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This post features a few random shots from the iPhone. Some are from my very old iPhone 5s, that recently died. And some are from the refurbished iPhone 8 that replaced it. As a photographer, I don't buy into the concept that phone cameras will ever totally replace 'real' cameras. That is a discussion for another day, but trust me, there are many situations and types of photos where a phone will never come close... especially if you know how to use a 'real' camera and it's settings. However, it is true that the best camera is the one you have with you, and I don't always have one of my 'real' cameras with me. But I usually do have a phone. So, although they aren't quite as striking, here are some of those phone shots... Above, a shot taken late in the day after completing a flight to South Sudan. There was a lot of rain earlier that day which cleared out the dust and haze and led to a beautiful, late afternoon sky.  Below, the pilots often get to see some pretty awesome sunrises...
over a year ago

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More from The Forney Flyer

More From Liberia

I've really been enjoying being busy helping with the MAF flight operations in Liberia.  Shortly after I landed at a remote location one day, our other aircraft, piloted by Ulrich Müeller, also landed (below) at the same airstrip. I was about to load up two medical patients into my aircraft. But since Uli had just arrived, he gratefully offered to help with the loading, so that I could take some photos. Don't worry... we had previously already acquired permissions from all involved to be photographed. Personally I do not like to 'stage' photos, and I don't like to ask people to slow down, or pose, or whatever. It just feels fake. So if I'm photographing, I like to do my best to blend into the background, or at least out of the way, and then just shoot whatever is truly happening, as it happens in real time.  Practically speaking, that means that it's often very difficult or impossible for me to get good photos of the activities around a plane, when I'm the only pilot--because my first priority is of course always the safety and security of the plane/flight. So it's a rare but great opportunity when I have the chance to photograph another one of our pilots in action. And again, just in case you might think it would be awkward for a patient, or medical personnel to be photographed, I'll put your mind at ease by saying that we always explain that MAF is a not-for-profit mission, and there are many people who pray and give to help make these flights possible. It is important that we can also share with those folks how the aircraft are being used to bless people in remote locations. And most people are very understanding of that, and very thankful for the help, and very happy to be in the photographs. Even-so, I always try to be respectful and discreet in the way I photograph or show people (especially patients) and of course, that we always do have their permission first. So don't worry. ;-)  There was an additional patient, already loaded, and seated in front of the stretcher patient. Here, Uli is carefully strapping in the 2nd patient for the 1.5 hour flight that I would make to take both patients and the medical personnel accompanying them, to the capital city for treatment. Upon landing in Monrovia, I was met and assisted, as usual, by the very capable MAF team. Most patients are very happy for us to pray with/for them, which we did both before and after this flight. Here, the serving MAF country director, Leon Prinsloo, prays with the two medical patients after they have been loaded into the ambulance, and before they go to the hospital. It's worth noting that I had previously asked some of the local people in the remote town where I had picked up these two patients, "how long would it take to drive from there to Monrovia?" They laughed at the question and told me that it is not even possible to do that--not at this time of year anyway--not during the rainy season. They said that sometimes it might be possible, but it would be many days of tough travel, but right now they said the jungle roads are totally impassible. And it's also worth noting that both of these patients were actually in quite serious condition. I was very glad that MAF was able to provide help to transport them! Switching gears... here is a shot of downtown Monrovia, the capital city of Liberia. And here's a shot from just nearby the above one, which shows markets along the roads where people are buying and selling stuff. This is not at all an unusual scene on departure from our 'home' airport here. The rainy season offers some challenging flying! But it has the potential to look like this!... although, in the past 5 weeks of flying here, I've only had about 2 days like this.  Here's a few more shots from the air showing the remote and rugged terrain over which we fly... And I'll end with a nice sunset after the rains cleared out a few nights ago...

