Horton clockwise

Following the precedent set back in the Autumn of 2013 at reference 1, I thought to walk the Horton Clockwise this morning to see what damage had been done in last night's wind. Not exactly a storm here, but I gather that there was serious wind over Tennyson Down on the Isle of Wight. Not that there are many trees up there and I don't suppose the great stone monument to the great man came to any grief. See gmaps 50.6667787,-1.5426103.

At the start point, in our own back garden, quite a lot of twigs down, large and small, nearly all a long time dead and very light for their size. Three ponds merged into one. Smaller dustbins gone walkabout, and as I write the fox-proof food waste bin is still missing, despite being numbered.

Half a dozen panel fences damaged on the circuit. Three with panels down and three with posts broken and bent but still upright.

One possible tree down in the margins of the Common, but I did not think to check the stump for freshness, so I am not sure whether it actually came down last night, although I am fairly sure it was up a few days ago.

One tree, that above, certainly down at the junction of Horton Lane and Christchurch Road. Not dead before the storm, but not very well.

The next tree down nearly took the Carlson Monument with it, but missed and ended up in the hedge rather than across the road.

Little damage that I could see at the Horton Golf Club.

Hook Road Arena rather waterlogged and so the Grand Bank Holiday car boot sale had been cancelled. A sale which has been grand indeed in previous years. Police patrol car parked in the entrance to the arena for some reason, possibly funfair, possibly tea-break related.

The funfair did not look very damaged. A few torn posters, a few portaloos down and some deflated inflatables. But they may have been deflated at close yesterday, just to be on the safe side. Large puddle in the middle of the enclosure. Not clear whether they would be opening later today - I imagine that they had certainly planned to.

Few twigs down in Longmead Road, some large. Stream high but well short of bursting its banks. There was a dustcart down, but that was probably not storm related. There was also a full-on recovery vehicle from Dynes in attendance and one of the chaps there thought it OK to wriggle under the dustcart while it was tipped up a bit with the hydraulic tow-bar at the back end of the recovery vehicle. Don't think that I would have cared to chance it.

And with Dynes coming from Crayford, quite near the Dartford Crossing, one might have thought that the council could have bought recovery from somewhere a bit nearer, but maybe this lot have the contract for the southeastern quadrant of the M25 and have their vehicles working the whole stretch - making them a better proposition than one might otherwise have thought.

PS: another snippet from Maigret being that the French for funfair is 'fête foraine', literally foreigners' fair. With their proper word for foreigner being stranger. Or, as Bart Simpson is alleged to have once said, no good using a cow on television as a cow. If you want an animal to look like a cow on the screen, you need a horse. Littré has a more learned take on the whole business.

Reference 1: http://www.psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/balanced-score-card.html.

Reference 2: http://dynesautoservices.co.uk/.

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