May This Be Love (Waterfall) - Jimi Hendrix

The preventative weather continues but despite that there were a couple of moments of metaphoric sunshine during the past couple of days. In addition to this we have also reached the final journey of 2001 in the memoir an adventure which was simply referred to as The B.U.P.A. Expedition. Not in geographical or chronological order this took my Boss Mike Hugh's and I through Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina with the outstanding highlight being the mighty

 IGUAZÚ FALLS

(likely the best Natural Phenomenon we have ever seen, 

by comparison Niagara and Victoria simply pale)

 with the attendant 'thousands' of

 GIANT DUSKY SWIFT

 First take in the panorama from the Brazilian side,

before crossing the border into Argentina to get up close and personal.

Walking under the cascades! 

Back to the gloom of reality even most of the

STARLINGs

had sort shelter while we were treated to a fly-past by the

COAST GUARD HELICOPTER

Over the past few days numbers of

BLACKBIRD
have risen dramatically, in line with the number of competitors at

the week-ends EQUESTRIAN EVENT.

HOSE SPARROW
and

GREENFINCH
taking advantage of the rain puddles for a quick dhobie.

That's Better.

Up at the Irrigation Pond we found the first

COMMON SNIPE
of this end of the year.

YARROW
still in bloom was followed by not only the bird, but also the 'sighting'

of the day.

Not enough space for all the excuses for the poor quality images,

so suffice to say this is the First Record of

GOOSANDER
on

Parley Court Farm
We are careful to state this as PCF as there was a female seen 'from'
the farm last year flying down the course of the Moors River.

This female didn't linger long either

now where have we come across that before?

Phase III of the Solar Panels are coming on remarkably well

considering the weather, it's a quagmire up there, but all the Panels
are now in place and 'trenching' for cable start tomorrow.

While in sunny Thailand our friend and camera-lady

ROONG
is busied being filmed about her passion - photography.
We started with a little nostalgia and that is where we'll end.

Shipmate 'Sandy' Saunders and I were not in HMS Eskimo together but each dis a 2 years commission in her. You get rather fond of a lady like that which serves you well over that sort period, most of which for me at least was spent in the Persian Gulf (chasing pirates and gunrunners), the Indian Ocean occasionally on Beira Patrol, Mozambique, visiting the Seychelles Islands and assisting Tommy Atkins pulling out of Aden 66'. The first image is before she even got going

FITTING OUT Cowes, Isle of Wight, Hampshire

Sporting the Dhow Emblem on her fwd funnel in the Persian Gulf,
with our Mascot the Ross Frozen Foods Eskimo Boy stood on fwd 4.5 Gun.

The ships WASP HELICOPTER safely stored the
Royal Navy Air Station 'Yeovilton', Somerset,
while the vessel was in refit.

It was an incident with this aircraft which taught me one of the greatest lessons in life. While in the Gulf, and with plenty of time on our hands, our New Zealand Pilot invited every crew member to undertake a flight with him on a rota basis and as time allowed, during our deployment. Like the only surviving Kamikaze Pilot, 'Chicken Chow Mein', I was the only crew member who didn't take up the offer but by the time my mess mates returned waxing lyrical about the experience, it was too late. Since that time I have NEVER turned down the chance of doing anything that is legal! Fortunately my 18 years working off-shore in the North Sea gave me ample opportunity to redress this matter - as in sick to the back teeth with 'Choppers!

An extremely long shot, but our all too few NZ Readers might like to investigate

who the Pilot was (HMS ESKIMO 1965-66) then E-Mail

captbagsy@btinternet.com 

MANY THANKS to YOU SANDY!

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