Archive for the ‘Marc’ tag
Mullard’s One Miler.
I don’t really know about telescopes. How they work isn’t of any great interest to me, but I respect the complexity of them and the knowledge that’s gone into building them. The Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory houses a number of telescopes, operational and decommissioned. An antenna of the 1964 One Mile Telescope just happened to be the one that we could park closest to, so as the July sunset faded orange light across the sky, myself, Marc and Keitei waded across the high wet grass in the adjacent field, and ascended.
The Hungarian Road.
Of course, not every moment of a roadtrip is spent shuffling round sewers, hiding from security guards in the Metro and climbing bridges. There’s the mandatory derping, train play, police intervention, angry foreigner interaction, budget food seeking, ‘prohobo’, sleep deprivation, automobile incidents and general swagger of the Brit abroad. Marc brought his gallic flair to the party, teaching us to speak ‘forrin’ whilst myself and NC Kapita incorrectly assumed that everybody east of Vienna would look and speak like Borat. Read the rest of this entry »
Newport Transporter
2012, the year of something else? I’d decided I wanted to do some different stuff in different places, and the Newport Transporter Bridge fitted the bill. Brad, Marc, Neb and Urban Fox joined me on the trip down the M4 for this adventure, at a place from which surprisingly few photos have appeared on the internet. Lets rectify that. Read the rest of this entry »
Flakturm
November 2011
Three days ripping up Budapest while barely sleeping took it’s toll, yet somehow we made it to Vienna alive. NC Kapita and Marc slept in the car as I drove and despite a 2 hour blitz for info while connected to the McDonalds free wifi at Gasometer City, we were left with plenty of time to take a look at the delights of Vienna. Read the rest of this entry »
Devil’s Ditch, Budapest
October 2011
Not a very sexy drain, Teh Ditch. It was probably once ‘really nice‘, as Siologen’s pictures show, but we had been warned it was something of a slippery sludge pit. It was also identified that there is a 10 foot waterfall at some point in the middle of the drain. Concrete lining had occurred relatively recently, but at parts deeper from the outfall the eternal wash of Hungarian poo had exposed the brick on the floor again. Hence, it’s a bit of a mess. We entered from the infall, which Siologen kindly pointed us in the direction of, and slowly made our way downstream.
Budapest Metro – Line 4
October 2011
Line 4 of the Budapest Metro has been under construction for over 5 years now, but consistent delays mean that the opening is still not scheduled until 2014. The train manufacturer has apparently failed to produce the break system in line with the instructions, and as such, there are now 10 stations under various states of construction waiting to proceed. Read the rest of this entry »
IYLO – “Inspiration for life”
July 2011
Another night, another trip into the skies. It’s quieter out there, no people, just a feeling of serenity. Whether it’s 80 stories or 17, being ‘up’ is rewarding. Read the rest of this entry »
Porte Molitor
March 2011
Metro Chien sat patiently while Maitre-Chien chatted with Marc, disbelieving everything he was being told. “You came down the tunnels? Pas possible!” Claire Elise translated although I don’t think any of us believed that 5 minutes of scattergun French could boil down to a single sentence. Myself, Statler, Gary and Patch sat in the tunnels, backs to the wall, confused at everything that was going on. Read the rest of this entry »
Glitches
January 2011
A series of glitches allows the infrastructure of Paris to be accessed through various portals. Along with our ever generous host Marc, I joined Brad and L’Ottoire for some Parisien place hacking, with Dsankt, Mrs Dsankt and Olivier joining us at times across the weekend too. I use the term coined by Brad as I felt that at times we were not exploring as such; the places we were accessing had been previously ‘hacked*’ and we were enjoying the fruits of the hard work of others. On the contrary, at times we immersed ourselves in the unknown and pushed for the new, when Paris’ delights are well known to many.
*To program (a computer [a place]) for pleasure or compulsively; especially, to try to defeat the security systems and gain unauthorized access to a computer [place]. Read the rest of this entry »
International Drain Meet
January 2011
The International Drain Meet was a celebration of drainors, and a great chance to meet parties from other areas that we haven’t taken the opportunity to acquaint ourselves with yet. Represented were London, Manchester, North East England, Paris, Canada, Brescia Underground and UE Kingz, and it was a pleasure to meet and spend time in The River Westbourne with all present.
Partake Read the rest of this entry »