World in my eyes

Dave & Ali's picnic at Beacon Hill

2011-07-05T22:26:00.002+01:00

Dave:

and Ali:

Organised a weekend of activities to celebrate their new house. We missed the first day but managed to join them for a picnic at Beacon Hill. They took us to a large maze cut in a thicket of rhododendrons.

We took the twins in the pushchair:

Rob was there

And Gwar

with some more of their friends, whose name i forgot. Sorry!

The maze was fantastic, lots of places to climb and hide. There's a circular path, decked out so we could take the pushchair with us. Older kids had a great time playing hide and seek and racing around the path.
There are little hiddy places where you can seat and listen to stories about animals and plants:

To view the other pictures, click here. Pictures with children can be viewed by my friends on flickr only!

Le 9 mars:

2011-03-24T21:00:00.002Z

Louise baby bump

2011-03-06T21:09:00.002Z

Last Monday, Louise looked like this:

That was the start of the 37th weeks. Tonight is our last "quiet" night!

Walk in the snow

2010-12-19T09:53:00.003Z

2 weekends ago, the snow "paralysed" the East Midlands. I went for an early walk to the nature reserve, with the camera.

This little chappy wasn't too scared

I made it to a high birds' hide. The visibility wasn't great, can you guess the power station from the fog?

And a view of Attenborough village:

The nature reserve centre, with my nordic walking poles - this was a great workout

The ducks were walking on the ice. This little one went first

He was soon followed by his friends

On my way back, the path became strangely wild

This happy snowman was guarding the golf course. Not a soul, all snowed up, quite eerie really!

Click here to access the full set of pictures on flickr

A walk around the nature reserve

2010-12-12T08:39:00.005Z

We took our mums for a walk around the nature reserve when my mum visited us in October. Nice weather and lots of birds. Click here to see the full set on flickr.

Louise and Margaret:

and Maman:

Here is a view from one of the hides around the nature reserve:

As we walked on the canal path, we came across a very young and friendly dog and its family:

We then got onto a path close to where birds wait for walkers to feed them. We first came across ducks:

And then some geese:

And finally swans:

Maman has a conversation with one of them:

I tried to take pictures of birds in flight. Here's one of my best:

We had a great time an enjoyed tea and cake at the visitor centre.

Our lovely pebble

2010-10-24T22:40:00.003+01:00

We have a house bunny called pebble. Here are some pictures in the garden:

Twins!

2010-09-28T19:01:00.005+01:00

Edit: We now know they are girls...

Recovering from a stressful week

2010-07-18T09:58:00.003+01:00

A good way to avoid being on the road during rush hour and to relieve the stress of last week: climb Tryfan! Never mind the weather.

An hour after parking the car, I was at the top.

Walking down on "heather terasse", I was sheltered from the wind:

As I arrived at "the cannon", a lovely rainbow appeared:

Somehow, it doesn't look the same with the timer:

Strangely, the weather cleared once i'd made it back down!

A good evening stroll, before driving home.

IML "summer" training week

2010-07-16T07:58:00.002+01:00

For our hill walking day, we went to the Ogwen valley and climbed the goat track:

In cas you're wondering about the weather, here's a view of the devil's kitchen during a break in the fog:

Shame the movement of the cloud blown down the col is not visible on the picture!

If you think this all looks familiar, maybe it's because you remember this

Ski de rando - Dolomites

2010-07-14T07:40:00.002+01:00

4 mois sans nouvelle sur le blog - trop de stress, trop de boulot, la ca va mieux...

En avril, Guigou m'a emmene dans les Dolomites faire du ski de randonnee. Il faisait mauvais, sauf le dernier jour. Notre hote nous emmene faire une journee extraordinaire:

Depart dans la foret

Et quelle foret!

Guigou en plein effort

On rigole moins: les peaux commencent a se decoler. On est sorti de la foret, bientot le col et la premiere descente

Et c'est parti!

Un chien en ski de rando, c'est genial: droit dans la pente...

... ca rassure de la voir courir, pour l'etat de la neige!

On n'est pas rendu: on doit traverser a flan pour rejoindre un autre col

Il faut se battre. Une grosse avalanche a applati la foret, et du coup on doit skier a travers, par dessus, les branches! Les peaux n'ont pas apprecier, les miennes vont bientot lacher...

Voici d'on on vient: le premier col, le couloir que l'on a skie et la traversee de la foret applatie

Et voici le deuxieme col. On va skier la meme face a la monte et a la descente.

Une derniere photo car mes peaux viennent de lacher pour la derniere fois. Plus de toile adhesive, il faut marcher. A pied, j'ai de la neige jusqu'au cuisses!

Le sourire avant la descente. Je vais avoir des crampes aux jambes, donc pas de photos de la descente

Celle ci, je l'ai prise a la monte. On doit skier le couloir, puis la foret et pour finir 1 heure de marche pour rejoindre la route.

Vue de la vallee: Le premier couloir et au milieu, le deuxieme est situe dans l'ombre entre la dent de droite et celle au milieu de la photo

Une superbe journee. Je dois rajouter les noms dont je ne me souviens pas, la trace GPS, corriger les fautes mais apres 3 mois d'attente, il etait temps de montrer les photos!

Les autres photos sont sur flickr. Cliquez ici

mud

2010-02-15T23:18:00.005Z

Campervan weekend in the Yorkshire Dales. Bit of the problem this morning: with the blinds in the rear windows, I didn't see this pole when reversing out of the field:

I couldn't drive forward as the ground had gone soft overnight and the wheels just kept digging themselves in. I tried with the mats, with stones, just getting deeper.

