London scene around Victoria

An early start up to London for a conference, travelling on the 7.21 train from Bearsted, joining the commuters on the daily toil. Like the rest of the country there were train timetables changes on South Eastern last Sunday. It won’t make much difference to me although the train I usually catch, the 8.13 doesn’t run and the journey time for the rush our trains is longer and it was 6 minutes late today. On the plus side, there were 8 coaches rather than the usual 4 on the 8.13.

The queues to get on the Underground at Victoria were awful. There was a line at least 100 meters of people, 10 or more people across trying to get on the platforms. I cut my losses, looked at Apple Maps, saw it was 1.7 miles to the Edgeware Road taking 40 minutes to walk.

In the event it took me 30 minutes, alongside Buckingham Palace round Hyde Park Corner up Park Road to Marble Arch and into Edgeware Road. It was while walking that I spotted today’s blip of the new buildings around Victoria.

The conference was good,challenging but more importantly came with a good lunch, let down by the lack of decaffeinated coffee.

The journey home was much better as tube and train conspired to get me from the venue to home in less than two hours door to door.

Meanwhile back at home, the Great Tit brood fledged today. Susan saw one of them emerging from the nestbox onto nearby branches, all fluffy and new. They’ve been through a lot those parents, some terrible wet, cold windy days, cats fighting on the fence above them, the large silver birch being cut down around them and me smoking them out with a barbecue. Despite the weather, caterpillars seemed to be in great supply as their visits to the box were very frequent.