Visiting London's Underground Farm

More adventures underground, this time visiting the Growing Underground farm in a WW2 bomb shelter in south London.

I'd been down the Clapham shelters before for an art installation (natch) and was told tunnels nearby were being used for a farm. That intrigued me so when tickets appeared for a visit I snapped up one quickly.

The aim is to produce low emission high quality food within urban areas. The idea came from the vertical farm but the initial concept in that book has difficulties, not the least cost, but also temperature control.

Using empty tunnels is not just cheaper, it is actually beneficial to keep the plants to the required temperature, particularly if horizontal (like here), rather than a shaft, as there is less height differences and hence less temperature difference.

In the racks shown above, salad is being grown, and the colour isn't wrong, that's what it looks like: the LED lamps only emit the frequencies used by plants i.e. excluding green.

The seeds germinate in one hot and humid tunnel (below) that still looks like the air raid shelter it is, before being transferred to the growing tunnels such as the one above.

The seeds are "planted" on what looks like carpet with the roots below picking up nutrients directly using hydroponic techniques:

We got to try some of the crop and wow! was it tasty! Intense flavours - my favourite were the pea tips.

It was all very high tech, indeed these types of farms are being studied by NASA for future space colonies.

But its also potentially very useful here on Earth. The two biggest environmental problems with have are global warming and loss of habitat, and farming contributes to both of these. Putting the farm underground means land can be returned to wildlife (surely better) and the LEDs can be timed to come on when there is spare renewable energy (e.g. wind farms at night).

And there are lots of potential sites for expansion, from cold war bunkers to coal mines. According to this BBC article, in the UK there are 25,000 km^2 of disused mines and tunnels. And with the potential to have up to 60 crops per year, that could be very productive.

Plus, have I mentioned it was delicious? Already its products are being used in restaurants, and one of their advisers is none other than Michel Roux Jr.

Absolutely fascinating, another of the wonders beneath the streets of London.

Photography Blog: Do you need Full Frame?

The Bursledon Blog had a post about cameras and how much the tech is required which interested me as it's a topic I've been thinking about. In particular, the long debated question "do you need full frame?".

This question relates to sensor size which relates to how big a camera is and a whole host of other factors. Basically, the order is:

• Full frame 36 x 24mm 
• APSC 24 x 16mm e.g. my Sony A6xxx series, shown above
• 4/3rds 17 x 13 mm
• 1 inch 13 x 9 mm e.g. my Sony RX100m4
• 1/2.3 inch e.g. my GoPro 5 Black, Mavic Pro drone
• 1/2.6 inch 5.5mm x 4.1mm e.g. my Pixel 2 phone

There is a school of thought that to be a true photographer you have to use full frame and only noobs and amateurs use anything else. But is that right?

As always, the answer it that it depends, most importantly, on what sort of photography you do, and is strongly connected to the choice of lens.

Many years ago I did a camera comparison and Tillerman commented all the photos looked very similar, which is a good point. For scenes such as these, well lit, using medium aperture and results displayed on small sizes on a screen, there is very little difference and so you don't need full frame.

However there are times when this is not true, such as:

• if you want shallow depth of field and use lenses with large aperture, then full frame is better (e.g. for portraits)
• if you want to take photos and videos in low light, then larger sensor (again, with suitable lens) is better

But how often is that the case for you? With me its not that often, as I get sufficiently shallow depth of field for portraits with my APSC camera if use longer focal length and/or shoot wide open. Also, these tend to be family photos, so the moment and expression are most important, not technical details.

That's an important point: very often its composition that is key, not technical details for pixel peepers. On one of my Greenland trips, someone was just taking photos on his phone and they were great - but he was a film director, used to thinking about composition and using what he had.

The APSC camera is usually, but not always, ok with low light scenes. Sometimes you can get away using a tripod, other times there is actually enough light (e.g. London at night isn't that dark). But there are shots my A6500 can't handle - such as I tried to take a video of us sailing off Morocco under moonlight, and the noise & lack of dynamic range were disappointing.

However that's rare, and there's another consideration, which is weight and size. I take pictures for fun, often while travelling, and there is a significant difference in weight between full frame and APSC. On another Greenland trip I was there with my A6300 and someone else had the full frame Canon 5Dm3. In a battle on features the A6300 would win on all counts apart from sensor size and yet was literally half the size and weight, which to me is an important factor.