In the end, I got the snow chains out:

Not much fun. My fingers got nearly as cold as if it had been snow, and a lot dirtier. In fact, it was harder work on mud than it is on snow!

We got out in the end... Not the most glorious first use of the van's snow chains!

snowy Wales

2010-01-22T17:39:00.002Z

Last weekend, I headed up to Wales in search of snow and ice. Up very early on Saturday, I picked up Rob and headed for Tryfan.

There gullies were not in good condition, so we did the classic north ridge traverse of Tryfan. On the picture above, we climbed the mountain from left to right.

Rob was reasonably cheerful at the start:

We had 600m to ascend, and soon we felt we were having a proper winter day

Not much of a view from the summit:

Still, there was some fun to be had on the way down:

On sunday, we helped Moira and Jeff look for a glove he'd lost the previous weekend in a gully near Ygarn.

There wasn't much snow left, so most of the search party went back to the Ogwen cottage for tea and cake. Liz, Michael and I walked to the summit ridge then completed the traverse over Ygarn.

Soon after we'd reached the summit ridge, we came across 2 walkers who'd missed their descend path from Ygarn. They were looking for the same path Louise and I used in the autumn, and it's not easy to find. They had to walk back 2km. Here they are at the start of their descend:

Summit picture. Snowdown, behind us, is lost in the cloud:

Looking back at Ygarn and Michael taking a picture:

The final descend was down "Devil's Kitchen". This proved untertaining:

Finally, here's a panoramic view from the top of Ygarn:

If you want to see the whole set of pictures, click here

At last! I've climbed some English ice!

2010-01-11T10:25:00.002Z

Last saturday after work, i drove up to the lake district to join Michael, Russ and Liz in the hope of breaking the curse of ice climbing in England.

On Sunday morning, we woke up early and went to Carrock Fell to climb/play on the icefall. Russ turned back before we made it to the car park. We were the first ones. Here is Michael:

We only had a 10 minutes walk from the car park. I led the most obvious route, to set up a top rope using trees as a belay:

Then Liz climbed the route:

Followed by Michael:

We climbed 4 routes in total. the ice was very good, plasticky. In places, it was thick enough to take 19cm ice screws! It felt like we could have been in the Alps. We even climbed an icicle:

We finished the day with tea / hot chocolate at the Lakeland pedlar cafe. What a great day!

To view the full set of pictures on flickr, click here

premiere tartiflette de la saison

2010-01-06T21:02:00.001Z

Pour le reste de svideos, il faut que je repare le camescope qui fait la greve...

Tobogan extreme

2009-10-27T07:03:00.002Z

Pascale nous montre comment faisaient les anciens dans les passages difficiles:

La danse des infideles

2009-10-22T21:34:00.003+01:00

En triant des photos et des videos, j'ai retrouve celle-ci. Il m'a fallu a peu pres 10 minutes pour faire la voie, avec un repos. J'ai edite la video pour qu'il n'y ai pas trop de temps mort, elle fait dans les 4 minutes.

fog for our first weekend in the van

2009-10-20T23:46:00.002+01:00

Our first weekend in the van:

Hole in the floor!

2009-10-05T19:40:00.002+01:00

Look what i found in the the van:

No rust, so i will win...

Campervan

2009-10-03T18:38:00.002+01:00

Louise and I have bought a van, to convert into a campervan. Louise is so happy with the van that she lets the rats visit - while I work on the insulation!

The van has it's own blog, click here to check it out.

Wet week in the Cheviot hills

2009-09-18T22:57:00.004+01:00

I worked on a gold Duke of Edinburgh expedition for Solihull college. On our way to Wooler, on the Scottish borders, we stopped at the angel of the north:

The leaders stayed in a cottage in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by real free range chikens:

And then it started raining, and we started to earn our money checking all the participants were alright. On the 2nd day, Grigor and I walked 26km, most of it not on footpath. By the end of the day, our river crossing skills had been properly tested. Here's a google earth picture of our track:

The rain stopped on the last day, so I took the camera on the hills. Here are a few pictures taken on Scald Hill:

The whole area was flowded 2 months earlier. Some bridges like this one were damaged in the flowd 2 months before. The rain we had wasn't as bad, just enough to make wadding through the rivers a real challenge!

Froggatt with friends

2009-08-31T08:09:00.011+01:00

To celebrate being a student again, we joined climbing friends who were camping in the Peak. Yesterday, we climbed at Froggatt. I started with Chequers Buttress and belayed Heather and then Louise:

Click on the picture to open a slide show of Heather climbing chequers buttress or here to access the set on flickr:

Same for Louise: click on the picture for the slide show and here for the set:

I climbed Sickle Buttress Direct, a route i'd never done before and belayed Louise and Scott up it. Meanwhile, Heather was leading the very nice Allen's Slab. By the time i got to the camera, she was at the top:

Rob and Angie joined us. I havne't seen Rob look so happy for a long time, so here they are:

Inspired by Heather, I lead Allen's Slab. I managed to place the three "friends" given to me as a leaving present by my ex-colleagues. Mike fetched my camera and took pictures of the finish, while the audience heckeled me for "posing"

Only Louise followed me up that one. Then, Slab recess direct with Louise and Scott.

Finally, Jaimie gave me the chance to try downhill racer on a top rope. It's too hard for me, and if Scott puts his pictures on the web i won't look so good then!

We then retreated to the pub under the thin drizzle. What a great day!