over a year ago 81 votes
MAF Liberia

A few weeks ago I was asked to pop over to Liberia (on the west coast of Africa) to help with their flying for six weeks. Our Liberia program has been short on pilots and very busy with flying, so of course I was happy to help! Above is a shot of a bunch of Covid vaccines and other medicines and medical supplies that I delivered to a remote hospital in a town at the very southeastern tip of Liberia. Below I'm unloading cargo before picking up two serious medical patients (you can see the stretcher behind me.) This is one of the airstrips that we frequently fly to... as you can see it is very close to the ocean. There are a number of towns/villages situated just along the coast, but frankly I've seen virtually no roads along the coast. Occasionally, near a town I'll see a few muddy narrow 'roads' branching out a few miles from the town, but then they seem to vanish. So, for the most part it's just rugged coastline that merges into jungle. And I've also seen no large ships, though I'm sure they must come to/from the capital city from time to time. But up and down the coast I've seen nothing other than a few small canoes and very small wooden boats. And if you pan the camera just a few miles in from the coast, then it's nothing but dense, sopping wet jungle. In short, it's definitely a place with vast geological barriers where the need for the plane is obvious! Now that I've shown you the 'nice' shots of what it can look like when the sun is shining (which in my short time here seems to almost never happen) now let me show you what it usually looks like... Actually, even the above two shots are not really accurate, because most of the time I can't see the ground at all once I'm at an IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) altitude. It's rainy season here right now and it's an understatement to say that it rains a lot. I've lived and flown/worked in a lot of places around the world, but I've never seen a place that can put out so much relentless, pounding rain day after day after day, most of which is not even tied to thunderstorms. It's just sopping wet atmospheric stuff. Incidentally, it seems that this is where the brewing begins for those storms that build into monster hurricanes that cross the Atlantic and eventually slam into the Americas this time of year. Fun fact: Monrovia (where MAF Liberia is based) is the wettest capital city in the world! They apparently get about 15 feet of rain a year, and I believe it! It's obviously challenging weather to fly in, but frankly, I've been enjoying it. It reminds me a bit of some of the flying I used to do in Indonesia. I've definitely done quite a number of low-pass runway inspections before landing here, just to make sure of the condition of the surface--b/c of all the mud/rain.  But if you maintain margins and are careful, it can still be done safely in the rain. And a little rain never hurt anyone, right? I've enjoyed seeing, and being a part of, the wide variety of strategic flights that MAF does here--from 'traditional' mission flying to critical medical transport flights, to humanitarian and community development etc. This past week I was the only MAF pilot in the country so I was flying every day and really enjoying it. Earlier this week Henk Jan (below, right) who is the MAF-International Africa Regional Director, dropped in for a two-day program visit. He has an extensive and distinguished background/career in aviation, including (but not limited to) many years in MAF. I was privileged to have him join me for a flight interior, and I was glad that the weather cooperated that day--in fact it was the nicest day, by far, since I've been here. (Below, Henk Jan talks to missionary, Kim Smith, about his ministry while I was waiting for my return load/passengers back to Monrovia.) One rare evening when the sun popped out for a few minutes before it set, I walked down the beach. No, I haven't jumped in yet, but I'm guessing I will before I leave in a month. That said, because of the nearly constant storms, the surf is really rough, and there are also many hidden rocks in the surf, and I'm told there are also strong undertows and rip currents in this area. Plus, the water is muddy brown and full of seaweed because of the winds/storms. So I need to wait for the right place/time so that I don't become shark or shrimp food.

over a year ago 95 votes
From the Flight Line

Here's some random shots from the flight line. First, one of our Cessna 208B Grand Caravans taking off from our home airstrip in Kajjansi, Uganda. This aircraft is now serving in Liberia. I've always loved watching the sky and the weather. Last week I was out of the city and had a chance to see the milky way in all it's glory. Maybe sometime I'll share some of those pics too. But in the meantime, here are a few shots related to the sky/weather, from the flight line, as I was pre-flighting airplanes in Kajjansi. These first two are photos of the rising son, through fog. I obviously took (and am sharing) two versions of this, b/c as you can see, in the first one I focused on the sun and intentionally threw the MAF logo out of focus, whereas in the second one I made the focus the MAF logo itself.  And here's one taken only a few weeks apart, and it is also in the morning, but this time it's obviously the moon. Haze and smoke are quite common here in our part of Uganda, but fog in our area is not so common. Here's another shot of the flight line in some very thick morning fog. And here's what it looks like on a more typical morning, with nice skies, and a dissipating thunderstorm out over Lake Victoria in the distance. Here's a shot of the Karamojang landscape in Northeastern Uganda.  And here's a shot of the steep, lush slopes of the eastern edge of East DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo) and the western edge of Lake Albert which separates EDRC from Uganda. And here's a young chap who was eager to have his photo taken in front of the plane... just like I'm sure I would have done if I had the chance at his age. :-)

