Henry's Blog

Archive for May, 2008

Since the baby is due any day now (well, in the next 4-6 weeks anyway) we thought it would be a good idea to make a little more space in the garage – you never know when another kind relative will drop off a spare cot or moses basket! So Henry set to work cleaning up the garage, and a heavily-pregnant Sara decided that the garden needed weeding. We followed a day of hard work with the first barbecue of the season – WAY later than last year’s first BBQ (April I believe) but hopefully the first of many to come…

We finally got round to putting the finishing touches to the lavatory this weekend. Having sanded all the rough plaster last weekend, we were able to paint the end of the room that was once hidden by the crappy cupboard the previous occupent had bodged. Once that was done, all that remained was the skirting board and beading (why do they call it beading?!). As you can see from the photos below, we managed to do a reasonable job of it and the bathroom finally looks presentable.

This shot recreation isn’t ideal – it was taken from a completely different spot for a start – but it quite nicely illustrates the change that 2008′s quay improvement works have had on the St Martins Higher Town quay – both wider and longer by a significant amount.

There’s not too many years between these two shots (only eight) and not too much change visible either. It’s the view from half way up the hill on Gugh, looking down to Black Point, over Porth Conger on St Agnes. The new quay is visible in both, with the improvements that have been made in 2008 quite obvious in the latter shot.

Here’s a nice view of the coastguard houses up at the top of Garrison Lane, as seen from the gun emplacement that has lovely views over Hugh Town. I’m glad to see these little houses haven’t changed much at all, apart from the car!

I find this "little" change quite saddening – the crumbling of the little old quay on St Agnes, in front of the Turks Head. I’m not sure what caused this significant decay – I looked back at some shots from 2006 and can see it there too, so at least it wasn’t caused by all the recent work to improve the new quay. But it definitely looks significant enough that it can’t just have been weather damage, can it? At least it’s not been destroyed as thoroughly as the old quay in Old Town, on St Marys – which has all but disappeared!

This is a view that you would hope hasn’t changed that much in 20 years – considering both of these castles have stood (or in King Charles Castle’s case, laid in ruin) for hundreds of years so far. It’s a nice view though, showing the older castle on the top of the hill, along with the (relatively) new castle at the bottom which was constructed from the latter’s stones.

Here’s another twenty-years-apart view, this time of the old ruined house on Tresco, near the Island Hotel. Other than getting a lot more overgrown and covered in plants, nothing much seems to have changed with this lovely old building. It’s very interesting to see how much bigger the big palm-like tree in the background has got though!