Tuesday, 4 June 2024

After a very busy weekend, I felt rather tired last night and slept late this morning. Lollz, Earl, and I only surfaced after 9 o’clock, made breakfast, and then headed to Plantation Warf to catch the Thames Uber. This was another exciting adventure as we do not have anything like this in the deep south of Africa.

My brother, Nicholas, was going to accompany us to Greenwich but work commitments prevented this so we went on our own. The trip took over an hour but it was lovely to see London from the river. The Earl loves anything nautical so this was just up his street – or should I say river?

Click on the first photograph to enlarge and then use arrows to view the slide show.

We visited The Maritime Museum which was very interesting. The sea has definitely played a huge role in the history of the world. Seeing all the exhibits made us realise that we all have different emotional connections to the sea. All my life, I have lived near the sea, and cannot imagine being away from it for too long. I found the polar exploration the most interesting in this museum but all of it was excellent. There are several interactive devices which makes it all the more interesting.

Click on the first photograph to enlarge then use the arrows to watch the slide show.

On the return River Uber we took some more photographs. Then we walked to the Waterfront Pub for dinner. It was quite cold by this time but there were some interesting birds in the shallows of the river.

The Grebe shown in the photographs is a Great Crested Grebe which is the same species as we see in South Africa. The subspecies P. c. cristatus is found across Europe, including England. It breeds in vegetated areas of freshwater lakes and winters on freshwater lakes, reservoirs, or the coast.

The African subspecies, P. c. infuscatus, occurs in South Africa. It is mainly sedentary, meaning it doesn’t migrate extensively.

Although they belong to the same species their subspecies adaptations and behaviours differ slightly.

The Grey Heron is the same one that we find in South Africa as they occur in temperate Europe and Asia, as well as parts of Africa.

It resides in much of its range but some populations from northern regions migrate southwards during autumn.