Photo by Maggie Talibart
My daughter’s debut shot, a stunning capture of Bradley Wiggins riding to victory in the Olympic time trials today. Well done, Maggie! I am not sure I should let her near my camera again if she is going to be this good. Well done, Bradley and also Christopher Froome (below) for winning Bronze.
Photo by Maggie Talibart
I hope you like this image I made this morning of a honey bee on fennel. I only have two fennel plants in my garden but they punch well above their weight when it comes to attracting insects.
A beautiful little spider sits in the middle of its web.
The ladies arrive
Yesterday we enjoyed the men’s Olympic road race as it came through our village, Oatlands, near Weybridge in Surrey. Today it was the ladies’ turn.
A rainy day for cycling
What a difference from yesterday’s sunny weather. Intermittent heavy rain and thunder greeted the women. But even the capricious English weather couldn’t spoil the fun for the hardy onlookers and the Police motorcyclists.
Netherlands lead
As it came through Oatlands, the pack was still together. Although the Dutch rider was out in front, it was still anyone’s race.
It’s still anyone’s race
As my other half is Canadian, we cheered two countries on. I hope the Canadian riders saw our huge maple leaf flag!
Determination
The race has just finished. Congratulations to Vos who won gold for the Netherlands but also to our own Lizzie Armitstead for bringing home a silver! Well done to all the hardy cyclists in a very wet race.
Next Olympic fun for us: the time trials on Wednesday!
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in short measures, life may perfect be.
Ben Jonson, The Underwood (1640)
This fine fellow is machimus atricapillus, the Robber Fly. He perches waiting for a hapless and punier insect to fly by and then darts out – game over. He is not fussy in his choice of perch, even making use of handy humans, but he does not bite people. Here, he is enjoying a spot of evening sun in my garden.
Evening light by the River Thames.
A panorama of beautiful Victoria on Canada’s Vancouver Island.
Evening light gilds a spider and its web.
The spider’s touch, how exquisitely fine!
Feels at each thread, and lives along the line.
Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man, I (1733), l.217
All that glisters is not gold,
Often have you heard that told.
William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, II.vii
Our summer holiday this year will be spent at Lyme Regis, a lovely little town on the coast of Dorset. It is steeped in history and features in Jane Austen’s Persuasion:
the principal street almost hurrying into the water, the Walk to the Cobb, skirting round the pleasant little bay, which, in the season, is animated with bathing machines and company…are what the stranger’s eye will seek
The Cobb is Lyme Regis’s famous harbour wall. In Persuasion, one of the characters takes a tumble off the Cobb. In a later novel, The French Lieutenant’s Woman, John Fowles immortalised “quite simply the most beautiful sea rampart on the south coast of England”.
Lyme Regis is on The Jurassic Coast, a World Heritage Site for its wealth of fossils from the Jurassic period. It was here that Mary Anning (1799-1847) discovered, at the tender age of twelve, the first complete ichthyosaur. She went on to become a renowned palaeontologist when the science was in its infancy. Lyme Regis Museum, a fascinating place to visit in its own right, is built on the site of Mary’s home.
Focused Moments 