London trip - NOT amateur radio

Today, we went to London by train. The purpose was two fold. 

Firstly, we wanted to visit the Clink prison museum and secondly we had lunch with our daughter-in-law and our granddaughter. 

The museum was gruesome, but worth a visit. The meal was excellent.

London sights - NOT amateur radio

London, the capital of England, is a fine city with a mix of old and new buildings. 

Some of the old buildings are known the world over. 

We went there on Thursday with our village theatre group by coach.

Mudlarking - NOT amateur radio

Mudlarking is the term for looking for rubbish on the shores of the River Thames in London, UK. The earliest ever banana in London was found as a result of mudlarking.

Tower Bridge - NOT amateur radio

As we were in London to see "Guys and Dolls" at the Tower Theatre with our village theatre group, I decided to take this photo of Tower Bridge as we left. Being in London, there was no radio today.

Near Charing Cross station on Saturday - NOT amateur radio

A selfie taken by one of our grandsons in London on Saturday.

Having a chat? - NOT amateur radio

It looks like these two are having a good old chat about something. Seen in St James' Park, London on Wednesday.

Moulin Rouge - NOT amateur radio

For the first time since before Covid-19 struck, we went to the theatre in London by coach to the  Piccadilly Theatre. 

It was an impressive production with some very clever scenery. We get about 2.5 hours in London before the theatre. This is enough time to visit a few sights and get a meal.

London icons - NOT amateur radio

Some may recognise this clock seen yesterday on our day tour of London escorted by our 14 year old grandson. 

Canary Wharf - NOT amateur radio

Canary Wharf in east London has grown into a major financial centre with lots of tall skyscrapers as the photo shows.

Google confirm new London HQ - NOT amateur radio

So Google has confirmed its £1billion investment in a new HQ building in London. This is good news in a post-BREXIT UK.

Big companies still see the UK as a good place to do business. There is much right with the UK.

Personally, I think the EU will face difficult times ahead. OK the UK has to find its way in the new world order, but it will. With a political swing to the right (hopefully a blip) I can see other nations wishing to leave the EU. It would not totally surprise me if the Euro loses a lot of its value in 2017. A total collapse of the EU is possible too.

See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-37988095 .

London Theatre - NOT amateur radio

Today we went with our village theatre group by coach from Burwell to see "Lord of the Dance: Dangerous Games" at the Dominion Theatre in London. The dancing was very good but, if I am honest, I preferred other productions I have seen. I think the women enjoyed this more than the men. If I say what I really think, I'll be called tactless. OK so I am tactless so let me say it!  I found it pretentious crap. Definitely not my cup of tea.

Energy harvesting wireless bus bell push

The latest edition of Land Mobile Magazine (a magazine for professionals in the mobile radio business) has an interesting column showing how London Eco-Routemaster buses are being fitted with a novel sort of bell push (the kind you push to ask the bus driver to stop) which harvests energy from the action of pushing the bell to send a wireless signal through the bus to the driver. The bell push uses an energy harvesting chip from EnOcean a company that specialises in such devices.

The EnOcean evaluation kit (for professional developers) as shown on their website

This is the first time that I've seen a very practical use for energy harvesting. I assume that the device "harvests" kinetic energy (from the pushing action) and thermal energy (from the finger tips) but it must generate a few uWatts for this to work.  So, no batteries, no wires, wireless comms and good for 300k presses. There has to be a QRP application!

For more on this read the article on line at Land Mobile magazine. 

Big Ben - a 119 year old recording

Not ham radio, but just spotted this fascinating recording of Big Ben chiming. It was made on a wax disc 119 years ago in 1890.