Thank you to Heather, Louise and Mike for taking these pictures.

Outdoor Instructor no more!

2009-08-30T21:21:00.003+01:00

Last Friday was my last day working as an outdoor education instructor at Beaumanor Hall. The instructors gave me this card:

And the ground staff this one:

Let's include this drawing courtesy of Sophie:

I don't have any pictures of the speach: Clive took me to the high rope store, where all the people with whom i worked were waiting. We went to the top of the zip wire tower, and i was presented with the cards and three "friends" (climbing equipment).

We were then invited by the YHA leaders to join their end of the summer camp bbq:

I will miss the pleasure of working in a beautiful place, delivering exiting high ropes and climbing sessions to young people and adults. I won't miss the awful management practice. I'm glad that my last moments in Beaumanor were on the high ropes, in the store and in the cabin furthest away from the beige building and the shenanigans it contains.

Dancing Sophie

2009-08-29T08:50:00.006+01:00

I wasn't the only one who enjoyed the high rope course. What a star!

Tight beam walk

2009-08-21T19:28:00.006+01:00

Having spent many a high rope sessions wondering what it would feel like to walk on the top beam,

I finally had a chance to try. Clive had asked me to glue some stamps on the trolleys at the very top, and to try the new harnesses:

Instead of climbing to each of the two trolleys, i decided to gather them in the same place and then to glue them. This worked very well as the caps were glued to the tubes, and i had to slash open the tube. I would not have liked to have to downclimb with open glue tubes in my hands!

It felt very wobbly up there at first:

But i soon felt more confident:

These trolleys are seldom used and were a bit rusty. In fact, the one i was attached to needed pulling along:

Allan and Mark were up there with me. A big thanks to Mark for taking these pictures!

Now glueing the stamps

Then retrieving and threading the tracers:

It started raining as i started to thread the second tracer:

Writing this post made me wonder if "normal" participants feel as stretched on the high rope course as i felt at the very top. I felt exhilarated after walking the beam!

budgie sitting

2009-08-20T20:42:00.005+01:00

We are Budgie sitting. The poor bird is so lonely, it wants to play with our rats. It mimicks the rats when we feed them:

It even stalks them all the way to their cage:

Les Maeso-Hugounenc de passage

2009-07-26T19:37:00.008+01:00

Quelle chance! Des amis du sud, en route vers l'Irlande, ont profite de leur long voyage pour passer un weekend chez nous, a Nottingham.

Nous les avons acceuillis avec un barbecue dans le jardin, suivi d'une promenade autour du lac du campus de l'universite:

On a fait une pause BN au bord du lac. On a finit notre promenade au bac a sable. Pierre en a profite pour passer a ses enfant le virus de la grimpe:

De retour a la maison, on s'est bien sur arrete au pub.

Le lendemain, on est alle se promener au Peak District, a Burbage north. Pique nique au bord de la reviere:

Il y avait suffisament de vent pour s'amuser avec les cerf-volants:

Pour finir un super weekend, Pierre s'est fait couper les cheveux!

Un grand merci a Pierre et Sabine de nous avoir rendu visite. Ils sont arrive les mains pleines de bonnes choses: fromages, saucisson, tomates, brugnons, peches, des bonnes bouteilles... Des gamins fantastiques, de la bonne humeur. Que du bonheur!

Pour voir le reste des photos sur flickr, cliquez ici Les photos des enfants ne sont visibles que sur invitation.

Walking in the Lakes

2009-07-19T21:35:00.005+01:00

A week ago i was leading a Duke of Edinburgh gold expedition in the Lake district. We were blessed with great weather for the whole week. The participants were great, the organiser friendly. They drove all the way from Brighton. I had to toughen up their chosen route, and the rose up to the challenge beautifully.

Here are some views i took during the week. At the start of the expedition:

Day 2: waiting near the top:

Day 3: waiting for them to arrive, with a book and a box of quality streets:

Day 3: on the way down

The cottage where we (the organisers) stayed:

To see the rest of the pictures click here

first panoramic digital picture

2009-07-15T23:40:00.002+01:00

It only took me one hour to download, install and troubleshoot the program to stitch panoramic pictures in ubuntu linux, then 10 min to use it. So here's my first one:

The pictures were taken last week when i was leading a gold Duke of Edinburgh practice expedition in the lake District.

The software used are panorama, huggin and gimp. A good tutorial can be found here

grimpe en cornouailles

2009-07-12T19:20:00.006+01:00

Je suis en retard pour mes photos. Pendant notre semaine de vacance en Cornouailles, Louise et moi avont fait un peu d'escalade. Sur la falaise de Bosigran:

Comme ca s'est bien passe, j'ai emene Louise a la falaise de Chair Ladder. Il faut faire un rappel pour descendre au niveau de la mer. Sauf a maree haute!

On a commence par une grande classique: Terrier's tooth. La on voit une cordee dans la longueur finale:

Tres belle voie. On est redescendu pour aller a l'autre extremite.

On s'est lance dans pendulum chimney, en pensant qu'il n'y avait pas de mouettes. Erreur:

Pour eviter les nids, j'ai du faire une variation un poil plus dure que prevu. Ca c'est bien passe, mais les nids de mouettes, c'est pas tres propre. Voila pourquoi:

Tour Ciel

2009-07-04T15:35:00.002+01:00

Been very busy lately, some good news: been offered a PGCE in business studies and ICT.