And if you're going to crop, e.g. for wildlife photography, you might as well go APSC to start with.

If you're a professional photographer then maybe you'd take what is required because its a job, but I was off travelling for fun, and that fun is a lot less if you're carrying many kilos of weight you don't need most of the time.

There's a saying that the best camera is the one you have with you: yes, the APSC camera might struggle with some shots but if the full frame is so large you leave it at home, you might actually get more shots using a smaller sensor camera as you'd actually bring it.

Then there are specialised niches, such as action cameras. Yes, you could strap a full frame camera to you head and take videos of you zooming down mountains, but its much more sensible to use a GoPro even if its sensor is smaller.

Similarly you might want a stabilised camera, using (say) a gimbal. These are what professionals use to get the butter smooth flowing shots, but that all adds weight. Say you have a full frame camera, good lens & gimbal - that might be 2 - 3 kg in total. Plus you'd need other stuff like ND filters, batteries, external mics, recorders etc etc. Yes the results might look great, but I'd never travel with it.

Instead what I've recently got is the DJI Osmo Pocket, small enough to take anywhere and weighing only 118 grams. Ok, the image isn't brilliant but what matters is story telling and the best camera is the one you have on you, and you can take this anywhere.

So there's not simple answer: it depends on what sort of photography you do.

Maybe one day I'll go full frame, but don't feel you have to. Focus on composition and think about what lenses you need.

Cadiz and Three Kings

I'd visited to Cadiz before when sailing from Lisbon to Gibraltar, and it was great to explore this beautiful city again. Previously (as blogged here) we'd moored at nearly the same berth in the marina as before, as can be seen in these two photos:

Oriole, 2019:

Selene, 2006:

Golly, time does fly by, doesn't it? So there were all sorts of memories when walked from the marina into Cadiz, as in the top photo.

The previous time was during the visit of the Tall Ships, which was very lucky. This time was lucky again, as was there for the Three Kings celebrations:

This is the big event in Spain, more significant than Christmas day. There were a series of processions on different days in which men dressed as kings throw handfuls of sweets at kids in the crowd.

Then we went for dinner had lovely fresh fish:

Sailing Europe to Africa: Seville, Cadiz and a green ray sunset

I was to join the yacht in Cadiz, but there isn't an airport there, so you have to fly to one of the nearby cities and then takes a train.

I flew to Seville (seeing a great sunset on the way, above) as I'd been there before and really liked it:

There was time for some tapas, a stroll around the town (complete with ice cream), listen to a little guitar music then head for the hotel.

The next day took the train to Cadiz where saw yet another rather nice sunset:

There was even a green ray!

A partial sail trip from Europe to Africa

Last month I was meant to sail from Cadiz down the coast of Morocco then across to Lanzarote, as in this route map:

Alas the lurgy that I've had several times before came back so I had to leave the yacht at Rabat, but at least I managed to sail from Europe to Africa.

It was a trip by Rubicon3 down the coast of Morocco in yacht Oriole (top photo, in Cadiz).

Ah well, at least I can post on the first part of the trip.

Birds by the Thames

Can you spot the fish this heron has caught? It was still wriggling!

The numbers of birds out there suggest there are many other fish in the river:

I'm currently reading a book about sea birds and there was an interesting section on why cormorants need to dry their feathers:

Got to keep those feathers out of the water:

The Thames Clipper Challenge - the Attempt

Friday the 21st of December, the shortest day of the year, and I had arrived at Putney Pier for my first attempt at the Thames Clipper Challenge.

The RB6 boat was late arriving at Putney: but I was pretty relaxed about that - as long as it did turn up, as there was time spare at Embankment.

The times for this leg were:

• 17:18 Putney 
• 17:25 Wandsworth Riverside (1)
• 17:29 Plantation Wharf (2)
• 17:34 Chelsea Harbour 
• 17:38 Cadogan
• 17:44 Battersea Power Station
• 17:47 St George Wharf (Vauxhall)
• 17:53 Millbank (2)
• 18:00 Embankment

(1) Didn't dock and not sure what happened here. It might have been too low tide and/or no passengers but the boat ended up banging into the pilings for the new pier being planned for 2019
(2) No passengers so slowed but didn't actually stop.

