flaneurs | Entries tagged with report

Today we went to the Autumn Fest in Marshall. It was an evening event, and the day had cooled off considerably, so it was quite pleasant. We were lucky to miss the rain there -- it rained a bit at home and we drove through several showers. This event continues on Saturday and Sunday if you want to catch it, and it is well worth attending if you're in Illinois this weekend looking for something to do.

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Current Mood: busy

ysabetwordsmith

Today we went to the Broomcorn Festival in Arcola, Illinois. This is a big harvest festival, well worth catching, and it runs the whole weekend if you want to check it out. The weather was beautiful, cloudy and mild, couldn't ask for better weather.

Arcola is a nice town with several favorite shops that we like to visit. The old buildings are colorful with beautiful architecture. Most of the streets along the festival are still brick. There are benches along the sidewalks. Several places had picnic tables set up for the event, too.

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Current Mood: happy

ysabetwordsmith

Today we went to the Tuscola Family Fun Day and the Arthur Amish Country Cheese Festival.

Amusingly, I'm wearing a goldenrod-yellow T-shirt with a corncob and the caption "This is my crop top." (It's full length.) I got at least half a dozen compliments on it. :D I bought it earlier this year at another event, definitely a good choice for fall festivals.

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Current Mood: happy

ysabetwordsmith

Today we went out to Mattoon, Illinois in search of evening farmer's markets.

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Current Mood: busy

spiralsheep

I walked first left turn then second right turn then first left &c [not June challenge III. (d) ], beginning from the highest and most landward gate of Conwy's medieval town walls: flanage report at my journal, with architecture and edification, and a bonus quick guide to Conwy.

"DEUWCH O'R NEILLTU, Y MAE I CHWI CROESO,
YR IEUANC I DDYSGU, A'R HEN I ORFFWYSO."

spiralsheep

June challenge III.(c), part two: flanage report at my journal again, to a bridge via an Oblique Strategy and a giant raccoon. How could you possibly resist? Enjoy!

spiralsheep

June challenge III.(c): flanage report at my journal, with a list of grey things and links to antique wall art. How could you possibly resist? Enjoy!

Current Location: Living in the past

spiralsheep

I also did a walk based on the instructions generated by

squirmelia from the novel Finnegan's Wake. I was under starter's orders at The Greyhound pub in Worcester. Report here:

https://spiralsheep.dreamwidth.org/643773.html

Well the hare she led on just as swift as the wind
He was sometimes before her and sometimes behind,
He jumped on her back and held up his ould paw -
'Long live the Republic', says Master McGrath.

spiralsheep

Having had to switch days, and towns, due to this year's first attempt being nobbled by balloonists, it will come as no surprise when I reveal that I partially failed again. This time it was due to the new cafe, chosen by the person I was meeting, being closed on Mondays, lol.

Report at my journal.

squirmelia

Hounslow is a place I think of more as somewhere to start an adventure (by getting a tube from there to Heathrow airport), as opposed to somewhere to have an adventure, but for a Flaneurs June challenge, I went to Hounslow. This perhaps isn’t the adventure you’ve been waiting 4 years to read about, but I will tell you about it anyway, and there are highwaymen.

My real motivation for going to Hounslow was because I wanted ice-cream, specifically unusual ice-cream flavours. I chose two fruit flavours - chickoo and custard apple, and ate them as I walked towards the start of the walk from Hounslow Station.

Hounslow has a heath! I found this out from the local council's website, as when I searched for walks, two appeared - Hounslow Heath history hike and Hounslow Heath wild walk. Hounslow Heath walks and trails.

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bob

On June 1st I did challenge II(b).
I randomly ended up with page 154 column D of our A-Z. In fact I did pages 136 and page 166 as well.
I think there was one point where I went outside the column but only briefly.

bob

We did a bus flanage again this year and started from somewhere new but kept our numbers the same.

The map is very loopy

shewhostaples

Last weekend I had a go at challenge II (b):

II. (b)

Get an A-Z map (or similar) of your city - something that has a grid of squares overlaid on the maps. Choose a page at random, then choose a grid column on that page at random. Start in the square at the top of this column, and travel as far as you can down the page without leaving the column.