For some reasons i can't upload my video of ski mountaineering on blogger. If you want to have a look at it on youtube, click here

Louise's university friend got married

2009-05-31T20:57:00.003+01:00

This weekend Louise took me to one of her friend's wedding. We had a really good time, lunch with Dan and Amanda, then the ceremony, drinks, a very nice dinner, good speaches and then the dance. I only took pictures in the evening.

Here are Dan and Amanda looking good:

The same enjoying the music:

Louise enjoying the evening:

Louise talking to the groom, Simon:

And the bride, Alison, talking and dancing with Simon:

They treated us to a night time balloon launch:

Congratulations Alison and Simon!

I've fixed my JVC GR-D70E camcorder

2009-05-28T22:47:00.004+01:00

The poor thing died the first time i powered it up after recharging the battery on my return from Val d'Annivier. I googled, found a forum, identified the fault, fixed it. It's now working again!

The main fuse blew up. It's a 2A, 32V fuse soldered on the main board. Here's a picture:

If you can't see much, it's because it's a surface mounted component measuring around 2x1x1 millimeters. I simply soldered it on top of the original one. A broken fuse is an open circuit, and i thought this would be safer than to try to remove the original fuse and possibly damage the board.

I would like to thank John from the pechorin forum, and Colin who let me use his RS account to purchase the replacement fuse.

My post on pechorin is accessible here

froggies

2009-05-25T22:59:00.002+01:00

Had fun stalking the wildlife in Louise's pond today:

Pictures are on flickr as well, click here to access the set.

Louise in Paris

2009-05-10T21:42:00.004+01:00

We had a lovely crepe bretonne and Louise befriended a "piaf":

Then we went to the Eiffel tower, and queued:

We didn't have time to go to the top,

Louise really liked the domed roof:

Then in the evening, we just relaxed while i tried the new flash

To view all the pictures click here

Happy Remi in orange

2009-05-05T21:57:00.002+01:00

2 weeks ago I was in an unguarded mountain hut near Zermatt:

It's taking me a long time to process the pictures, not to mention the film. I should also write a commentary...

Just for a laugh...

2009-04-15T13:41:00.003+01:00

Sorry, Louise's camera ran out of memory so you don't know what comes next... Until i get Jess' pictures!

To give you an idea, the climb looks like this:

Ducks

2009-04-13T21:54:00.002+01:00

Little walk with Louise today near Youlgreave in the Peak. We saw lots of ducks:

Sporty weekend

2009-03-31T07:15:00.005+01:00

To prepare for the ski mountaineering week next month, I went on a 32km bike ride near Wildboarclough in the Peak last Saturday. 1150m ascent and atrocious weather, just what i needed - windy, rainy, sleet/hail with sunny spells.

This ride had lots of fast singletrack to start with, ups and down. I manage to get my money worth from my knee pads with a spectacular tumble, flying other the handlebars landing well in front of the bike. My knees still hurt 3 days latter although there's no blood. Strange feeling!

I had been lucky with the weather up to that point, the wind had been pushing me but now it was time for the return leg. Here you may be able to see the weather front sweeping past from the right. I had to cycle right through it.

When the worst was other i stumble upon this burger van. Home made cakes, home made burger, cup of tea. I was ready for the last push up to the start

There it is, the last hill. The car is parked near the building on the right.

Sunday was climbing day, with Mike. It's been a year since the last time we climbed together. We went to Blackrock, and had a warm sunny afternoon cruising VSs:

Cruising? Well we can't see clearly on the picture that Mike had the rope wrapped around his leg there!

Harwick Hall

2009-03-27T23:59:00.002Z

Louise and I took our mums to visit Hardwick Hall. It's an interesting contrast to see the ruins of the old hall right next to the restored new one. I especially liked the old plaster work, still hanging on to the walls, more or less in the open:

Meanwhile, some of the old stoneworks shows sign of wear. Or even erosion!

We had a great time. If you want to see all the pictures, click here

Maman vient nous voir

2009-03-27T21:29:00.004Z

Maman a passe une semaine avec nous. J'ai recuperer les photos qu'elle a prise pendant son sejour.

On a beaucoup cuisine. Avant meme de sortir sa valise j'ai du vider les courses:

On a eu le temps de beaucoup discuter le lundi. Mardi, je devais faire des demandes:

Maman a profite du jardin:

C'est la saison des grenouilles:

Yes i was working:

Le samedi, Louise nous a emmene visiter Hardwick Hall

La maman de Louise etait avec nous:

Bien sur, j'ai pris plein de photos:

Le lendemain, j'etais un volontaire pour une course d'orientation.

Et l'apres midi, on a lu, plante des graines, joue au triominos. Une tres bonne semaine, merci Maman!

rc="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3559/3390002075_359ceb2252.jpg?v=0">

Heather wants to know about Goldfrapp

2009-03-21T08:06:00.002Z

My friend Heather has tagged me an interesting list of questions to be answered with song titles from one band of my choice. Here it goes:

Choose ONE ARTIST ONLY. Using only SONG TITLES, answer each question (cleverly please) .
If you are tagged, it’s because I want to see YOUR list!