So got to Embankment on time and here there was a pause. I could have continued from Embankment but there was the danger of getting the boat that stopped London Eye (Waterloo) but not Westminster. The only way of being sure of picking up the next boat from Westminster was to walk to Westminster. As it was a short way and had plenty of time that is what I did.

The South Bank was looking very seasonal and the moon was full:

Finally the RB1 arrived and off we went:

• 18:40 Westminster
• 18:44 London Eye (Waterloo)
• 18:54 Blackfriars
• 18:58 Bankside
• 19:03 London Bridge City
• 19:06 Tower
• 19:18 Canary Wharf

That was a huge relief! Got to Canary Wharf in time for the RB4 over to Doubletree Docklands. But it wasn't over yet as had to get there and back and catch the next Woolwich clipper. They were slightly in "its CHRISTMAS" mode, with staff wishing each other "Merry Christmas" and "See you next year" but they (as I found generally) were very efficient and so soon off we went to the south bank of the Thames:

• 19:24 Canary Wharf
• 19:26 Doubletree Docklands
• 19:30 Doubletree Docklands
• 19:32 Canary Wharf

I then rushed to the display to see the next Woolwich boat only 3 minutes away - hurrah!

So I was in time to catch that and for the final time was off, stops including Greenwich (below, also looking seasonal) and on to Woolwich.

The final times were:

• 19:38 Canary Wharf
• 19:41 Greenland (Surrey Quay)
• 19:44 Masthouse Terrace
• 19:47 Greenwich
• 19:55 North Greenwich (The O2)
• 20:06 Woolwich (Royal Arsenal)

I used my phone as a stopwatch using the gangway up/down as the trigger and the times were:

My Thames Clipper Challenge time was 2 hours 48 minutes - exactly as predicted by the timetable!!

I was pretty pleased by that: but could it beaten, if so how?

Anyhow, it was good enough for me to declare the first Thames Clipper Challenge a success.

The Thames Clipper Challenge - the Route

So what route to take? It seemed obvious from the map above that the most efficient way would be to start at one of the two ends (Putney or Woolwich) and then head either east or west respectively.

To get a more detailed view, I downloaded the timetable the Thames Clipper web site. It was immediately clear that a limiting factor was that the RB6 Putney route currently only runs during the week which ruled out a weekend attempt.

So, looking at the weekday timetable, lets first consider starting at Woolwich in the morning:

The problem here is that the first boat arriving at the London Eye (Waterloo) pier isn't until 09:26 while the last boat to Putney has already passed it and is at St George Wharf (Vauxhall) at 09:10, so that's no good.

Next let's consider starting at Woolwich in the evening:

Here the problem is Millbank: the last RB6 that stops there is at 17:37 while the first evening boat from Woolwich (Royal Arsenal) is at 18:01.

How about the other direction? Let's look at starting at Putney in the morning:

There's a similar problem here: Millbank (which is clearly a pinch point on the route) has its first arrival at 10:05 but Woolwich (Royal Arsenal) has its last boat arriving at 09:27.

Things were looking pretty difficult and I was wondering if this was one of those mind-bendingly complex scenarios when I turned to the Putney in the evening page:

What's that? A route that goes through all the piers? Yes!

It starts at 17:15 at Putney and yes is scheduled to stop at Millbank (the last one!). Then its necessary to pick up Westminster and London Eye (Waterloo) so have to get off and change. Alas the next boat at 18:08 doesn't stop at Westminster (why?) so have to way until 18:32 (Embankment) or 18:40 (Westminster) to continue the journey.

This picks up all the stations to Canary Wharf at which point must alight to pick up the RB4 over to Doubletree Docklands:

Then back to Canary Wharf for the 19:37 to pick up all the remaining piers to Woolwich, arriving at 20:03, making a schedule journey time from Putney of 2 hours 48 minutes.

This RB4 over to Doubletree Docklands is the most critical connection: if the RB1 18:32 arrival is late then might not be able to take one of the two possible RB4 connections over to Doubletree Docklands. For example, if have to get the 19:34 over to Doubletree Docklands, I wouldn't manage to pick up the 19:37 and so end up on the 20:01, arriving 24 minutes later.

And there can indeed be delays or cancellations on Thames Clipper. Around that time I spotted these tweets:

If the RB4 was suspended (or indeed, any of the routes used) then you could call the whole thing off.

