The sights of an East-London walk to the Olympic Park

Last Sunday, we headed up to London after seeing CBC's new nephew.

Since it was a delightfully sunny day, we decided to walk along the canal from Bow towards the Olympic Park.

 There was lots of interesting graffiti along the way.

 I really liked seeing the Lock system here.

 When we were almost at the Three Mills, we noticed the canal was completely covered in Duckweed rendering it a sickly shade of green!

 The Crocodile is fun- I saw a few of those.

 And another...

 Here is the Three Mills.

 I was not sure what this unusual construction was but it was particularly striking.

 I have seen this brightly coloured perspex-clad building from the Railway line on numerous occasions but this is the first time I have stood alongside it.

 In the Olympic Park, we reached the Orbit which now has a slide you can go down...for £15!

 The sight of the Aquatic centre, the Olympic swimming pool made all of us realise we wished to go and swim so we decided to arrange an excursion.

 I've not been to the Olympic Park since the Opening Ceremony Dress rehearsal in 2012, so there was a lot for me to take in.

 We reached a little glade of trees with almost mahogany-coloured trees. Does anyone know what they are?

 As we walked along the middle, these weird orbs made me think the Toclafane from Doctor Who series 4 had invaded!!!

 As we neared the Aquatic centre, we saw these fun-looking swan boats. This looks like an exciting endeavour for a future occasion!

 Walking alongside the Aquatic centre made one feel like one was alongside the Ark or a rather imposing space-vehicle!

 As the sun set, the skies became a vision of beauty.

 Soon, we realised it would be prudent to return home so we had to wend our way back to Bow to fetch the car.

 They did try to persuade me to take the Santander Bikes but since I was wearing that Maxi dress and sandals from last week, it seemed somewhat foolhardy. We took the Docklands instead...

 As we left the Olympic park, we vowed to return for adventures soon.

 And we have indeed already begun those so stay tuned to find out what we did soon.

Bidding you a good night.

Have you been to the Stratford Olympic Park?

xx

Circumnavigating the UK - Day 3- Invergordon in the Scottish Highlands

Day 3 of the cruise, we woke up bright and early at 7am ready to go and take battle with the epic amounts of food available in the Raffles Bistro. 

We docked fairly early in the morning in Invergordon in the Scottish Highlands and we headed outside around 9am to join our coach to go on an excursion.

We were greeted by the delightful sight and sound of this young piper!

 The sea looked wonderfully serene.

 There's the Magellan behind us.

 We joined our coach and were driven with a jolly coach driver to the Roagie Falls further into the Highlands.

Given that most of the members of the excursion were older, it was a little slow-going climbing down to The Falls but when we eventually got there, they were pretty beautiful.

There is something truly mesmerising about watching the water powerfully crashing downwards. I could have remained all day.

I headed over the bridge to go and look at the other side. I went past the Salmon Ladder which was a series of sort of water steps to help the salmon jump!  Lots of people saw Salmon jumping but like my River Tyne on Christmas day experience, I always missed them!

After about 10 minutes, we walked back towards the coach. 

By the coach was this mesmerising fish mosaic!

On the way back, the coach driver and tour guide decided that we had time to make an additional stop at a pretty little town/village called Strathpfeffer.
We all visited the bakery and Mum and I hotfotted it down the road to the old Victorian railway station which is now a cafe and set of gift-shops!

Back in Invergordon, we went and had lunch on the ship and then Mum decided to stay on board the ship as her knee was hurting. I decided I wanted to explore Invergordon more and have a longer walk.

Around the town are a series of art wall murals in a sort of trail which depict life in the Highlands.
I LOVE a good art trail so I set off in earnest to seek them.

The first was at the Invergordon Museum where there was also a Craft Fair.  This was good as the strap on my handbag had split and I managed to pick up a handmade one made out of tweed!

Carrying onwards, it was easy to find lots of the murals.

I adored this sea animals one!

Almost missed these two!

Ahhh, there HAD to be some bagpipers!

As I reached the end of the main parade of shops, I went into a church hall of the Methodist church where there was an Art sale and bought myself a print of a scene of Stromness which really reminded me of the Katie Morag books (it was only £3!) and bought my mum an original painting of the Standing Stones of Standnis. (wasn't very expensive!)
 At this point, I had reached the end of the street and it didn't look like there would be any other murals.  However, I spied Invergordon station and I am a bit geeky when it comes to going to look at Train stations so I decided to look inside and a good thing too as I found the final mural!

..which seemed to take up the whole station!

I wanted to see if all in one scene so I decided to walk along and cross the railway bridge.

I phoned my Mother in law J as I was walking here and chatted to her as I walked.  After this, as I dithered walking up the hill on from the stattion, as I wasn't sure if this road would get me back to the water's edge as I was on the wrong side of the railway,  I happened to spy someone who realised I was from ship who realised why I was dithering and told me he was following a map (he was from the ship too) and I ended up walking with him and keeping him company as he walked along back towards the ship.

It was a really pleasant walk with beautiful views of the water.

We walked under this little donkey bridge to get under the railway.

There are lots of rigs on the water.

This anchor was from a tragic boat, the Oak which sank during the War.

It was around about 5pm by this point and seemed a good time to board the boat. I remembered that I wanted to buy some bottled water to have in our cabin (the boat stuff was expensive!) so I nipped to the Co-op and picked up some 19p for 2 litres water (as, it seemed, did the rest of our table!) I also picked up some popcorn.

By the time it was dinner time it started to rain and the views over the water with sunset were beautiful.

As we departed, we were serenaded by a Pipe band!

Our first excursion day of the trip had been a success. I am glad that we took the trip to the Roagie Falls as there wasn't a huge amount to do in Invergordon although in retrospect, I wish I had taken a longer walk to the more remote reaches of the water's edge.  As it was, it was a great day.

Have you visited Invergordon? This was my first time in Scotland!

xx