Outside the main gates to Buckingham Palace is the Queen Victoria memorial. Essentially it is the centrepiece of a roundabout, and at its centre is a column on top of which stands a golden version of Victory, arms outstretched to the skies.
One of the very important, and well cared for ravens at the Tower of London. An ancient legend states that as long as the ravens remain at the tower, Britain is safe from invasion. The ravens at the tower today are fed and have their flight feathers trimmed (ensuring they remain at the tower). At the time this photo was taken the birds, which are naturally territorial, had been fighting and were being separated by the Yeomen Warders who look after them. You can see more photos of the ravens here and here.
One of the few photos I took on my recent (short) business trip to South Korea. These were served one night as part of our dinner. At the time I assumed they had to be some type of green bean, but thanks to Peter Garnhum‘s comment on this photo in my Flickr pool I now know that they are in fact garlic scapes. Stir fried and served in a slightly spicy sauce, they were very tasty indeed.
Inside the White Tower at the Tower of London, was an exhibit all about Guy Fawkes and his plot in 1605 to destroy the houses of parliament, kill the King and his government and restore the Catholic church to power in England. The plot failed, but only at the last minute. Now, on November 5th each year, England remembers this early attempt at terrorism by burning effigies of Guy Fawkes on large bonfires and setting off fireworks (oh, and having a few beers of course).
One of several stone spiral staircases in the White Tower at theTower of London. The railings and the wooden step covers are a more modern addition to a building that is over 900 years old. Guess they knew how to build things to last back then.
I wonder how many people have walked these stairs? How many battles were fought on them? How much bloodshed have they seen? They are, after all, in one of the most notorious places in British history; a place with a long history of torture and death.
Just outside the Tower of London, were these two RNLI launches. On an otherwise grey day, the bright orange boats provided a splash of colour on the river.
Apologies to the Linux users out there (like myself) who have to put up with an error message when loading that Tower of London page – just click OK and the page loads OK. I have reported the error to the site’s webmaster and PR person, but I doubt anything will happen to fix it.
In the United Red Carpet Club lounge in Narita airport is a beer pouring machine [Quicktime] that you load a glass into, taken from the adjacent refrigerator, press the button and watch as it gently tilts the glass and pours beer into it. As it nears the top, it gently moves back into the vertical position, and then finishes up by adding a head to the beer from a second nozzle. The movie clip, from my cellphone, is not quite long enough to catch this last step, but you get the idea.
I took the video while I was there earlier today waiting for my flight back to San Francisco. When I got home, I found an article at Gizmodo describing a robot that Asahi is giving away that will pour beer for you.
The beer is called Cass Fresh, says “Sound of Vitality” over it and underneath, as shown in the photo, it says 100% Non-pasteurized beer provides ultimate refreshment with fizzy and crisp taste. What more could one want from a can of beer?
Currently sitting in the United Airlines lounge at Narita airport waiting for my connection to Seoul; the airport here is snowed in, most outbound flights are delayed and when I got to the gate 15 minutes before departure time (having just got my boarding pass and seen the departure marked as ‘On Time’ on the screens everywhere), I was told that there was no plane yet. Now it has vanished from the indicator boards and they are telling us to wait for announcements.
I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that flying today is not the way to get around. If I had the time, I think I’d prefer to take a ship. At least there you get proper meals, a proper bed to sleep in and can walk around more easily.
A little further west along the coastline is the city of Brighton. Here is a shot of the west pier, which finally collapsed into the English Channel at the end of December 2002. Here is all that remains of a once majestic pier. Now it looks kind of ghostly, especially in this shot where the boundary between sky and sea has blurred.