On the shortest day of the year, Friday 21st of December 2018 I headed off to the Putney Pier to take the Thames Clipper Challenge.

What do you think happened? Did I make it to Woolwich? 

If so, how close to the target time was I?

The Thames Clipper Challenge

During the summer of 2018 I went on all the scheduled river services on the Thames in London, which was a lot of fun and a good way to explore the city. But it took quite a long time and during those hours watching the riverbank glide by I wondered if there was an optimum route that covered all the piers in the minimum time.

It was a bit like the Tube Challenge in which urban explorers try to visit all the tube stations on the London Underground network in the shortest time possible, as described by that article on Wikipedia. There are similar versions in other cities, such as the Subway Challenge in New York.

You can see videos of it - such as this and this - and it looks fun though hard work. So I thought about whether they'd be an equivalent for the river. Googling "Thames Clipper Challenge" didn't seem to come up with anything so I decided to invent one.

I decided to limit it to the Thames Clipper routes as they run all year round unlike the scheduled services to Hampton Court and other upper river piers. I also excluded the tourist boats as I've never been on one and have no idea what they are like.

This gives the following list of piers:

1. Putney
2. Wandsworth Riverside
3. Plantation Wharf
4. Chelsea Harbour
5. Cadogan
6. Battersea Power Station
7. St George Wharf (Vauxhall)
8. Millbank
9. Embankment
10. Westminster
11. London Eye (Waterloo)
12. Blackfriars
13. Bankside
14. London Bridge City
15. Tower
16. Canary Wharf
17. Doubletree Docklands
18. Greenland (Surrey Quay)
19. Masthouse Terrace
20. Greenwich
21. North Greenwich (The O2)
22. Woolwich (Royal Arsenal)

The Thames Clipper Challenge is then to:

• Visit at least once all piers served by a Thames Clipper vessel
• A visit involves arriving or departing from the pier by a Thames Clipper vessel
• The time starts when the gangway is raised at the first pier
• The time ends when the gangway is lowered on the last pier
• It is allowed to go between piers on foot but not use any other forms of transport
• A visit is a scheduled stop but it's not necessary for the vessel to actually moor up for those piers where there aren't actually any passengers (like a request stop on the trains as per the All The Stations rules)
• It is not necessary to get out at each pier

The day I chose to do this was the shortest day of last year. i.e. 21st of December 2018.

But where to start and what route to take?

Ghosts of London Boat Show's Past

This year there isn't going to be any London Boat Show, neither in December (in Earl's Court) or January (in Excel). Apparently visitor numbers dropped too low, something I feared a few years ago when Thursday night (above) was quieter than normal.

Its a shame as I have enjoyed wandering the halls, listening to talks, visiting a wide range of boats. In particular have met all sorts of interesting sailors, including:

• Conrad Humphreys, offshore sailor
• Emma Bamford, author of Casting Off books
• Chris Eakin, author of A Race Too Far
• Monty Halls, explorer and TV presenter
• Saskia Clark, Olympic Gold Medallist
• John Blake, author of The Sea Chart
• Bob Shepton, author of Addicted to Adventure
• Elaine Bunting, editor Yachting World
• Tom Cunliffe, author 
• Will Stirling, boat builder
• Sam Llewellyn, editor Maritime Quarterly
• Stokey Woodall, sailor and author
• Roger Taylor, sailor of Mingming up to 80N
• Paul and Rachel Chandler, who were captured by pirates
• Geoff Holt, paraplegic sailor
• Peter Webb, sailed round Spiztbergen in an open boat
• Liza Copeland, author of the Just Cruising books 
• Sally Kettle, author of Sally's Odd as Sea rowing the Atlantic
• Hector Macdonald, author of The Storm Prophet
• Jo Rogers, one of the Sisterhood
• Jock Wishart, Arctic veteran

Ah well, there's always Southampton Boat Show later in the year.


Updated: or, alternatively, something called the London Yacht Show has been announced for May in St. Katharine Dock. Its focus: "elite individuals visit London Yacht Show in order to seek out the extraordinary in luxury yachting and living". Hmm..... sounds like a different focus than the list above.

Visiting Neverwhere: Walking the Mail Rail

The Berlin bunkers weren't my only exploration in 2018 of the world's underground, as I also visited Neverwhere.

