weekend or travel down to Whitstable or Herne Bay for the day.

But Fags, Booze, and Girls (in that order) put pay to the cycling, but I continued to be interested in the sport and read about it.

One ambition was to one day see the Tour de France live, either in the Alps, Pyrenees or on the Champs Elysees but like they say life sometimes gets in the way.

Today I finally got the chance to see the Tour not in France but here in London.

The streets around central London were absolutely packed, I can't believe that so many people are interested in a cycle race, in most places along the route it was 3-4 people deep and the crowds in the parks watching the big screens were massive.




As this was the prologue; it wasn't a case of waiting for a couple of hours and then 189 riders whizzing by. It was a leisurely 7.9 km race against the clock and each rider going on their own, so we got to see them all, in a little under 3 hours although the buggers still whizzed by.





Before the racing starts the sponsors go round the course advertising their wears, most of the sponsors are European so a lot are unheard of in the U.K. This was one part of the whole Tour I was disappointed in as the sponsors normally give out freebies to the crowds. Toay the freebies seemed a bit thin on the ground, mainly a few pens and inflatable hands; although this didn't stop two people close to me fighting over an inflatable.





We were hoping for a British winner today in the Prologue; with either Bradley Wiggins or David Millar but unfortunately Wiggins was only 4th and Millar 13th

Other than that London had a great day for the Tour.

Sunday 1 July 2007

Long way down

It seems as though Charley and Ewan are on a new adventure.

Long Way Down is the latest motorbike adventure with Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman. They are travelling down through Europe, and then Africa – from Tunisia to South Africa, via countries such as Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Namibia. It is a follow-up to the Long Way Round trip in 2004, where the pair rode their motorbikes from London to New York, travelling east across Europe, Russia and the United States. As on Long Way Round, they will be accompanied by Executive Producers/Directors Russ Malkin and David Alexanian.

Looking at the website they started back on 14/05/2007

The route can be seen here

The BBC will be showing the series sometime in the Autumn.

It seems as though the boys are having fun camping.

Greed is good.

And sometimes it's funny too.