Pick Your Artist: Goldfrapp

Are you male or female: Number 1

Describe yourself: Human

How do you feel about yourself: Time Out From The World

The worst thing about you: Ooh La La

The best thing about you: Happiness

Describe where you currently live: Utopia

If you could go anywhere, where would you go: Felt Mountain

Your best friends are: Little Bird

Your family is: Happiness

Your favorite color is: Deep Honey

You know: Slippage

What do you love the most: Some People

What do you hate the most: Some People

What's the weather like: Twist

What are you wearing: Paper Bag

If your life was a tv show, what would it be called: Time Out From The World

What is life to you: Black Cherry

What is love to you: Cologne Cerrone Houdini

Do you believe in an afterlife: Road To Somewhere

What is the best advice you have to give: Train

Worst advice you’ve ever been given: Strict Machine

If you could change your name, what would it be: pass - no names in their song titles

If you were a Superhero, your name would be: Oompa Radar

The title of your Autobiography would be: A & E

Your favorite food is: Happiness

What do you fear: Clowns

What will your Epitaph say: Lovely 2 c u

Your last words will be: Let It Take You

What are you going to do later today: Ride a White Horse

What is your dream: You Never Know

Lecturer!

2009-03-17T06:53:00.002Z

I am now a part-time lecturer at a local college! (pour les francais: lycee professionel)

This will give me access to teacher training in further education, and then i will be able to apply with other colleges, for teaching jobs for which they think i am suitably qualified. It's a step in the right direction.

Because at the moment, i'm only doing cover for the sports department. And this department does live to students expectations of sports education: For my first lesson, i had to make a class watch a DVD then write down some analysis. One of the students was blind, nobody in the department spotted the mistake. Hmmmm....

Pasta!

2009-02-23T23:32:00.003Z

I brought a pasta machine when i visited my sister in Italy last year:

Fresh tagliatelle for lunch, vegetarian lasagne for dinner... twice!

Walk across Kinder

2009-02-09T08:23:00.003Z

The weather was very cold and sunny last Saturday. The snow had not had the chance to melt yet, but the roads were clear so we took the chance to drive to Edale (2 hours). We started to walk at 11am and 5 hours latter, made it back to the car having crossed the Kinder plateau on solid, frozen ground. Have a look at the pictures:

note: there seem to be a problem uploading the picture on the blog, but you can see the whole set by clicking here

Question for Tom... Lloyd... Matt... those who know about bike brakes

2009-02-08T16:46:00.003Z

I've replaced the old fashion handlebar on my city bike with something a lot more comfortable:

Here are the bits:

And what it looks like:

Problem: I don't have any brakes!

The original plan was to reuse the V-brake/shifter combo that came with my mountain bike. You can see the right hand side one on the last picture.

Not having a new brake cable, I tried to reuse the old one but it's too short. So I don't know if it works yet.

My questions are:

Is it possible to use V-brake levers with cantilever brakes,

Is it possible to drive the rear and front mechs with indexed shifters? The rear cassette has 5 rings and the shifter 8 speeds, have i got any hope to make it work?

Chineese New Year

2009-02-02T17:12:00.007Z

We went to the Chineese new year celebration on the university campus yesterday. We met Louise's Friends Kate, Gordon and Beth - who's not on the picture:

It was dark and only a handful of pictures are worth showing: the legend of monkey puppet show, one dance, the drums and the fireworks. We did miss a couple of acts when we retreated to the union for a hot chocolate in the warm!

Thank you Pedro!

2009-01-25T21:43:00.009Z

Et un bonus special pour Pedro: vue a St Veran, une vraie moto pour la neige:

Ah ca alors!?

2009-01-19T22:08:00.003Z

Je viens de faire le test etes-vous de droite ou de gauche". Voici le resultat:

Vous etes de gauche ou vous appartenez a une famille politique de gauche.

Il est possible que vous ne le saviez pas avant de commencer ce test.

Vos valeurs dominantes sont le partage, la dimension humaine, la generosite, vous refusez les egoismes primaires.

Vous avez parcouru pas mal de chemin mais il vous reste encore a avancer, la seule question que vous devez vous poser est celle-ci:

"Aurais-je le temps?"

J'en reviens pas. Car en Angleterre, c'est vrai que je suis "a gauche". En France, je suis un dangereux liberal aux idees corrosives voire dangereuses pour le bien etre de mes amis. (On m'a conseille de garder mes idees pour moi afin de ne pas faire de peine a mes amis, ce noel).

Ca alors, ce test donne une bonne explication de mon choix de vivre en Angleterre!

Sur ce, je retourne a mon business plan pour demarer ma propre boite, comme tout bon liberal futur exploiteur du peuple!

Telemark... Yeah Baby!

2009-01-18T17:29:00.003Z

Merci Pedro pour les conseils!

St Veran

2009-01-09T16:27:00.006Z

Poudreuse de reve au dessus de Montdauphin

2009-01-05T16:50:00.008Z

Edit: Toutes les photos sont maintenant sur flickr. Cliquez ici.

Et le fichier google earth est ici.

Arrives au chalet Porte a Guillestre, Pascal m'accueille en me proposant une sortie en ski de randonnee le lendemain, avec Mika, Eric, Mathieu, Jeannot et son chien Leon.

On commence a monter a travers la foret.

Assez vite, on apercoit des sommets.

Sortis de la foret, il fait grand beau:

Leon a l'air d'apprecier:

Une petite pause, apres 800m en deux heures de montee. Mais la on ralentit, et de toute facon Mathieu et moi decidons de ne pas sortir au sommet car la pente semblait chargee. On s'est donc ecarte pour ne pas reste sur le chemin d'une avalanche. On a bien regarde les autres grimper tout en mangeant notre sandwich. Il faisait -9C en plein soleil! Pas de photos du sommet, elles sont toutes ratees.

Et voila la descente, dans une poudreuse tres legere. Un vrai bonheur!

Bien sur, on en redemande et on grapille la moindre pente jusqu'a la fin, quitte a se retrouver coince dans les arbres comme Jeannot!