What is Neverwhere, you might be asking? Well Neverwhere was originally (back in the 90s) a TV series on BBC written by Neil Gaiman that was turned into a book and then lots of other things (comic book, stage play, radio play etc. etc.).

The idea of Neverwhere is that underneath London there is a second city, inhabited by those lost from the real city above, full of mythical peoples that echo the places above. So there is a real Earl's Court, a real Angel of Islington and don't ask about the Seven Sisters....

It was filmed in all sorts of brilliant locations, from Abbey Mills Pumping Station (as visited earlier), to the (at the time) derelict St. Pancras Hotel, to the (then abandoned) Battersea Power Station. There was also a scene on a small underground railway that I didn't recognise (@ 6 seconds):

Where or what was this railway?

This turned out to be the Mail Rail, a special railway for the Royal Mail that connected some of their main sorting offices as in this map from Wikipedia:

It was closed on the 31st of May 2003 and for many years the tunnels were dark and empty. But last year it was opened up to tourist rides of a special train, less dangerous than the one in the trailer above.

Just before Christmas there was an opportunity to walk through the tunnels, to get the real Neverwhere experience. 

It was fab!

There were even stalactites:

Above and Below Berlin

I didn't get to see any boats in Berlin so no chance of a Boats! Boats! Boats. Instead, here's two views of Berlin.

Firstly from above, the best views are from the TV tower (above) as can be seen here:

Can you spot the tethered balloon near the sunset?

Another view of Berlin can be found by going on one of the tours of Berlin Underworlds. The one I went on visited a Second World War bunker and then a Cold War fall-out shelter, complete with airlock, shower and claustrophobic bunk beds:

Exhibition Review: Europe and the Sea

The museums of Berlin are pretty good, so good that some you have to buy tickets in advance while others are a bit dark (Stasi Museum anyone?).

But I saw an exhibition on Europe and the Sea that turned out to be very interesting and tickets were available on the door. It told the relationship between Europe and the sea via some of its major ports over the last few millennium, including:

• Athens
• Venice
• Seville
• Cadiz
• Amsterdam
• London

It felt refreshingly straight-up show and explain. There were lots of good maps of the various places and the main shipping routes of each of the ports:

This one was clearly the wrong colour:

As well as examples of cultural elements, maps, navigational tools (top) there were also some good quotes, from Homer to Sir Walter Raleigh:

Very interesting, worth a visit if you're in Berlin.

Berlin by night

Back to Berlin, with some night-time shots.

Rather than going to the endless Christmas Markets (yawn) I went out with my camera and tripod. Brandenburg Gate above, Reichstag below:

The Holocaust Memorial was pretty thought provoking, particularly at night:

Looking back at 2018

It's time to look back at 2018 and those blog posts that got the most views, of which the top ten were:

1. The Tudor Pull: Gloriana, Stela and a photo-bombing heron
2. London Boat Show: Random Photos
3. Boats! Boats! Boats! .... in Geneva, at night
4. Cambridge wins everything!
5. London Boat Show: Golden Globe Race Anniversary & Susie Goodall Racing
6. Frozen Boats! Frozen Boats! Frozen Boats! .... in Geneva
7. This blog is a TEENAGER
8. Reflections on the Thames
9. Thames River Routes: RB1
10. The last days of the old Woolwich Ferries

Not sure how random photos from the London Boat Show got in the top ten, must have been one was picked up by Google photo search.  However I can see where the hits on Susie Goodall racing come from given the recent drama she's been through.

The largest category was about the Thames in London (5 of the top 10) so maybe that's something to post about in 2019. None were about the Svalbard trip, the highest of which was "Longyearbyen, Svalbard" in 13th place.

The simplest to write was the "Cambridge wins everything!" which had no text and the image was a light blue rectangle (go figure that one).

As noted in the "This blog is a TEENAGER" post, a lot of the top scoring posts seem to be photo related, but that's ok, I like taking photos.

What would my favourites be?

I suppose I'd highlight not individual posts but the series, as they've been the fun ones to do and write about - in particular:

• Walking the canals of London
• Exploring the scheduled river services of London
• Visiting Norway and circumnavigating Spitsbergen

Often these projects have opportunities for good photos and also tell a bigger story than can be fit in a single post.

I wonder what 2019 will bring.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!