This quiet backwater on England's Norfolk Broads in the '50s brings back happy memories of a couple of sailing holidays there.

The slow, winding waterways of the Broads were an ideal place to learn the ropes on a 20' gaff-rigged boat, but even then it was getting very congested.

Note: In 2005, thanks to help from Pete and others on the "Broads Forum" I finally identified the building in the background of this photo as the Pleasure Boat Inn at Hickling.

Low tide in the harbour at Avoch in the Black Isle area of eastern Scotland.

The old churchyard at Avoch (pronounced "Och!") is the final resting place of one of my explorer heroes, Alexander Mackenzie. I made a point of stopping there to pay my respects when visiting the UK in 1995. Mr.Gregor Macintosh, who proudly tends the impressive grave site, kindly invited me home to drink a toast to Mackenzie while sitting in one the explorer's very own chairs.

Mackenzie made an epic journey across Canada arriving on the B.C. coast in 1793. To record the event, he left an inscription on a rock near Ocean Falls, British Columbia.


Couldn't resist including this image I took in May 2000 of Queen Victoria's "throne" in a carriage of her Royal Train in the National Railway Museum in York.

This was a state-of-the-art high-tech device in those days, as may be seen by the array of knobs and switches, purpose unknown, beside the bowl. The Queen was instrumental in popularizing the use of the flush toilet although to this day it is doubtful that any of us in the common mob have used such a splendiferous appliance - a carpenters pride, complete with lavishly decorated enamel bowl and velvet curtains.

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