Dent de Lanfon

2009-01-02T11:00:00.004Z

Lundi dernier, j'ai eu la chance de faire la traversee de la dent de Lanfon avec Oliver et ses amis Hubert, Jean-Louis et celui dont j'ai oublie le nom.

les photos sont sur flickr, vous pouvez les voir en cliquant ici

Vacances chez Oliver

2008-12-21T17:14:00.007Z

Premiere journee en famille. l'apres midi, nous sommes alles a Semnoz faire du ski de fond.

Tres belle vue avec cette inversion nuageuse et un groupe de randoneurs en raquettes:

Aujourd'hui, ski de randonnee dans le massif des Aravis, a Bellefrasse. Nous allons derriere la crete, entre les deux sommets centraux:

Comme je suis lourd (!) j'ai laisse l'apareil photo dans la voiture, et garde le gps. Voici notre trace:

De retour sur le parking. Hubert, Jean-Louis et Oliver:

Demain, Oliver et Hubert nous emmenent faire la traversee de la dent de Lanfon. Depart et retour a la frontalel, monte en raquette a neige, puis piolets et crampons. J'espere que l'echauffement de ce weekend sera sufisant!

When i'm feeling blue...

2008-12-20T19:09:00.007Z

... I cook!

I try to find a recipe to cheers me up - and also Louise :) Last week, I had an aubergine in the fridge:

Google to the rescue! Find a suitable recipe: a pie with aubergine in it.

The robot does the hard work - I wish...

Final result - it tasted as good as it looks!

And here's another one i did soon after, brocoli and blue cheese "gratin"

Good bye Tom

2008-12-03T00:51:00.009Z

Tom is going back to Australia. Some South African mountain biking friends of his organised a weekend in Afan (south Wales), so i fixed my bike and joined them.

On saturday, I really struggled to keep up for the whole 40km we did. But we had good, dry weather instead of the fog/drenching we were promised, and i really enjoyed the day. Here is an image of our ride, recorded by the GPS. Click here to open the file in google Earth, or to download it.

I only had my mobile to take pictures with, the quality is not too good.

At the start:

First breakdown - and only - breakdown:

First long climg, and last time i had the chance to take pictures of the others from the front (!)

First break:

Another break, I'll loose my smile soon:

Near the end we caught up with other friends who did a different ride. Here's Julie:

On sunday, I emptied all the spare layers from my bag to take the bigger camera:

After these 3 pictures i realised i'd left the gps in the car park, so i raced back down and then tried to catch up with the rest of the group, which i did after a couple of hours non stop except for this picture:

A big thanks to Claire and Spike who organised this. I hope to join you for more adventures on wheel next year!

And good luck to Tom on his return to Aus.

Les Visiteurs!

2008-12-02T23:16:00.005Z

Isabelle et Guilhem sont venu pour un weekend - c'etait en octobre. On a eu beaucoup de chance avec le temps, plutot sec. Cliquez sur l'image ci dessous pour voir le reste des photos ou bien ici pour le diaporama.
show/

Weekend in Amsterdam

2008-12-02T13:54:00.003Z

Louise was doing a one week course in Arhem last month. I went with her in advance to enjoy a weekend in Amsterdam.

Click here the picture to access the other pictures from this trip, all on flickr

Quand on voit ca, on comprend mieux...

2008-11-20T07:45:00.003Z

... pourquoi ca casse:

Et moi qui croyais que je ne faisais pas beaucoup de velo! Qu'est ce que je vais trouver quand je vais nettoyer les moyeux des roues? du sable?

J'ai casse mes velos!

2008-11-12T10:33:00.003Z

Les anglais disent "fait en fromage" (made of cheese) quand ils pensent qu'un bout de velo n'est pas solide. A voir ce qui reste de mon derailleur, on comprend!

Happy Beasties

2008-10-26T21:55:00.006Z

In the garden:

In the house:

Aiguille de l'Index

2008-10-20T22:21:00.005+01:00

Il serait temps que je termine les photos de vacances. Nous sommes revenus a Chamonix apres la tempete pour faire l'ascension de l'aiguille de l'Index. Voici Louise au parking du telepherique:

Une heure plus tard, au pied de la voie on fait la queue. Il y a 2 cordees devant nous, et comme le matin nous etions a Verbier en train de plier la tente, il etait deja assez tard: on a commence a grimper vers 12h30. Mais on a tout le temps de manger nos sandwichs et de preparer la corde!

Prochain arret le sommet. Il est 3 heures quelque chose. Ca risque d'etre juste pour la benne du retour.

Apres les rappels et la bartasse, nous voila sur le chemin. Le telepherique viens de s'arreter. Il nous faut redescendre a pied, loin dans la vallee... Mais pour le moment on a encore le sourire!

Apres 2 grosses heures de marche qui n'etaient pas prevues au programme, nous voila dans la vallee. On a coupe a travers le golf pour rejoindre la voiture. On n'etait pas les seuls, un couple d'islandais qui etaient au sommet en meme temps que nous viennent de nous doubler. Derriere nous, l'Index c'est l'aiguille qui se detache sur la droite:

La journee s'est terminee a la pizzeria pour Louise - qui s'est assoupie dans la voiture - et chez Oliver pour moi, devant un bon verre de genepis. C'est notre sommet de ces vacances - sur 3,5 tentatives (!)

vacances a la montagne: promenades

2008-10-08T21:51:00.005+01:00

Time to catch up with uploading the holiday pictures:

vacances a la montagne (2) - weekend chez Oliver

2008-09-07T21:20:00.003+01:00

J'ai plus de bras !

