Thursday 26 April 2012

End of the line


What a dreary day it was yesterday. I decided to take Fern for her afternoon walk in Stanmer Park and as soon as we got out of the car the heavens opened. I did take this picture (in the rain) of a sight which could be quite attractive in the right conditions.

The lower picture was taken from much the same spot almost two years ago.

I have been posting daily pictures on this blog since October 2009 and I have decided that I have come to the end of the line.  I will continue to post pictures on my other blog - Pebbles in the Sea - but not necessarily every day.

My thanks to all who have dropped by and the few who have left complimentary comments.

Wednesday 25 April 2012

More apple blossom


Still in the garden - and still raining!

Tuesday 24 April 2012

Apple blossom


The weather has been so gloomy that I have had to resort to a picture taken two years ago.  This is what the tree in the garden will look like as soon as we get a blue sky!

Monday 23 April 2012

Withdean Park


Looking down the park from the very top.

Sunday 22 April 2012

Sign of wind to come


When the flowering cherry trees in our road are in full bloom we always get strong winds.  Any day now.

Saturday 21 April 2012

Blue sky


After the dull mornings we have endured lately, what a pleasure it was to see blue sky over the Downs when I drew back the bedroom curtains this morning.

Friday 20 April 2012

Primroses in Waterhall


The bank where these primroses are blooming faces north so they are several days behind all the others, most of which are now past their best.

Thursday 19 April 2012

Not in Stanmer

This group of trees at the bottom of the garden at my cousin's farm caught my eye as the sun shone on them while the sky behind was dark.  At the left front is a holly, the lighter green tree in the middle is a dawn redwood, the evergreen at the back is a Monterrey cypress and the one on the right just coming into leaf is a tulip tree.

Wednesday 18 April 2012

Stanmer church


Stanmer church and part of the village as seen from the edge of the Great Wood.

Tuesday 17 April 2012

Reminder of 1987


Back in October 1987 a "hurricane" whipped through south-east England and many trees in Stanmer woods were uprooted.  To this day there are humps like this one which are where the root patterns of the trees were pulled out of the ground.  Many of them (again, like this one) still have the remains of the trunk jutting out.

Monday 16 April 2012

Bluebells I bring you


For one reason or another, I haven't been in Stanmer woods for several weeks.  I went into the Great Wood yesterday afternoon to get out of the wind and discovered the bluebells in bloom at least a week or ten days earlier than usual.

Sunday 15 April 2012

Baseball in Brighton



Tucked away behind the rugby pitches in Waterhall are two baseball fields that have seen better days.  Now, however, the Brighton Buccaneers softball club is in the process of renovating them.  The picture above shows the work as it was a week ago while to the left is as it was a month or so back.


This is a view of the second field from behind the batter's plate - which has only recently been put in place.  Up until a week or so back there was some pretty awful chain link-type fencing which has been removed and which will presumably be replaced.  The picture below shows the pitcher's mound looking towards the batter's plate - as it was!

Too late


When we were washing up after dinner the other evening I noticed the gorgeous sky.  By the time we had finished, I had found my camera and gone outside it was very nearly too late.

Saturday 14 April 2012

Waterhall tadpoles



The spawn in the Waterhall dew pond has hatched and there are dozens of tadpoles swimming around.  They don't stay still long enough to get a photo that isn't blurred.

Friday 13 April 2012

Back on the Downs


This is the view from the Roman Camp looking north. The high point on the horizon is Ditchling Beacon. It might not look much higher than anywhere else but it is the third highest point in Sussex. In the middle distance are Stanmer woods while to the left the flats are in Hollingbury and we get a glimpse of the Hollingbury industrial estate.  To the right is Coldean.

Thursday 12 April 2012

Hanover district


Jersey Street and Ewart Street (left) are part of the vibrant Hanover community. It seems not so very long ago that this area was a bit run down but the rise in property prices has meant that Hanover has changed as new people moved in. This is now the heart of 'green' Brighton - but there still seems to be at least one car for every house and parking is a nightmare.

Wednesday 11 April 2012

St Bartholomew's church


Seen from Albion Hill, St Bartholomew's church certainly stands tall - as it should. The cross makes it taller than Westminster Abbey and it has the highest nave of any parish church in Britain. It was supposedly built to the measurements of Noah's ark.

Tuesday 10 April 2012

St Peter's church


Looking back down Albion Hill we can see how the old slums were cleared and replaced by tower blocks of flats. St Peter's church, which became the parish church in place of St Nicolas, look small by comparison.

Monday 9 April 2012

Albion Hill


The small two-up-two-down houses of Albion Hill were built in the mid 19th century to house the fast-growing number of manual workers in the town. On the edge of the now "in" Hanover area, this is still just about first-time buyer territory.