over a year ago 84 votes
Recent Stuff

A few weeks ago we (fellow MAF pilot Andrew and I) landed at Amudat airstrip for the first time in a very long time (below). Over the past year and a half quite a few of the upcountry airstrips in Uganda (especially in Karamoja) deteriorated so badly that we had to stop using them. There were several contributing factors, mostly related to the Covid lockdown and lack of flying for so long, but also due to various organizations and users  being short of staff and funding. The next two photos show the Amudat runway from the air (from both directions) during the time that it was closed. It actually got quite a bit worse than this later on, as these were taken soon after it was closed. Our sending church in Oregon gave a very generous gift to help facilitate the reopening of several of the closed airstrips. MAF sent a work team to oversee the project in Amudat. Here is a photo of the cleaned/repaired/improved airstrip, just before we landed there a few weeks ago. Here's a shot of Andrew and I with the MAF guys that oversaw the project. They also hired many locals to help with the work (which was also a great way to help the people during these very difficult times when it is SO hard for them to find a source of income), and purchased some tools that will be used for continued upkeep of the strip. Anytime a plane lands, especially after it's been a long time, people will seemingly suddenly appear out of nowhere to watch. This time was no exception. Here's some random shots from the air that I've taken in the past month or so. This first one captures sort of the classic northern Karamoja. This is the very point where the Nile leaves Uganda and enters South Sudan. In this photo the water is flowing from the lower left corner to the bend on the right, and then continuing up towards the upper left corner, on its way South to North. The brown (left) side of the river is South Sudan, and the green (right) side of the photo is Uganda. Just behind/beyond the bend is the town of Nimule, South Sudan. It might strike you as odd that the brown and green are so distinct. It is not always like that. And it's certainly not normally that abrupt of a change between the two countries. It's true that parts of South Sudan can be much dryer than Uganda, but in this region it is generally a much more gradual transition. The reason it's like this here, in this photo, is because the Uganda side is very flat and swampy, hence the greenery, whereas the South Sudan side is the higher ground, and thus dryer, when this photo was taken. But for much of the year both sides are equally green. Speaking of green, this was a very odd (algae?) green floating mass of something that was on top of the Lake Victoria water for several weeks, not far from the shore. I have no idea exactly what it was, or what caused it, but it was almost an iridescent green. It's gone now.

over a year ago 89 votes
Subsistence Living, Way Back When

Well, it's been forever since I've posted and I won't even begin to make excuses. But before I try to start posting stuff from East Africa, I figured I'd finish that series I had started over a year ago about Way Back When we used to live just north of the Arctic Circle in Alaska. In the small village where we lived, subsistence living was the way of life. There was a small store in the village, but it had very limited items--canned or pre-packaged stuff that had no shelf life, or at least a very long shelf life. There was rarely fresh produce available, or anything like fresh milk or stuff like that. And there was no fresh meat. Instead, we had to go find our own meat to eat. I realize that there are lots of strong opinions out there regarding hunting, but let me just say this--what I'm talking about in this village was not 'trophy hunting'. This was hunting for food. Below, a shot of me, on my snow machine, with my rifle, far out in the wilderness. During the very short summer, folks stocked up on salmon, cleaning and drying/smoking it to put away in large quantities for the long winter. We were a very, very long way from the ocean, so the salmon were extremely tired by the time they got to us. What that means is that they were not as fat/rich/tasty as the salmon down on the Yukon, or other places closer to the sea, so often these salmon became the main source of food for the dog teams that require a lot of protein throughout the winter. Then, folks in our village would often trade other types of meat that we could get more easily, with friends/relatives further down river, or out near the coast, and in exchange they would be given the nice, fat salmon for eating. In the winter I helped some men build a fish trap that was frozen into the river ice. Then we would go check it at least once (or often twice) a day and almost without fail we'd find a good number of large fish in there. Depending on how cold the temperatures were, we would have to chip away several inches to even a foot of ice from the hole, before we could peer into the fast moving water. And yes, that is me gaffing the fish, and no, it is not in the middle of the night--it's just dark most of the time there in the middle of winter since it's so far north. A very big source of food there was moose. It basically served as the 'beef' of the far north. And caribou was a real tasty treat when they came through the area. We also hunted bear (which is what we are doing below)... And trapped beaver (below) and other fur animals. The folks would sell the furs and/or tan the hides and prepare the furs themselves, which they would then turn into the best winter clothing, mittens, mukluks, etc. Even though it was extremely cold, and often dark, I was blessed to often be out in very remote, rugged and beautiful wilderness, which had an astounding surreal beauty. In the far distance  (in the picture below) you can see some snowcapped mountains. Those are the foothills the to Brooks Mountain Range and the Gates of the Arctic National Park... the most remote National Park in the U.S. Well, that finally concludes my "Way Back When" series. Now I will try to post some much more current stuff soon...