Vacances a la montagne (1)

2008-09-06T12:08:00.005+01:00

Oh jungleland!

2008-08-19T07:56:00.005+01:00

There's life in my vegetable patch:

There's also some happy growing veggies:

Just after a 4 days weekend i get to harvest this :

gps tracks

2008-07-26T15:36:00.005+01:00

Linux computer + garmin etrex gps = lots of head scratching, and success at last. Here is a map of last sunday's bike ride:

Now i have to tackle the backlog of such maps, and to find a way to upload routes on the gps. But for now i am happy :))

I would like to thank fub for his explanations.

cheap sci-fi set

2008-07-23T07:34:00.004+01:00

I had to cycle through a cement factory on Sunday. It felt as if i was visiting the set for a cheap science fiction television series:

Here's another one, a bit more 70's "James Bond":

The Truth about Politics

2008-07-17T23:57:00.004+01:00

Click on the picture and play the "time for some campaignin'" video to have a good laugh...

It's a sign...

2008-07-14T07:35:00.006+01:00

That i'd never seen before. Somewhere between the M40 and Banbury - trying to escape from the mayhem on the motorway... Here's the bridge in question:

Fortunately there was a layby soon after. The "road" was a bit narrow...

Bird rescue

2008-05-18T22:15:00.004+01:00

A little bird got trapped in Louise's loft. There's a nest somewhere on the roof and this one must have found a way inside. Louise caught it in her hands (!), but to climb down the loft ladder we put it in a cardboard box. I got the camera just in time to set it free:

Premiere recolte

2008-05-18T22:13:00.002+01:00

UK climber feel the credit crunch

2008-05-06T06:59:00.005+01:00

Yesterday, climbing at Stanage north end - High Neb, Mike and I saw:

I must say the owner of this climbing shoe admitted to being Scottish...

Stubai + GPS + googlearth ...

2008-04-16T22:14:00.003+01:00

Enfin une manip d'ordinateur qui me prend moins d'une soiree:

Si vous telechargez ce fichier pour l'ouvrir dans googlearth, vous aurez quelques points de references de la semaine de ski de randonee dans la vallee du Stubai en Autriche.

Bon, il doit y avoir moyen de lancer googlearth depuis le blog, et aussi de faire un lien avec les photos, mais c'est la premiere fois que j'arrive a faire quelque chose avec le GPS sous linux donc c'est la fete. Na.

Si le lien ne marche pas bien, le voici en chair et en os:

http://www.btinternet.com/~lanewton2/stubai08.kml

Avant de partir en ski de randonée...

2008-04-04T22:46:00.003+01:00

... On re-encolle les peaux. Et avant d'encoller, il faut oter la vielle colle:

Qu'est ce qu'on rigole :(

Dust-up

2008-04-03T20:17:00.003+01:00

Dusting up the links was long overdue, some new, mostly French stuff for those who want to practice.

I'm off to Austria to do some ski Mountaineering with Guigou. I bring with me some nasty English virus that i've just about recovered from, they won't like me...

He looks already worried there... Well it was x-mas 2006 but i'm sure he's a bit anxious right now! 6 of us plus the guide. How hard will it be? How cold? How much sweat? How strong will the others be? Bring it on!

Another video... more skiing!

2008-03-26T21:31:00.004Z

First scenes are me on telemark skis !!

If you want to see happy Louise, scroll to the end...

Visite de ma Maman!

2008-03-25T10:30:00.007Z

Bon, ca date d'avant le ski, mais Maman est venue a Nottingham quelques jours. On a fait des promenades:

Bonus! Depuis mon anniversaire, je peux boire ca a la maison:

Merci Louise!

Ski Holiday with Louise

2008-03-18T08:19:00.004Z

Click on the picture to see the other pictures on flickr...

Ma premiere video...

2008-03-07T00:12:00.003Z

Enfin! J'en ai bave pour avoir cette video sur le web, et meme si je n'ai pas de son sur le laptop, je suis bien content!

Vous pouvez aussi la voir en plus grand ici

Le jeux des similaritudes

2008-02-19T18:44:00.005Z

Saurez-vous trouver quels sont les points communs entre ces deux photos:

Mars 1996, depart pour l'Irlande:

Janvier 2008, depart pour l'Angleterre:

I can't believe it's February ???

2008-02-10T22:55:00.001Z

Amazing day at Stanage with Mike. In chronological order:

And the first route of the day - no climber hence only here for the record:

Can you spot what's wrong?

2008-02-03T22:03:00.002Z

Salsa Party

2008-02-03T21:27:00.001Z

With a live Band!

And some very, very good dancers:

and only my phone to take pictures - sorry!

New blog

2008-01-30T13:09:00.001Z

For the 2 years anniversary of this blog, i am creating a new one!

This blog will still exist, with all the pictures of things i like to do in my spare time,

While this one will be a collections of short thoughts of mine - ie boring text ?? - gathered in my struggle to make a living as a self employed business consultant, specialised in Corporate Social Responsibility.

It's called Don't be afraid... Spread your wings as i'm still terrified of creating my own company....

Wish me luck!

