Lloyd Rowling

The conference is over and this afternoon I had the chance to have a stroll around town.

Harrogate is an old spa town with spring water which has a high sulphur content. I sampled some in the Pump Room Museum and it was… distinctive! I bought a small bottle so that I can share the experience with the family.

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The Royal Baths are now a rather nice Chinese Restuarant which we visited on Monday evening.

There is a lot of parkland around Harrogate and walking through it we came to RHS Harlow Carr. These are some lovely gardens which provided a few hours of exploring the plants and the “Gardens through the ages” walk.

I had a cup of Bettys tea and enjoyed a Yorkshire Fat Rascal, a scone like cake which was very nice indeed.

There is obviously much more to Harrogate than I could enjoy during this visit, but I’m sure I’ll be back again one day.

I had a quick visit to Knaresborough this evening. This is a historic market town in North Yorkshire and very picturesque.

The castle dates back to Norman times. During the civil war it was held by the Royalists, but was besieged and then destroyed by Parliamentary forces. It is now laid out as a rather tranquil park.

The river Nidd runs through the town and was so still this evening that it provided some good reflections in the water.

It was the home of the seer, Mother Shipton. We wasn’t able to visit her cave though as it was closed this late in the evening.

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I’m staying in Harrogate whilst attending the BNMS annual conference which finishes tomorrow.

I spotted what turned out to be a “Bee Fly” in the garden last week.

It looked very much like a bee, but hovered and had a very long proboscis. I managed to get a single photo as it buzzed around the mascari, but it was rather timid and flew off as soon as it sensed me close.

It came back once or twice, but didn’t allow me to take another picture.

Matt, Fi and I went to Birdworld today.

This is a wonderful park with a large collection of birds and Jenny Wren’s farm which has pigs, goats etc and where the children can stroke some small animals. There’s the usual selection of playgrounds and cafes plus some other interesting items such as the willow maze. The talking parrots were very entertaining and I was pleased with some of the photos I took. Fi loved holding a mouse and stroking rabbits and guinea pigs.

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In particular I enjoyed seeing the black swan and the penguin feeding. This was gatecrashed by a pair of wild herons who had their eyes on the penguins fish!

Apparently, the heron is our largest native bird and very impressive it is too. Just keep away from my pond!

Another excellent day out!

We went to the craft show at Fort Purbrook today.

This is always an enjoyable event at the beginning of spring. I treated myself to a sculpture of a Crane (the bird, not the building site tool!) made from recycled oil drums which will look great by my pond.

We also did a tour of the tunnels which gave us an idea of the history behind the fort, one of many encircling Portsmouth built in the late 19th century, to defend the harbour from the threat of French invasion.

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There is also an assault course there for the children to play on.

I bought a few other bits and bobs too, took some photos and was blown about on the top of the fort with Jen whilst enjoying watching the children play on the assault course.

A good day out!