Paddington Trail London

It's a busy time for trails in London. Aside from the Bus Sculpture Trail there is the Paddington Trail. The Paddington Trail is related to the release of the new Paddington Bear film. There are fifty statues around London each designed by an artist, designer or celebrity. The trail will raise money for the NSPCC.

This Paddington is Rainbow by Darcey Bussell, the ballerina. I expect his tutu and ballet shoes are inside his case. Rainbow Paddington is outside the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. So he is quite close to the London Transport Museum, not sure if he has a ride on the bus sculptures there.

London Bus Sculpture Trail III

I'm now at the start of the bus trail which is outside the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden. This bus is called Accessibus and is by Liliana Ortega. Accessibus is decorated using ideas from UCLs Accessibility Research Group, Liliana Ortgea is a Phd student at UCL. There's lots of words and phrases that come up in interviews all over the bus.

The windows on this bus are covered in blackboard paint. The idea is that people can give their thoughts using chalk. The quote from the website is "Accessibus is an ever-changing sculpture which will give helpful feedback on people's views on these topics." From my photo the feedback seems to be that buses should be driven by 'Mrs Dean' and 'Delia & John' should sit upstairs at the front. Which of the three 'people' are Delia and John I'm not sure. I look forward to all buses being driven by 'Mrs Dean', though how easy that will be to achieve I don't know.

London Bus Sculpture Trail II

This bus is close to the Buckingham Palace one in the previous post, just a few yards away. It's called Gull Graeni Straeto and is by Kristjana S Williams an artist born in Iceland. I guess the buses name means something in Icelandic then. It has a lot of London's landmarks painted on it, the other side is slightly different. The front has the London Orbit Tower on it, which was built for the Olympics, with the London Eye. You can just make it out in the photo. To the back of the bus I think is the Post Office Tower with a giant bird on it - would look better with a dragon instead.

London Bus Sculpture Trail

2014 is the 'Year of the Bus'. I don't know why it's the year of the bus nor who decided it was, I might decided to call 2015 the 'Year of Cute Little Red Dragons' and see who goes along with it. Anyway, as part of The Year of the Bus there are 60 model buses being placed around London to form trails. Lots of artists and designers have come up with designs for these buses, the basic model is the new Route Master, to showcase the role of Buses in London (you can tell I'm reading the publicity blurb as I'm not really sure what its all about).

This bus is inspired by Buckingham Palace. It is the work of Mandii Pope, an artist from New Zealand, and is outside Transport for London offices on Victoria Street. I resisted the urge to wear a big black wig and play guitar when I got on the top.

Caerwent

I'm visiting Caerwent today. It's a village in Monmouthshire between Newport and Chepstow. The walls in the photographs are Roman. The Roman town was known as Venta Silurum and was the tribal capital of the Silures tribe . A lot of the Roman walls are still standing and some places the walls are over 15' high. The walls include some towers that were added towards the end of the Roman occupation. As they are now the walls have some handy niches for me to sit in and have my photograph taken. Maybe they were built that way to keep dragons happy by giving them somewhere to rest.

Around the village are remains of a number of Roman buildings. The Forum, Basilica, some temples and some houses have been found and you can walk around the foundations of these.

Tenby

My first visit to Tenby. It is a town on the Pembrokeshire coast and still has its medieval walls. You can see the 13th Century walls behind me, I don't think the car park sign is quite that old.

In Welsh Tenby is Dinbych y Pysgod - Little Town of Fishes. The Normans strengthened the castle next to the town. After it was attacked by Llewelyn The Great the town walls were built. This was done by William de Valence, Earl of Pembroke. At times it appears this period of history seems to consist of somebody called Llewlyn attacking somewhere and a Norman called William building a wall or castle.

Tenby is where Henry Tudor sheltered (I think that's polite for hid from people with swords) before leaving the country during the Wars of the Roses. When he returned and became Henry VII the town benefited from royal grants.

The town suffered a decline after the civil wars. It lost a lot of its population and became very run down. Then Napoleon came along and rescued it - sort of. As rich people could no longer visit fashionable parts of Europe they started looking for places in Britain to go. Sir William Paxton built a 'bathing establishment' then a hotel and cottages. This attracted lots of the tourists who could no longer go to Europe. The towns revival continued into Victorian times.

Tenby is now a very pretty town. A cliff top road gives lovely views into the harbour. The centre of town is full of narrow streets with brightly painted Victorian shops.

Big Pit - Blaenavon

I'm at Big Pit in Blaenavon, Wales. Big Pit is an old coal mine that is now a museum. You can even go down into the mine itself (bit like being home) where an ex-miner talks about mining, you can't take cameras or phones down there as there is still the risk of gas. Down in the mine there are still the stalls for the pit ponys.

Big Pit is an amalgamation of a number of mines, the oldest dating back to 1812. The main shaft at Big Pit was opened in 1860. It closed in 1980, though there is still plenty of coal down there. Above ground you can wander around and see the winch room for the lift, which is behind me in the photograph, and the miners baths. The baths were built in 1939, before that the miners had to go home to wash.

Blaenavon itself is a World Heritage Site due to it's role in the industrial revolution. Not far from Big Pit is the iron works.