over a year ago 82 votes

More in travel

Tour of London

I toured London yesterday. Barking and Dagenham I thought OK that's quite enough, I should probably go home now. Barnet the hotel was still heavily promoting a wedding fair they held in March 2022. Bexley I admired the two Empathy Revolution elephants placed there by Elephantman. Brent I noted that a Full Leg Wax only costs 50% more than a Half Leg Wax. Camden an elderly lady in a floppy floral hat outshone the hollyhocks behind her. City I picked up a copy of The Standard and it was only borderline toxic this week. Ealing we pulled up alongside a throbbing blue and yellow Yvonne Bradley. Greenwich the Next Train arrow at Abbey Wood switched to point at the wrong train 1 minute before departure. Hackney an angry man in a bucket hat ranted until someone gave him a bottle of water. Hammersmith and Fulham the American family were not enjoying the mechanical savagery of their UK trip. Haringey the three topless sunbathers in the park were vastly outnumbered by nearby pigeons. Hounslow I was looking at the lobsters when it started raining. Islington the pawnbroker's £/$ exchange rate was given to five decimal places. Kensington and Chelsea five chunks of melon had been left on a bench. Kingston the surveyor broke off from using his digital level and hid in a storeroom. Lambeth I was given a free pack of 'zingy' German wet wipes. Lewisham I was surprised by the emergence of four twisty signature ventilation columns. Merton the Wimbledon branding is already everywhere but the cycle park is now suspended. Newham we finished Squid Game 2 two hours before they released Squid Game 3, annoyingly. Redbridge the grass is looking terribly yellow (and the football car park sign is new). Richmond all the cakes and pastries had been reduced to £2, somewhat desperately. Southwark I realised that if I'd planned this better I could probably have gone to all of them. Sutton Fiko supposedly offers a skin fade for €16, and even if it's £16 it's still good value. Tower Hamlets I took four books out of the library but they don't have the Stevenson. Waltham Forest the ranty vaping woman blamed everyone except herself. Wandsworth a man in a blue conical party hat walked past Pizza Village carrying an umbrella. Westminster I picked up a copy of City AM magazine and it had four features about watches. I did not go to Havering again. I didn't go to Bromley, Croydon, Enfield, Harrow or Hillingdon either. I also went to Surrey but I didn't see anything interesting there.

