16 Nov 2020
A quick lunchtime jaunt to Dowry Square, which is very close to me but, being effectively a cul-de-sac as well as a square, I've probably only circumnavigated a couple of times in the last couple of decades.
17 Nov 2020
A fruitless wander, as Spoke and Stringer (who I thought might do a decent flat white) were closed, and the only other harbourside inlet offering were a bit too busy to wait at, especially as I'd spent some time wandering some of the convolutions of Rownham Mead. This last congeries of dull alleyways and brown-painted garages was at least somewhere I've never been before, in parts.
It never look that reputable, even when it was a going concern. Converted to flats in 2001, according to the excellent resource Bristol's Lost Pubs.
I like this piece. It reminds me of a friend.I should probably try to get a pic of it without a car parked in front. I particularly like the way that along with the more wholesome stuff there's also a drone pizza delivery going on! Apparently that's part of the original art from Silent Hobo rather than a commentary addition by a later artist.
I think it was a quite well-used commercial garage and MOT centre, but as usual I may be being an unreliable narrator.
In which our intrepid hero levels up.
20 Nov 2020
Just a quick wander up the hill to get a flat white from Twelve. I really enjoyed the spooky mannequin (?) in the window.
A little retirement housing block sitting at the end of a private road at the end of the Fossway. I've never wandered up and seen it before, though I've walked past it a thousand times.
I wonder how many times I've crossed this zebra crossing, or cut across the road at the little traffic island in the background to get to the diagonal path across Victoria Square?
21 Nov 2020
A rather more wide-ranging weekend wander with Sarah and Vik, taking in some mock Tudor bits of Bedmo (I should note that I've subsequently been corrected to "Bemmie", but I'm an outsider and have been calling it "Bedmo" for short for decades...), a chunk of Ashton, a path up Rownham Hill called Dead Badger's Bottom(!), The Ashton Court estate, a bit of the UWE campus at Bower Ashton, and some of the Festival Way path.
I have no idea how anyone managed to smack this street furniture so hard, or what direction they came from to do it. It's a pretty straight 30mph road right there, and this is only one side of the dual carriageway. Never seen so much as a near-miss there.
I'm not sure I'd be waiting literally in the road here if my car had broken down. The continual strewing of the pavements on these flyovers with broken bits of cars, vans and lorries, large and small, suggests that smashes are pretty frequent.
21 Nov 2020
This is my return from getting my annual flu jab at Christ Church, as explained in more detail in my wander up the hill.
encaustic | ɛnˈkɔːstɪk |
adjective
(in painting and ceramics) decorated by burning in colours as an inlay, especially using coloured clays or pigments mixed with hot wax.
Used to be a fairly nondescript place with offices or a home—not sure which—over a double-garage, which seems to be the standard layout on this stretch of PVS. The only thing I remember about it is the only nondescript thing: it had a big flagpole jutting out of the top floor. You can still see a St George's Cross dangling from it on Google Street View.
21 Nov 2020
A trip up the hill to get my winter flu jab. I'm not sure I really needed it this year, what with avoiding Covid—I haven't had so much as a sniffle in more than a year—but seeing as they offered... Instead of the doctor's surgery on Pembroke Road, they'd taken over Christ Church, presumably to give more room and ventilation for the necessary social distancing at the moment. As usual, it was their typically efficient operation, and I was in and out in about three minutes.
On the way there and back I snapped as much as I could, but I wanted to be home in time for the first online Times Crossword Championship. As it turned out, I needn't have bothered, as the technology at the Times couldn't keep up with the demand from competitors, and their system just collapsed under the weight of page-views. They tried again the day after, and it collapsed just as badly. Maybe next year...
This wander is split into two parts, as I turned my tech off to go into Christ Church for my jab. The walk home can be found over here.
Although it looks like the side of the kind of flats you see everywhere in Clifton Village, the building to the left is actually the Christchurch Recording Studios. Among other artists who've used the studios, two of Massive Attack's number one albums were recorded here, according to this article that sadly but inevitably seems to suggest that the building might be converted into luxury flats soon.
It was originally fitted out as a drama and recording studio by the BBC in the 1980s.
I really like the random scattering of windows on the backs of Bristol's houses, especially the arched ones here.
26 Nov 2020
I took the day off my day job to do my accounts—or at least do enough bookkeeping to send them to my accountant. I hate doing the books. I woke up late, tired and with a headache and decided to bunk off for a walk around Cliftonwood, Clifton Village and Clifton instead, taking in a couple of good coffees along the way. Thanks, Foliage Café, and Twelve for the flat whites.
It's a bit of a raggedy old view from Granby Hill, but I always love to see it when I'm working my way home from the heights of Clifton.
27 Nov 2020
I took an extra-long break at lunchtime today as I'd taken the day off my normal day-job to do the accounts for my previous side-job, which is still generating paperwork, though not much in the way of money. This took me through some undiscovered bits of Cliftonwood, including Worlds End Lane, which unexpectedly leads to White Hart Steps. That's certainly not where I expected the end of the world to lead to...
I came up here drunk one night, searching for a shortcut home from somewhere around the Triangle. At least this time I was reasonably sure I'd not get out of the far end here.