Bills Posts

The house at night. Quite impressive.

I’m sorry, long day tired. Off to bed. Good night. Sleep tight.

A really good reason to visit Longleat at this time of year is to experience the festival of lights. Each year is a different theme this years being fairy tales.

There must be a mile or more of lit up themes such as the one in the header picture including; Peter Pan, Hansel & Gretel, Rumple Stiltskin, Winnie The Pooh, Snow White and more. Very nicely done, it is a wonderful experience and for children magical.

One show that impressed me was at the fountains where they had an arc spray which they were using as a movie screen, very, very good.

It was a delightful day and we thoroughly enjoyed it. I can think of only one negative comment; the price of food. Beyond that well worth a visit. Especially the red panda.

Whilst we were waiting to board the boat for the lake cruise, watched the staff cleaning out an enclosure. A sign said that the enclosure was for Red Pandas, but it looked empty.

The river cruise was entertaining, the host was very funny and the trip lasted about 20 – 30 minutes. After we disembarked, we walked around the other side of the compound and realised the compound wasn’t empty.

Just around the corner, we came across a party of people who were inside the compound, they were obviously on a VIP visit because they were feeding a red panda. This incredibly beautiful little creature was perched on a bench happily wolfing down carrot sticks. We found out the panda was a female and had recently had babies.

They are an endangered species, so that she was breeding is incredibly important. Watching her was a captivating experience. She would gently take an offered carrot and chomp away at it. She was not in the least bit bothered by being surrounded by people.

Without a doubt a beautiful animal, what saddened me was that her species is in danger, I wish we (human beings) could live in harmony with other occupants of our planet.

As you can probably imagine, there have been periods of intense activity as a delicious meal was prepared by Elayne, I did help mainly as a spud and carrot peeler and dishwasher manager.

It is though in the getting of all of the ingredients to the right state for consumption at the right time where the real skill lays. Elayne delivered literally n plate loads of delicious food.

To all my readers, I hope you’ve had a really delightful day. I would wish nothing less for you.

Of course I enjoyed our drive along the longleat safari route. We had a lovely view of the lions, but the cheetahs had, quite reasonably, taken to shelter from the cold British Weather.

Once we finished with the drive through safari, we parked up and walked in to the house area, not far only a couple of hundred yards. I hadn’t realised that we were very close to the meerkats. I went through an airlock system, thinking that I would be lookin through glass at the little critters, but no, by going through the airlock, I was now in their space.

The meerkats were at total liberty to mix in with the people. And they were not reluctant to do so. They would cross the path we were following through their area and notice that we were there. Who are these things invading our space? The Meerkat on duty watch had no way of knowing that there was absolutely nothing here to threaten them except being trodden on, being run over by a mobility scooter, being electrocuted when trying to find out if the mobility scooter battery is edible – these last two, I very nearly saw. I guess kidnapping could be a possibility, but I wondered if the little critters are chipped and there’s a sensor in the door.

Meerkats are utterly, beautifully cute. watching them go about their daily activities was fascinating, I could easily have spent a couple of hours there. Without a doubt one of my highlights. 

We went to Longleat today. There’s an event on, the festival of lights. Obviously, we did the safari before hand which was fascinating. As a lot of the animals were from Africa, it’s difficult if not impossible to Say what they feel about the cold British winter. It must feel alien to them.

As we drove into the safari area, we were able to stop at an area called the African village, we had a chance to have a nearby encounter with a giraffe. They appear to be such placid creatures, but are quite capable of effectively defending themselves. They are always though, graceful in their movements.

We drove into the ostrich enclosure, there’s something about these flightless birds that is comically endearing. Whilst most drive through areas are very strict about windows closed, we found out later that they are more relaxed here. The car in front had their window open and an. Ostrich seemed keen to explore.

Whilst driving through this part we were able to see into the monkey enclosure. I very much wanted to drive through there but couldn’t bring myself to for fear of the little darings ripping off a windscreen wiper or wing mirror. We saw the monkeys sat on and exploring cars as they drove through.

It was fascinating, but we avoided that encounter. More tomorrow.

I started to a bit of a sob story about me being pathetic about something, not related to my current anxiety issues.

I was three paragraphs in explaining the issue and realised the utter “patheticity” (I know that’s not a word. I’m sure there’s a word that describes how pathetic I am being over the issue, but I can’t think of it now) of what I was writing. That I had to delete all of it. I’m just too ashamed and embarrassed by the whole thing.

Don’t worry it’s not a deep dark secret, it is one that is visible to all of my family on two occasions per year.

Tonight then, was in my estimation the first time in not far off five years when I didn’t have to worry at all about the Thursday Night Net. I have to confess that the freedom from the anxiety of the thought of doing tonight’s net or worrying about next week or any future activity was, to say the least exhilarating.

That’s not to say I won’t come back to it at some point in the future. I certainly hope to. The question, of course is why did I have to leave it? That’s the one I can’t answer. All I can say is that the prospect of having to do it was making feel physically ill.

Of course, I haven’t completely got away from it, as I am wracked with guilt at having let my friends down. For that, I am having a lot of trouble forgiving myself.

I haven’t been walking anywhere near as much as I should be doing. After work today I suggested that we go to the stokes bay for an hour, Elayne could listen to her audio book, to kill a mockingbird and I would go for a walk.

I must admit it was a lot windier than I thought, a quite brisk westerly with a bit of a chill to it. We parked at Pebbles, I bought a ticket for an hour, left Elayne to her book and started off heading in to the wind. My thinking that I’d rather have my back to it.

It was the right choice. I was pleased to have my waterproof jacket, because it’s also wind proof, some nice gloves and my flat cap, so I was quite comfortable.

I’ve seen the Solent rougher that what it was, but it was very nice to be accompanied on my walk by the sound of the waves crashing against the sea wall and the swoosh as the waves hit the pebbles.

I walked almost two miles still not far enough, but better than nothing.

Just want to apologise for the couple of very short posts. I’d reached a point where I really didn’t want to lose the day count, but was too tired to write anything.

One of the things I have been wondering about is what is the optimum size of a community where people start finding that there is a group with a common interest. Doesn’t seem to be a lower limit. It appears that Winfrith Newburgh with a population of around 740 people has thriving garden and arts clubs, which is great for Elayne.

I have to go slightly wider afield if I want an amateur radio, astronomy or camera club. Dorchester and Weymouth are the most likely candidates, and there is an observatory at Durlston with an associated club, I. Think near Wimborne.

There is a walking club in the area and of course Dorset is festooned with lovely walks, so that will be good. I did promise that I would never become involved in a Committee again. I wonder how much interest there would be in starting any of those groups? No, I’m not going to do it, but I don’t mind testing the water.

There’s even a railway line nearby, but I don’t think the freight traffic will be very exciting. Definitely no shipping near by, so I’m afraid the marine traffic node will be going. I think I need to pay a bit more attention to what air routes, if any go over the area? Worth looking at being a flight radar node?