13 hours ago 2 votes
The news from Havering

The news from Havering (black holes, Schrodinger's bus and thatched rabbits) roundabout in north Havering has closed to traffic for 12 weeks. It is an almighty constriction. Gallows Corner flyover can be strengthened, even made safe for HGVs, safeguarding it for the next 60 years. But this requires sensationally savage road closures because the A12 arterial is already such a barrier that there's essentially no other way to cross from one side to the other. Through traffic is being diverted via the M25, which is miles and miles, and local traffic faces lengthy tortuous detours via insufficient roads increasingly choked with cars. From the south it makes a trip to the mega-Tesco basically unattainable and from the north it makes a quick nip into Romford most unwise. The only traffic permitted through the junction is public transport (and taxis and emergency vehicles) so the smart way across is by bus, but routes have reduced frequencies and anything trying to get through has to wait at temporary traffic lights (a 3-way junction with an approximate four-minute cycle time). I watched a suspicious number of vehicles trying to get through anyway, then struggling to reverse when they discovered their exit was blocked, blocking everyone else. Pedestrians can still cross but it's poorly signed, and basically stay the hell away unless you live here, in which case my deepest summer commiserations. A highly unexpected casualty of the Gallows Corner closure is the 375, one of London's least frequent buses which normally pootles out of Romford to serve the village of Havering-atte-Bower. For the duration of the closure it will instead terminate at Chase Cross, i.e. the urban 3 miles will be chopped off and only the rural lunge into Essex will remain. This is particularly rubbish for residents of H-a-B because it means their only bus won't even reach some shops, let alone a station, the intention being that they switch to/from the 175 to complete their journey. I went to ride this embarrassment of a stunted bus yesterday. A huge poster outside Romford Station warned potential passengers that the 375 wouldn't be stopping anywhere near here until September... so it was a bit of a surprise when a 375 rolled in at the bus stop opposite and disgorged several passengers. It was even more of a surprise when the supposedly non-existent bus reappeared and took a dozen of us out of central Romford. We passed at least six bus stops with a yellow poster claiming the bus we were on wasn't running, then drove straight past the stop where the journey had been due to start. I rode the bus all the way into Essex, way out beyond Stapleford Abbotts almost to the M25, and at Passingford Bridge the driver swung round and took a growing cargo of passengers all the way back to central Romford again. So is the 375 buggered or not? • According to TfL's bespoke Gallows Corner webpage, the 375 definitely isn't serving Romford. • According to TfL's Bus Changes webpage, the 375 is not mentioned so must be running normally. • According to a poster outside Romford station, the 375 won't be back until September. • According to the Countdown display it's due in 3 minutes. • According to the 375 webpage and various apps, all's normal. • According to every ounce of pre-publicity, Chase Cross only. restored, not a moment too soon, by a public body intent on carving up the borough. That building is Upminster Tithe Barn, built in the mid 15th century on the orders of the Abbot of Waltham Abbey. At 44m it's not quite as long as Harmondsworth's but it is believed to be London's oldest thatched building. It was also in an increasingly poor state, so much so that it was added to Historic England's Heritage At Risk list in 2023, and with its damaged timbers and leaky roof could simply have decayed away. Financial rescue came from a most unlikely place, namely National Highways who contributed £650,000 towards full restoration. A team of master thatchers and other craftspeople started in January and were done by June, and the resulting finish does indeed look splendid. 11,000 bundles of water reed were used to rethatch the roof and it looks properly crisp, like a recently barbered cut. Up top are a particularly striking pair of thatched hares named Willow and Hunter by local schoolchildren, added as a final decorative flourish. Three lightning conductors have been added in the hope that the new fire alarms will never be needed. The intention is to retain the barn for public use, indeed the superbly quirky Museum of Nostalgia is due to be back inside and offering Open Days again next year. As yet nobody's found the cash to install toilets, and if you go along today all you'll see is a smart locked building beside a dusty car park, but this fine survivor is indeed back on the map. Lower Thames Crossing. This is the new road tunnel between Essex and Kent which will scythe off through fields around North Ockendon and help declog the QE2 Bridge, and which was given the financial go-ahead just last week. Grants from the Lower Thames Crossing Designated Funds have been offered to over 50 community projects including Purfleet Heritage Centre, a local Scout Group, a bike skills area in Gravesend and Thurrock LGBTQ+ Network. It may seem perverse to be donating cash allocated to road building to rethatch a barn nowhere near the proposed dual carriageway, indeed a cynic might suggest National Highways are only doing this to take some of the eco-heat out of their hugely controversial tunnel project. But wouldn't it be nice to be able to drive under Gravesend Reach, and aren't those boxing hares superb?