4 weeks in France

2008-01-24T11:42:00.001Z

2 business meetings in Paris,
3.5 climbing days in sunny south of France, with friends,
1 x-mas with familly,
2 days helping Mum take care of the nieces,
4 days new year celebrations with friends in the Alps,
2 days ice climbing with friends, one day ski mountaineering, one day discovering ski hiking,
3 more familly parties/celebrations,
2 days being sick with stomach bug - coursesy of my friends' children - but these were rainy days anyway!
2 salsa evenings with friends,
1 2CV repaired after one year off the road,
lots of time spent with my Mum,
2 suits bought on the first day of the january sale - time spent in shop: 1 hour - note: time spent on market research: 1 evening
lots of sorting done at my Mum's,
1 extra day of ice climbing, skiing, and ski mountaineering on my way back,
1 business meeting in Brussel,

And now:

1 month worth of receipts and letters to sort through,
3 business proposals to follow through,
5 weeks+ of work to catch up with,

And lots of very happy memories to keep me smiling!

cinq ans c'est tout!

2008-01-09T14:17:00.001Z

Et deja ca fait des photos comme ca:

Merci Martin!

et ici avec sa maman, Katia:

je sais pas me garer.com

2008-01-07T17:54:00.003Z

For those who don't read French, this is a fairly typical exemple of my home town driving standard... I took a picture in the hope of loading it to the French version of i park like an idiot.com

C'est toujours autant la fete du slip sur les routes et parkings montpellierains:

La blanche, c'est ma voiture anglaise et la bleue, c'est un bon montpellierain comme on en voit souvent. Je lui ai laisse un mot sur le parebrise, lui conseillant de retourner a l'auto-ecole.

J'ai aussi pris une photo que je pensais mettre sur le site Je sais pas me garer, mais pour que la photo soit publiee il faut mettre un autocollant sur la bagnole en question, et j'en avais pas... Donc je la mets ici!

Aie mes doigts!

2008-01-07T17:43:00.001Z

Je suis alle grimper avec Antoine hier apres-midi:

Mais ca valait le coup, car il m'a mis une moulinette dans "la valse de l'aigle" et dans "total desastre 99", deux voies que je n'avais jamais faite. Maintenant, il va me falloir les enchainer, et proprement! Attention!

ski de randonee

2008-01-04T21:32:00.001Z

Pour finir l'annee en beaute, j'ai eu la chance de faire 4 jours de montagne avec les amis de la fac et meme du lycee, pres de Guillestre. Du soleil, de la neige, que c'etait bon!

Il y a eu aussi de la cascade de glace, et du ski de fond, mais pour ca j'avais laisse mon reflex au chalet.

Pour voir toutes les photos, cliquez ici

Et bonne annee!

Escalade a La clape

2007-12-28T21:22:00.001Z

Comment chaque annee, le rendez-vous de Noel a la falaise de La Clape entre les perpignanais de Carcassone Philou et Jean-Marie, et les montpellierains de Toulouse et Nottingham Guigou et moi meme. Voici Guigou charge comme un dromadaire:

Philou en train de grimper (!)

Jean-Marie bien fatigue en fin de journee:

La vue depuis le pied de la falaise en fin de journee:

Que du bonheur:

Pour plus de photos, cliquez ici

Where is Remi?

2007-12-17T20:21:00.001Z

The climbing wall made a display of our old membership pictures from 10 years ago:

Victorian Christmas

2007-12-04T12:42:00.001Z

Not much climbing instructing to do at this time of the year. So the centre has devised other activities making the most of the old mansion. Here you can see kids all dressed up for a "Victorian Christmas Day" singing carols on the main stairs:

Modern Day Dinosaur

2007-11-21T17:40:00.006Z

Murder Mystery

2007-11-21T17:29:00.001Z

Great with a group of 8 years old!

No time for sport

2007-11-19T16:23:00.002Z

But i can still dream about using these:

Good day to work ...

2007-11-04T19:09:00.001Z

Very nice weather last week

It was a pleasure to lay the kit out for the kids:

Monopoly Money

2007-11-03T19:38:00.002Z

150 notes in my hands to buy the new car...

Apres 5 ans de bons et loyaux services...

2007-10-25T23:07:00.002+01:00

Plus une longue annee ou elle n'a pas arrete de tomber en panne,

La 806 GPL est en vente sur ebay!

Elle m'a encore claquee dans les doigts hiers, elle a du etre remorquee a cause du froid je suppose. Pas de pitie, car j'ai deja achete sa remplacente, sur ebay elle aussi:

Je dois aller la chercher samedi...

Rainy sunday

2007-10-17T16:37:00.001+01:00

A bit too much on my plate, not able to find time to feed the blog? Or time to take good care of myself for that matter! Off to the peak on sunday, the forecast was all wrong and we left the climbing gear in the car to keep it dry. We walked up to the crag, Birchin, to say hello to Scott who drove up from his new home in Bristol to help the club for fresher's day.

The experienced club members had brought golf umbrellas with them and had setup a couple of top ropes. Usually, once freshers have been seduced into paying their yearly membership to the club, the experienced members try to discourage them from coming to weekend trips so i guess bad weather played in their hands ! Only joking ;)
So i grabbed a climb, some slippery chimney but in good style: rope around my waist and walking boots on:

I had a thought for the pioneers who only climbed that way. Back then a dif did mean difficult!

Meanwhile, i decided to lighten the load of crappy machines that constantly break down on me: a new laptop should be on its way. Hurray!

Some computer progress

2007-09-30T20:28:00.001+01:00

After weeks of computer frustration, something is going my way at last! In spite of a dodgy network connection and dead CDROM drive, i've managed to resurected my big laptop with a netboot install. Hurray!

Meanwhile, a storm last week has broken roofes and uprooted trees everywhere. Here's a picture from the park where i work:

The tree got broken at its base when the other one fell on it: