Portcam of the day

No , its not cousin , its sister :wink: I believe its Condor Express. Operate on Weymouth - Jersey - Guernsey - Poole route. And I have been on the Condor Express! We first went to Jersey on our honeymoon 22 years ago! - on an old overnight ferry from Portsmouth. There was some medical emergency and some one had to be ambulanced off at St Peter Port. We then tried to have breakfast but as anyone who has done this route knows, the bit between the islands is rough! - I don't get seasick but I only just managed half a yogourt! (probably not a wise choice either!) Anyway, beautiful though Jersey is, it took us 17 years to return with our boys (oh crikey, that means it was 5 years ago - cripes! it seems like yesterday). This time it was a 'flight' on the Condor Express. It was around the time of the 'Foot and Mouth' outbreak and I had our picnic dessimated by the environmental folks. Even sealed, vacuum packets of processed ham and butter were all thrown away. (I had taken a large picnic as we had a 5am sailing with a 4 hr car journey to get to the port). That was the last time we booked a holiday through a travel agent - they never warned us. Anyway, the hotel was so lovely that we went back the following year (booking independently!) and as the end of our holiday approached, a huge storm was cancelling sailings all over the place, to our great delight - until it was our turn to be cancelled! Oh it was terrible! we got stuck and had to stay on holiday for another 3 days, we had to sit on the beach and visit the lighthouse to take spectacular pictures and watch incredible sunsets! (see my website)I had to text my boss to tell her I couldn't get to work as I was stranded on holiday! :wink: (she said it was the worst excuse for missing work she ever heard!). I have to say that we were well looked after (including extra drugs for Andrew and his kidney condition if we had needed them) and the insurance took care of all the financial arrangements, though it wasn't fun for everyone. One of the big old ferries couldn't dock at Portsmouth because of the storm and spent 24 HOURS at sea waiting to come in. Not funny. Liz - some of the cams seem to have trouble focusing too. See if you can capture a 'Puddleduck!' I'll leave you to google that! I also found this cam http://www.bbc.co.uk/jersey/views/ and if you go to the St Ouen's Bay cam, then click on Tarkaseatrips.com you get a (kind of) live image. There should be SPECTACULAR sunsets from this cam as it faces due west. Next stop from here - NEW Jersey and LIZ! It also says there is another view (which there is) but it says this comes from Jersey Insight (the original cam site) but I can't find it on there. It looks like a kind of circle that doesn't meet. I have friends holidaying in Jersey at the moment, if I had found these cams before I could have stalked them! If you see a bunch of folks on bikes - its probably them!

Cozumel http://www.cozumelinsider.com/Webcam

Poppy, have not yet google Puddleduck......but I DO remember Beatrix Potter :D :D :D

Ah - maybe I sent you in the wrong direction! :oops: A Puddleduck is an amphibious bus that takes peeps out to Castle Elizabeth in the middle of St Aubin's Bay. Its is large and yellow (and ugly) - its like a boat with wheels. :? Should be visible on the cam! Another ship to stalk! Yes I remember Jemima too! PS I'm having trouble with the internet at the moment - Invincible is the only site I can get to load! :shock: I know we are important but I didn't think we would be asked to save the world! Maybe we are turning into the Incredibles!

:D :D :D I figured that a Puddleduck was something like that :D :D Only site you can get :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: Good Grief :shock: :D Invincible AND INCREDIBLE :D Possibly this is an IE problem :?: :?: The "rest of the world" still works for me :D

All is well with the internet now - maybe we are just tougher than the rest! My ISP is generally faultless so maybe it was just having a 'senior' moment! The only picture of a Puddleduck that I can find is this one! It must be its only flattering angle! http://www.webkast.nl/log/images/jersey2.jpg Noisy, beastly thing, but it did get us to the castle -eventually.

Ride The Ducks ....seems to be springing up everywhere. We did one at Branson, Mo. It was fine, we rode around town with people staring at us. Then it came to the lake.. The driver had to take it down a high hill....He must have been in a daring mood or a bad one... He took us down that hill at lightening speed and bang right into the lake. Wet ! We almost had to swim for it ! Try a hard water landing in one of those things with the driver yelling "Hee Haw " over the loudspeaker. Then after a tour of the lake, we zoomed back through the town looking like drowned rats. As we got off the Duck, there were others waiting to get on. You should have seen their faces...Priceless.

Speaking of strange modes of transportation, have a look at this http://www.burghisland.com/facilities_tractor.htm Not a very clear picture but what a strange vehicle. We saw this in 1986 when we drove the Channel coast. A very interesting hotel here, which you can walk to when the tide is out. Otherwise, this stork-like creation is the only way to get to the island.

:shock: :shock: :D :D Somehow, somewhere, though I have seen this before......like maybe a movie :?: :?: :?:........a mystery, ........set maybe in this hotel :?: :?: :?: :?: or SOME hotel, and the scenario being that that was the only way to get there :?:

Liz, that hotel is used a lot in films and TV shows set in the 1930, such as anything by Agatha Cristie, you might have seen it in one of those.

Now for the story of why we even went to see this hotel on that trip. Near where we live, on Saltspring Island, is the town of Ganges. It is not named for the river in India but for a Royal Navy ship that was 'on station' here in the 19th. century. Well, while researching our UK trip, we learned that the stern cabin section of HMS Ganges was saved when the ship was decommisioned and broken up and installed as the back wall of the bar at this hotel. Naturally, we had to go and see it since we were passing so close. At the time, the hotel was closed and undergoing renovations but the manager saw us and gave us a private tour. Disappointingly, that part of the ship had been painted over and the original wooden portion was covered up. In any event, it was still an interesting visit, especially to The Pilchard Inn, the onsite pub which dated back to very early days of smuggling along this coastline. see http://www.burghisland.com/facilities_pilchard.htm The hotel itself is 'art deco' and has hosted a lot of celebrities in it's time, as well as being the site for movies, as Stephen says.

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