For Whom the Bell Tolls

I can't find out much about this building, in fact I can't find anything! All I do know is its in Gloucester city centre and is the very grand frontage of Baker's watchmaker. I can't even tell you what the characters with the bells mean. So you'll just have to look at the interesting figures and make do!

Which Way To The Sea?

Like most towns and cities in Britain, Cheltenham has a problem with Seagulls, not a huge problem though, not like neighbouring Gloucester. There the gulls dive bomb shoppers in the car parks and snatch food from hungry visitors! This Seagull was on the roof top car park at the Regent Arcade shopping centre. His mate had just flown off, looking for the sea!

Herd Of The Countryside?

One of the great things about living in Cheltenham is that you are never very far from the countryside. To the North are the rolling fields towards Tewkesbury, to the East are the Cotswold hills and all the chocolate box villages, to the South the Forest of Dean, and to the West the spectacular Malvern hills. Between these four points are numerous farms, villages, woods, forest and fields.

This herd of cows, well calves actually, are in the fields that separate the South West of Cheltenham and the suburbs of the neighbouring city of Gloucester. Over the years this strip of farmland (the Green Belt) has been gradually shrinking and is always under threat from development, as the Green Belt boundary changes. I hope that there will always be some open space between Cheltenham and Gloucester as the merger of the two heavily populated areas would do them both damage.

Pottering Around The Cathedral

The Citizen newspaper reported yesterday that the crew working on the next Harry Potter film had arrived in Gloucester to prepare for filming, and I immediately thought "photo opportunity!". The magnificent Cloisters at Gloucester Cathedral double up as the corridors of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and are filled with children from the neighbouring King's School. A huge marquee has been erected in the schools grounds to get costume fitting for the 174 pupils taking part underway.

The Cathedral has been used twice before by Warner Brothers, for the filming of The Philosopher's Stone and The Chamber Of Secrets. In the past you haven't been able to get near the place, so I didn't know what to expect when I got there - but it was "access all areas"! Above is the garden that is enclosed by the Cloisters, now its turned over to scaffolding and staging.

There wasn't a great deal of activity at the Cathedral, but these guys were working on protecting the stone floor of the Cloisters in readiness for the camera tracks. Outside there was one security guard, from Movie Lot Security, on his mobile phone, stood in front of two vans. I acted all innocently as I walked by him, I got to the back of the vans (and out of his sight) and I pushed my camera through some security fencing without really looking, getting a snap of what I hoped was film cameras...

...but it turned out to be electric cables! When filming of The Half Blood Prince gets under way properly I'm going to head back to the Cathedral and try to at least take a photo of a camera. Maybe even a wizard or two! Watch this space...