I couldn't find my A-Z street atlas, so had to use a city centre map. ( Report, with images )

secretlondon

Every year I've done challenge 3a (2014, 2015, 2015b, 2016, 2017). I was worried flaneurs might not happen this year. What should I do? Should I do it anyway? What happens if I break the chain?

III. (a)

Travel to or from your workplace one day using a completely different route to any you've ever used before.

Working in zone 6 is only tolerable as it's 20 minutes by train from Vauxhall to Surbiton. Although I could probably get home by bus in several hours I just didn't have the energy. This was a bit boring so I may come up with something better later on in the month.

I considered the K1 bus to New Malden but felt bored. I walked to a main road and all the buses were boring too. Zzzz.

I ended up walking from Tolworth Hospital to Tolworth itself. It started out as suburbia and became a linear shopping street. Tolworth Tower happened and then a roundabout with underpasses, Elephant and Castle style. It's the 1960s! Walking further I got to the station - 1930s Art Deco like others round here. Unlike Surbiton Station the one in Tolworth needs some love and attention. There are only two trains an hour from here. Going the other way I'd end up at Chessington World of Adventures.
( Photos )

Current Mood: tired

secretlondon

Last year I did two challenges based on small London buses which have letter suffixes - Small buses with letters and The bus of St George. Looking back I've done a few flans with these local little buses which go off the beaten track. In 2013 I did 10 stops of the C10 and I went on the W19 in 2015.

Today was the turn of the K1 - a little bus going from Kingston to New Malden via Surbiton and Tolworth. It also goes past Tolworth Hospital, and in good little bus style it's the only bus that does.

1b is:

Get on the first bus that comes along (and that you're able to get onto).
Stay on the bus until you reach the 10th stop or the end of the route, whichever comes first.
Get off and navigate your way home by a method of your choice.

This was quite a disappointing flan. My current work route is Surbiton Station to Tolworth Hospital and that turns out to be 9 stops worth. Ten stops is just round the corner from Surbiton station. This is very boring.

The other way the bus goes to New Malden. I was going to wait 15 minutes for it when I realised it has a hail and ride section. How do i count stops with that?

Have some photos - Surbiton Station is a lovely Art Deco thing.
( Photos )

Current Mood: tired

nou

I only managed one attempt at the June challenge this year: a modified version of Theme II.(a): Lines.

The full version of this challenge involves starting at a railway terminal and walking outwards from the terminus, following one of the railway lines as closely as possible. I’ve been doing this in stages from West Croydon Station to London Bridge Station, and this month I did a new stage.

I was originally going to walk from Tulse Hill to East Dulwich, but my lungs were playing up so I stopped at North Dulwich; i.e. I only walked one stop. Here’s a map showing my route so far (plus the bit I intended to but didn’t walk, which will be done next time), and here’s a photoset including all stages so far.

I photographed quite a lot of railway bridge identifiers on this one, since secretlondon and I are collecting them, and railway line walks are a very good source. My favourite photo is the one below, showing the premises of a “Fibrous Plaster Specialists”.

A view through a square brick-lined tunnel to an open passageway and buildings at the far end. A dilapidated sign on the left wall reads “19a / E J Harman & Co Ltd / Fibrous Plaster Specialists / 19a Birkbeck Hill SE21 8JS”.

Someone came out just after I took it and asked me why I was taking photos. They seemed a bit offended by my use of the phrase “old sign”, oops. They were very keen to make it clear that the business is still going!

bob

Hello,
As is customary I did Flaneurs bus challenge I. (c) from the same stop as before with an unchanging n of 6.
In exciting news I managed to finally cross the river and in fact ended up at Tottenham Hale. I covered about 30 miles on buses on the hottest day of the year. The routemasters were hellish.

* Map
* Google Photos or Flick Photos depending on what you prefer. Includes lots of video.
* Twitter thread

I'm currently uploading the videos to youtube and may make a longer video of them.
Talking of which I often post videos of my bus journeys on my youtube channel

Current Mood: accomplished

squirmelia

I arrived in Kraków on Monday afternoon and decided to do challenge III. (d), take the first left, then the second right, etc. I prefer to use the adaptation of take the first left, then take the first right, etc.

( Write up and photos )