'Imagine Watford'

We saw some of the of "extraordinary open air moments" of Watford festival. One of my favorites was 'Glisssssssssando Opus II' - a troupe of musicians who played great music whilst gliding smoothly in formation, puffs of smoke rising from their funnels. Surreal and wonderful. 

There were roaring dinosaurs loose in the street (sorry Simon ;-), which certainly livened up a damp day in town.

The skilled stilt walkers (try saying that after a couple of ciders) made it look easy but it must have been exhausting performing in huge swaying costumes. Heads swooped to peck at children and forage in the flower displays, a grocer's stall and among drinkers outside a pub. Made people laugh though you had to watch out for the wildly flapping tails!

The dinosaurs were commanded by an elegant witchy figure.

There were other really good performances and experiences, such as the onboard show 'Tug', which Simon has written about here :nbtortoise.blogspot.co.uk

Growing things

It's great to see everything growing on the boat (apart from the rust, that is), after such a slow start. The rooftop plant's aren't suffering from my sporadic watering but are getting regular showers and thriving so far.

Inside, I have two more 'gardens' that I'm excited about as they're first times for me. I have a sprouter from a charity shop and here i have sprouted alfalfa lentils and radish seeds - yum.

And most exciting of all.. (drum roll) are the mushrooms! I bought some mushroom starter compost from Poundshop and doubted it would work, to be honest. Look!

You just cut them as needed and they keep springing up! They seem to like the dark cool of the engine hole but you have to remember to get them out when you run the engine ;-)

Superpram!

Looks like Silvercross are still making these amazing prams. Great suspension,  loads of room for shopping underneath, a weather-proof hood. My mum had one for us three kids and there was an extra seat installed for me on the front when my little brother came along and ousted me from the pram cave.
We used the wheels as a go-cart when we were bigger. Wonder if the baby in this pram will grow up with the freedom and death-wish we clearly had, to ride it down the street :-)

night-ride home

Blackbird is moored near the Ebury Way, which is a former railway line linking Rickmansworth with Watford.

(photo borrowed with thanks, from www.geograph.org.uk)

 The path is wide in some parts as shown in this photo; passes lakes and fields before it joins a windy section at Rickmansworth where it's very narrow and dense with bushes and trees. It was delighful to cycle along to the station. I went to see my son and daughter in south London before my son heads off back to his job in France and got back late last night. For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to cycle home the way I'd come! Of course, it was completely dark, thick with trees and no moon to be seen and my only light was the bike's dynamo, a little yellow beam that disappeared if I slowed and stopped. At the narrowest part of the path, a frantic rustling and branches breaking close to one side, told me I'd disturbed something large, maybe a fox but it was so close that I wobbled to a stop and of course the bike light went out. In an electric moment of fear and exhiliaration, I felt fur brush lightly against my bare leg in the dark and then the creature was hurtling away. The rest of the ride home was uneventful and so quiet after the racket of London travelling. I'm very lucky to live on a boat.

a visit to Wales

My son was staying with his grandparents in Wales so it was a good opportunity to go and visit them all for a few days. Apart from eating and drinking too much, me and the lad went on long walks together. Lovely.

 The weather was great and the hedgerows full of flowers.

This is the boat my dad has recently bought and is working on. It's a better size for an  80 yr old than the one they lived on for 2 years!

When I got back to London, they were running steam trains!

Sowing a seed

Seeds for Change, is a 'non-profit training and support co-op, helping people to organise for action and positive social change'. They run great workshops on effective campaigning, overcoming difficulties, widening support, inclusivity and mutual support, and much more (not to be confused with Seeds of Change, who sell pasta). All organising is based on consensus decision-making principles which saw the harmonious creation of the first Camp for Climate Action and which is such a pleasure to see happening in many grassroots movements across the country today.

Anyway, their resources have always been free to download and print off but they've now made a Consensus Handbook which brings together many of the guides and shows in a very practical way how we can come to decisions in a way that exclude no-one. There are practical tools on widening participation, helping overcome obstacles, accessibilty, resolving problems etc. You can dowload it for free as a PDF (i think there are about 200 pages) or buy it cheaper from the Seeds website than elsewhere (£4.90 instead of £6).

I'm declaring an interest - I did the illustrations, (but no, I'm not getting royalties!) but my real interest is in helping spread the adoption of consensus decision-making to all organising groups, whether it's a small bunch of people in a city wanting to start a fresh veg co-op or thousands trying to shut down a coal-fired power station.

HS2 - Slicing through

So far, the planned High Speed rail link between London and Birmingham (then Manchester) has been a vague idea on a map for me. I knew it was going to cut through the Chilterns and all for a few saved minutes of travelling time. But this morning, it all became more real for me as I sat out on the bow of the boat with my breakfast. I'm moored up alongside an area of woods, wetland and lakes and the birdsong is just lovely now that spring is here. I heard a cuckoo, an increasingly rare sound in this country, then had an extra treat of watching it fly across to other trees.
(borrowed from the rspb site)

Yesterday evening I saw a red kite.There are also woodpeckers, wrens, chaffinches, blue-tits, great-tits, robins, dunnocks and thrushes and probably lots of other birds I wouldn't recognise. There are kingfishers here too, I've been told. On the canal itself, swans, ducks, moorhens, coots and cormorants are all doing well here. I saw great-crested grebes and tufted ducks on the lakes. There are muntjac deer in the woods. Nearby, a Dog Rescue home has volunteers walking the dogs through the woods, along the towpath and around the lakes. But this area is just one place that the HS2 will be slicing through. I see the little tragedies of ruined nature repeated all along the line, completely insignificant to the planners, the profit-makers.