yesterday 2 votes
Thames Ditton

One Stop Beyond: Thames Ditton In this series I'm taking the train one stop beyond the Greater London boundary, getting off and seeing what's there. Today that means Thames Ditton, one stop beyond Surbiton on the Hampton Court line. Obviously it's beside the Thames, in this case on the south bank (in Surrey) opposite the broad sweep of Hampton Court Park (which is in London). Thames Ditton is historic, well-off and quaint, but also post-industrial, over-private and lacking in river. If you live here, well done. Long Ditton to the east, but the two have inexorably coalesced over the years. Thames Ditton got the station which is why you're more likely to have heard of it. That's where I arrived yesterday morning to complete my challenge of visiting every station in London and its outer zones, this being zone 6 which keeps local commuters' fares down. A white-haired lady from Thames Ditton In Bloom was watering the flowerboxes and flowerwheelbarrows on the up platform, whipping open her portable stepladder as necessary, and also being thanked by passing passengers for all the work she was doing. She has horticultural competition from Thames Ditton Men In Sheds who've knocked up three wooden habitats called Bug Halt, Bug Central and Bug Junction in an elevated garden above the ramp opposite. Even before nipping into the cosy waiting room with its small mornings-only cafe and stack of local leaflets, I could tell this was a community that looks after itself with pride. The heart of Thames Ditton is its snaking high street, a cottage-lined thoroughfare that wiggles down to where the ferry used to be. A lot of weatherboarded frontage is still evident, also a couple of old pubs of which Ye Olde Swan is the real deal with a waterfront terrace and a backstory as the site of a Tudor hunting lodge, what with Henry VIII's palace being just across the water. The Red Lion, by contrast, is merely a fine free house with an obsession for hanging baskets. For groceries there's a smart Budgens, the bank has inevitably become an estate agent and for plump pastries it's got to be the Nice Buns Cafe. The top row of the newspaper rack goes 'Telegraph Mail Times Mirror', for what its worth. As for the very long building with the cupola that's a Georgian mansion built for riverside status, later sold for £5000 to an Anglican hospice fleeing from Deptford. For over a century it's been known as the Home of Compassion, even after being sold off as a luxury care home, until last year the owners decided to tone down the mortality angle and glibly rebranded it Thames View instead. Ferry Works, a former boat-building yard that diversified into marine engines in the 1880s. You can track the site's subsequent history through three plaques and a To Let sign... manufactured the revolutionary central valve steam engine, moved to Rugby, the amazing Auto-Carrier car made here, Character Riverside Offices To Let. AC Cars arrived in 1911 to build open 2-seaters, coupés and chuggy saloons, also the first British car ever to win the Monte-Carlo rally. The company spent 75 years in Thames Ditton with its motor works just off the high street, in its later years churning out the pale blue three-wheeled invalid cars that used to crawl the nation's streets. All of that's since become flats, as has the site of the foundry that forged the Quadriga that bestrides Hyde Park Corner - also suitably blue-plaqued. The one scrap of riverside still accessible is a narrow slipway that now doubles up as Ye Old Swan's car park. You can tell access is limited because one workman had chosen to sit amidst the hatchbacks to eat his lunch. This is also the landing point for the footbridge that joins Thames Ditton Island to the mainland, and no you will not be visiting because it's private and the gate has a black pad. The island is 300m long and consists of a single central track faced by 48 detached properties, each of which started out as a weekend bungalow and is now a desirable hideaway with its own individual mooring. Despite being much closer to the south side of the Thames the island had always been part of Middlesex, and only in 1970 did residents manage to be officially relocated to Surrey. Alongside are two much smaller eyots, Boyle Farm Island and Swan Island, whose sum total of two properties get their mail delivered to a red lockup box at the top of the slipway. The Church of St Nicholas has been here since the 12th century, the oldest part of its structure being its broad squat flinty tower. It also contains what may be the oldest font in Surrey, a sturdy stone bowl dating back to 1120 with a carving of the Lamb of God on one side. Above the chancel the oak panels are an even rarer survivor, these depictions of the Day of Judgement from 1520 having somehow escaped destruction during the Reformation. Today the church is very welcoming of visitors so the door will likely be unlocked, or maybe I just got lucky while the Bereavement Cafe was meeting in the church hall. A particularly attractive exterior feature is the path that wends quarter of a mile from here down to the station, known as Church Walk. It's too narrow for vehicles so of the 60 houses only two have parking spaces, which must be fun on removals day, but the Victorian semis and cutesy cottages are so desirable that residents are all too happy to suffer the inconvenience. Vera Fletcher Hall where the local amdrams occasionally put on shows, wove through occasional leftover shards of woodland and eventually found my progress halted by a 90 acre sports ground. This is Imber Court, purchased by the Metropolitan Police Service in 1919 with recreation in mind. Not only is it the home of Metropolitan Police FC, a team who've reached the first round of the FA Cup five times, but also the training centre for the Met's mounted police. Looking across a sea of tennis courts I could see floodlights and the Des Flanders Stand in the far distance... and I presume someone was also watching me. headquarters of the Milk Marketing Board, they of "drinka pinta milka day", until watered down by William Waldegrave in 1994. It's now a housing estate and the MMB's sole local legacy appears to be that they helped pay for Thames Ditton Cricket Club's snazzy pavilion. I should also mention the Thames Ditton Miniature Railway, a teeny straddled treat, but their next open day isn't until 6th July. tip the river was again fenced off and the slipway hidden within a modern boatyard. Instead the local populace are left to make do with City Wharf Open Space, a scrap of waterfront mostly shielded by trees with a brief opening where the full sweep of the main river is finally revealed. The main problem with living round here, it turns out, is rather too much Ditton and nowhere near enough Thames.

a week ago 6 votes