Picture(s) of the day....

[NewcastleFalcon]

...black and white too.....in "Indian Ink"...

I can understand the rarity value, and it being an original drawing by an iconic artist whose characters and images have become known and loved throughout the world. Can't quite weigh up the pleasure of owning such an item, and paying such a price for it meaning that it will have to be carefully preserved, and effectively largely unused.

£7.99 for a copy of the full story in colour, which you can enjoy and come back to time and again would always be the better value for me

Purely academic of course

As an investment, Herge is not making original drawings anymore, and there are plenty of collectors bidding for his original works.

Perhaps on our own shores the works of Dudley Watkins with his well known "Oor Wullie" and "The Broons" and "Desperate Dan" may become similarly sought after on a smaller scale.

regards Neil

[CitroJim]

Have you seen the animated Tin Tin film Neil? It's truly excellent, both technically and in the storyline. It has elements from many of Tin Tin's most well-known stories...

Interestingly, it seems Herge was a frustrated journalist and created Tin Tin to live out his dream...

[NewcastleFalcon]

Haven't seen it Jim but if its this one Jim, it certainly has a heavyweight director and cast


Steven Spielberg must be a fan!

from wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adven ... tin_(film)

The Adventures of Tintin grossed over $373 million,[4] and received positive reviews from critics,[10] being compared to Spielberg's previous work Raiders of the Lost Ark. It was the first non-Pixar animated film to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film.[11] Williams was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score. It was nominated for six Saturn Awards, including Best Animated Film, Best Director for Spielberg and Best Music for Williams.[12]

The short cartoon episodes always ended with the cliffhanger and that characteristic voice imploring you tune in to the next episode. I'll have to dig around and see it I can find a clip to wallow in a bit of nostalgia.

Regards Neil

[CitroJim]

That's the one Neil I rate it as excellent and a film has to be bloody exceptional even before I'll consider watching it. That one most certainly is!

[NewcastleFalcon]

...Youtube does it again. Red Rackham's Treasure....from "Herge's Adventures of Tintin" from Belvision the series of 5-minute episodes of the Tintin stories which I remember from the 1960's.

And yes this clip has the starts and ends of each 5-minute episode complete with the announcements, the summary of the last episode and the cliffhanger at the end. (even a BBC globe at one point!)

Notalgic stuff for us babyboomers!




Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Should really slip in the odd French car from time to time on "French Car Chat" so here's

http://dardel.info/tintin/Tournesol57.jpg

Well not exactly French, but based on one of Citroen's products given the treatment by carrossier Chapron, but with the Moustache logo of the leader of Herge's fictional Country of Borduria loosely based on Josep Stalin.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... ga.svg.png

Citroen 15 Six 1955 by Chapron
http://dardel.info/tintin/AutosOrig/15Six_Chapron.jpg

Regards Neil

PS If you are curious as to who did the opening "HERGE'S ADVENTURES of TINTINNNNNNNNNNNNN" announcement. It was the distictive voice of Paul Frees who also voiced Captain Haddock.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Had an airing on Jim's blog but there is a link between this

http://www.foldingcyclist.com/MIFA-fold ... ochure.jpg

and this
http://www.eurovelo13.com/ev13-1.png/image

its this

That book sounds good, I'll be reading it over christmas.

Yes I think that would be a good read too, totally inappropriate bike bought off German e-bay, and a 10,000 km ride from the Arctic to the Black Sea...what could go wrong

https://d3by36x8sj6cra.cloudfront.net/a ... 100205.jpg

Regards Neil

[CitroJim]

I must read that book and his other one about his ride of the Giro D'Italia on another totally unstable bike...

His account of his ride around the Tour de France - 'French Revolutions' - is absolutely excellent and hilarious... One of my all-time favourite books and precious as I found it in a second-hand bookshop in Hastings when I attended Malcolm's (Citronut's) funeral. Every time I see it I'm reminded of Malcolm - Doubtless Tim Moore has lots of Malcolm's Percywotsit!

That bike, the 904, is reckoned to be utter rubbish and prone to breaking in half... It's very heavy too... Allegedly Tim had to have his reinforced before he embarked on the trip and used a scaffold pole to add a top tube to the frame...

