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- 1983 port and 2004 claret - festive drinking 2024
- Glenderaterra Valley gate in the snow - Lake District National Park
- Boulez, Benjamin and Brahms 4 at the Barbican Hall, London
- Hiking Latrigg in the snow - Lake District National Park
- Ice ride: Brundholme Woods and Lonscale - Lake District National Park
1983 port and 2004 claret - festive drinking 2024
Cockburn’s 1983 Vintage Port and Saint Julien AOC 2004 Ulysse Cazabonne (Margaux)
Two fine bottles for Christmas and New Year just past. The Cockburn’s 1983 port had somehow lasted in the dusty depths of my cellar. Its time had come last year but we’d had a bad year and didn’t feel like celebrating. So its cork came out this time round. The port wine poured ruby red in to the glass; our first impressions of taste were honey and mead, there was a nutty, almost liquorice flavour as well, which lasted long after the swallow. And a deep warmth as the port wine was absorbed.
Read more: 1983 port and 2004 claret - festive drinking 2024
Glenderaterra Valley gate in the snow - Lake District National Park
Hike from Keswick, up Spooneygreen Lane to Lattrig Saddle and onwards to the gate in to Glenderaterra Valley, which has Lonscale Fell and Skiddaw one side with Blencathra the other. A familiar route made magical by the snow. Frosty on Latrigg but soon getting to be heavy going traversing Lonscale Fell because of drifted snow up to knee height. The clouds were closing in over the fells beyond Ullswater as I took my picnic. The path past the rocky shoulder was even more heavily drifted so it was time to come down.
More photos: Glenderaterra Valley gate in the snow - Lake District National Park
Boulez, Benjamin and Brahms 4 at the Barbican Hall, London
Sir Simon Rattle (conductor), Barbara Hannigan (soprano), George Benjamin (composer), London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican Hall, London
Boulez’ almost infamous piece Éclat started the LSO’s programme at the Barbican. A touchstone work, “difficult” at first hearing but staking the claim for music as exploration in sound for the rest of the second half of the twentieth century. Seeing Simon Rattle conducting made clear the grammar which is there in the sound but is clarified seeing the music in performance. An educational privilege I think, to hear and see this piece laid clear like this.
Read more: Boulez, Benjamin and Brahms 4 at the Barbican Hall, London
Hiking Latrigg in the snow - Lake District National Park
First sun on Skiddaw
Candy floss pink dawn over Skiddaw (931 m.) was the start of a photographically rewarding day hiking the snow on Latrigg (368 m.). Encountering a family of Roe Deer was special, I’ve not seen them this far down before. I walked home to shelter from a chill wind and sleet shower, I resumed my day out, but on my mountain bike.
More photos: Hiking Latrigg in the snow - Lake District National Park
Ice ride: Brundholme Woods and Lonscale - Lake District National Park
Blease Fell from Lonscale
Round Latrigg (368 m.) on my Rockhopper MTB. Lots of fun cracking the tyres through frozen puddles. Skidding and power slides at different places than riding mud. Iced beck run-off needs concentration and fast reactions but I never seriously lost control. A fiery sunset over Grizedale Pike.
Birk Beck
Birk Beck and Greenholme in Cumbria, seen from the Birkbeck viaduct on the West Coast Main Line. Shap Fell in the distance. Lying snow here at 200 m. altitude. Birk Beck is a tributary of the River Lune.
Blackdown Common and Culmstock Beacon (250 m.)
Family hike in the Blackdown Hills around Culmstock Beacon (250 m.) and Blackdown Common. Frosty start after the storm had blown itself out overnight. Enjoying the magnificent Devon countryside plus sharing that peculiar pleasure of stomping through iced puddles.
Île de la Réunion - November 2008
I enjoyed a week hiking on the Indian Ocean island of La Réunion in November 2008. The hiking in and around volcano craters was spectacular but the climbs were tough. I stayed first at Saint-Gilles-les-Bains, the first couple of days were cloudy in the mountains, eventually I got a hike up from le Maïdo. Then I moved to Cilaos, but had to return early due to an Air France strike.
Carqueiranne
Carqueiranne, difficult to say and similarly difficult to get to by road. The railway has long gone so it’s a bash down through suburbia from Toulon. But the ride on the old N8 over le Mont Sainte-Baume was a fine compensation, its banked curves giving plenty of sportsbike rider interest.
My visit was inspired by reading that the writers and lovers Raymond Radiguet (1903-23) and Jean Cocteau (1889-1963) enjoyed a fling here in 1920-21. A complicated liaison, intertwined with publications and performances in Paris. The presumed simplicity of the Mediterranean fishermen of the 1920s is replaced on the quays of 2024 by the similarly presumptive sophistication of millionaires’ motorboats.
I found Carqueiranne to be special nice so it was hard to turn round and ride back. So thanks guys for the inspiration.
Marin trail bike at beach gym, Marseille
Mont Ventoux (1910 m.)
Satisfaction at getting to one of the beach park gyms in Marseille after an early start in London for the dawn flight up out of the anticyclonic gloom. Fine aerial views from the A320 of Mont Ventoux, the Écrins and the Alps.
Great to cycle with no wind and to enjoy blue sky and sunshine. Hardly anyone around at the Borély beach gym as 14°C in the shade counts as too cold here.
Calanches de Piana - Corsica in November
Golfe de Porto
Embarking at Marseille
Corsica in November, my escape from storms on the continent and taking advantage of Black Friday pricing. Seeing snow on the Corsican mountains at dawn was the first of many memorable sights. The road from Ajaccio to the red rock Calanches goes over two good cols, both reasonable surfaces for a bit of sportsbike fun, though a bit of sand washout. Cool but not cold first thing, and by midday I was opening the vents on my jacket and boots