Sunday 8 April 2012

Street art



As we head back into town, St George's Road becomes St James's Street and that is where the Property Shop is situated with this large mural on the wall in a side street. That's some advert!

Saturday 7 April 2012

The Sidewinder


As we head back towards the centre of town we come to the Sidewinder pub. Just how the mural links in is something I have yet to work out.

Friday 6 April 2012

Kemp Town Pier


Down towards the sea and running parallel to Eastern Road is St George's Road and this is where we find the community centre known as the Kemp Town Pier. This was built in 1912 as the church hall for St Anne's church, which has since been demolished. The Pier is - or was - also th John Nixon Memorial. I'm not entirely sure it is still used as a community centre; it looks more like shops and flats.

Thursday 5 April 2012

Kemp Town goods yard


Just after Edward Street has become Eastern Road we reach what was at one time the Kemp Town railway station and goods yard. The station and goods yard are long since closed and turned into an industrial estate but the building on the south-west corner retains this reminder of the past.

Bingo, anyone?

Wednesday 4 April 2012

Edward Street


The court building is now in Edward Street, a nondescript road that lost its character when the buildings on one side were demolished to make way for the courts, the American Express European headquarters and so on. The south side still has a few speciality shops like this among all the lawyers officers.

Tuesday 3 April 2012

County Court



Further down Church Street we have the old county court building. The only indication of its previous purpose is the archway on the left which seems to lead nowhere.

Monday 2 April 2012

Ancient and modern


From the 21st century on the left where the Jubilee Street redevelopment can be seen to the early 19th century Dome and Corn exchange. This is a view down Church Street from just below Bond Street.

Sunday 1 April 2012

Bond Street BOGOF


Just along from yesterday's mermaid but this time in Bond Street itself. I'm almost sorry that I can't see the painting underneath the dogs.

Saturday 31 March 2012

Bond Street Lane


Being a fairly exuberant sort of town, Brighton has plenty of what might be called street art. This mural is in Bond Street Lane, just across from the sign that has caused a certain amount of controversy. I like the bicycle racks as well!

Friday 30 March 2012

Park Crescent


I was stopped at the traffic lights at the junction of Elm Grove and Lewes Road when I spotted the old K2 telephone box over in Park Crescent. To many people this is an icon of England but they are fast disappearing from our streets.

Thursday 29 March 2012

Ditchling Rise


Looking down the hill from outside the house once owned by my wife's great-great-grandparents. In their day, of course, none of the cars would have been there. Now it is difficult to park anywhere in the street and one needs to buy a resident's parking permit in order to do so.

Wednesday 28 March 2012

Great-great-grandfather's house


According to the Encyclopedia of Brighton, the houses in Ditchling Rise were built in the 1870s. My wife's great-great-grandparents lived in this one at the top of the road from sometime in the 1880s until their deaths. Coincidentally, my wife and I lived in a flat in a house towards the bottom of the hill when we were first married.

Tuesday 27 March 2012

Stanford Avenue Methodist church


The church was built right at the end of the 19th century but just a few years ago a doorway - almost subterranean - was turned into a prayer garden with the addition of this sculpture.

Monday 26 March 2012

The Warren


I'm not sure that enlarging the picture will show any animals, but there are a couple of rabbit warrens in that field across the valley.

Sunday 25 March 2012

On the Trail of the Lonesome Pine Hawthorn


We turn up the hill beside the golf course where there is a lone hawthorn tree in the middle of the fairway.

Saturday 24 March 2012

Stripes

It looks as though the farmer has had the heavy roller on the field beyond the dew pond.

Friday 23 March 2012

Frog spawn

There's frog spawn galore in the Waterhall dew pond. This is but a tiny fraction of it.

Thursday 22 March 2012

A Waterhall walk continued

A little further on we can see across the dew pond and up to the head of the valley.

Wednesday 21 March 2012

A Waterhall walk


Let's spend a few days wandering up the Waterhall valley. After we pass the playing fields and the rugby club, we come to where the council brought all the timber felled in an attempt to stop the spread of Dutch elm disease. It is still a locked compound where possibly diseased timber is burned.

Tuesday 20 March 2012

Daffodils


As in every spring, there are plenty of daffodils in Withdean Park but this year there also seem to be a lot of them coming up blind. It's the same in my garden. I wonder why?

Monday 19 March 2012

That's more like it!


These blossom trees (variety quite unknown to me) are at the edge of Stanmer Great Wood.

Sunday 18 March 2012

Down at ground level


If the trees in Stanmer Great Wood are showing little sign of spring, at least the bluebell leaves are thrusting up.

Saturday 17 March 2012

Spring in the woods


It might not look as though the trees in Stanmer Great Wood are showing any signs of spring but up close one can see the buds starting to sprout.