He was attracted to it because of its twin luggage carriers...

[tl1000s]

Thanks I appreciate it, iconic bridge from the people that made the steel for the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Having just returned from a mini-holiday in Skipton and Hebden Bridge, I have to pay tribute to the enterprising folk who planned and built canals across the Pennines. Still there today for pleasure boating of course.

So in Hebden Bridge there is the "Rochdale Canal" ending up in Manchester, and at Skipton the "Leeds and Liverpool Canal"

Incredible engineering achievements.
Skipton
http://www.cravenherald.co.uk/resources ... ve-gallery
Hebden Bridge
https://www.natureflip.com/sites/defaul ... kshire.jpg

Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

http://www.themanufacturer.com/wp-conte ... -wagon.jpg

..and thundering through Hebden Bridge Station was a very long one of these...saw it heading Manchester Bound lunchtime-ish and heading presumably DRAX B bound on its return journey later in the day.

Reading Wiki DRAX B has converted a number of its generating units to solely Biomass, and was set to import 7.5 million tonnes of Biomass from America and Canada. Now that could well be borne out by the trundling trucks direction of travel, and how on their return they literally shook the track on the way back in the direction of the power station.

Regards Neil

[CitroJim]

Great stuff on the canals - another interest of mine

And good to see all that stuff being moved by rail Neil Did you see what the locomotive(s) were?

Pleased to see today the Government have approved funding for the long-awaited restoration of the 'Varsity Line' rail link between Oxford, Aylesbury, Milton Keynes, Bedford and ultimately Cambridge

It's definitely worth doing as presently the exact route of the currently disused railway is plied by hundreds of buses a day!

This is the present state of one part of the line, near Winslow and not far from the site of the Chevrons and DS Rally:



It's been 'mothballed' since 1993...

[Hell Razor5543]

If you are ever in the Dudley area you might want to take time (a lot of time) to visit 'The Black Country Living Museum'. They show a lot of how things were throughout the Industrial Age, including a cast iron semi detached house (made to help deal with housing after WWI), trams, iron working (for a while the Black Country produced, amongst other things, over 90% of the chains throughout the world), and the Singing Cavern (the hills were mined for limestone (used to purify iron during smelting), and the Singing Cavern was mined by hand (and explosives) and is seven times larger than St Pauls' Cathedral).

http://www.bclm.co.uk/

[NewcastleFalcon]

When I saw Biomass on the side of those specially built wagons, I imagined yes thats probably a euphanism for "manure". No...wood pellets as it turns out, and probably highly specified wood pellets at that.

Did you see what the locomotive(s) were?

I didn't get an original pic but did find some details of the very first Drax B Biomass train to use the Port of Liverpool

GB Railfreight ran its first train for Drax Power yesterday (October 26 2015), hauling biomass from the Port of Liverpool to Drax Power Station in Selby (North Yorkshire).

The operator’s only Class 59, 59003 Yeoman Highlander, led the train of 25 wagons, carrying a total of 1,600 tonnes of biomass pellets, with 66706 at the rear. The train departed Port of Liverpool at 1725. At Tuebrook sidings (Liverpool), 59003 was detached and 66706 continued to Drax Power Station. It arrived at 0159 on October 27. The journey marks the first phase of a project to increase the number of biomass trains from the Port of Liverpool, the second phase of which will be complete in 2016.

8.5 Hours from Liverpool to Selby doesn't seem too quick, although there is probably a scheduling nightmare negotiating it through the passenger traffic.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/645/2123 ... d45c0f.jpg

GB RailFreight has recently sold this month by Groupe Eurotunnel SE to a Swedish Company EQT.

Regards Neil

Bonus 66706 (Named Nene Valley Railway) hauling a biomass train on 31st October 2016

http://www.railwayherald.co.uk/images/ic/750/452095.jpg

Rgards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

If you are ever in the Dudley area you might want to take time (a lot of time) to visit 'The Black Country Living Museum'.
http://www.bclm.co.uk/

The "Chip Shop" seems very much like the operation at Beamish in County Durham with its coal-fired range, and a big queue outside it!

https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media ... d-chip.jpg

Regards Neil