Birds Birds Birds

 One of the things that excited me about moving here is learning about the flora and fauna of my new home. 

As I walk along the Thames, there are birds everywhere. Some new to me, some old friends.

There are so many ducks. I look forward to learning all of them!

I was surprised to find lots of fellow expat Canadians 

Swans are a common sight

Grey Heron


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hogsmill River

Image
 Hogsmill River is a small little river, some might call it a stream or a creek, that runs through Kingston-upon-Thames. This is next to the Kingston School of Art Knights Park campus where Owen works. This is where we ate our lunch today and watched all the little water birds milling about doing their thing. You can watch ducks, herons, moor hens, Canada geese and much more. There are even some good size fish in there as well. Enjoy this little video of the duck munching away on something. She is at the bottom in the middle. Eventually you see her swim/float away.
Read more

On Change

Image
I have been in this country for exactly 14 days. It is completely different and yet not so different at all.  I really haven't been able to get out and about very much. We have frequented restaurants and grocery shops, met the owner of the local bookshop and wandered up and down the walking paths around us. But we, or rather I, haven't really interacted with people very much other than our landlords. I have been limited by how far I could comfortably walk. The public transport system here no longer accepts cash and so I have been unable to go very far while I waited for my bank card to arrive so I could set up my Oyster card and be able to get around. What on earth is an Oyster card? It's the payment system they use here for public transport. If you are in Edmonton, it's like an ARC card.  For the first few days, I just slept as my body adjusted to the time change. I started looking for ESOL jobs of which there are precious few especially in the limited area I am lookin...
Read more

Random Thoughts

Image
 One thing we have noticed, at least in Richmond/Kingston, is the dearth of advertising in public places. There are no billboards. There are very few large poster-type ads in public spaces such as beside roads and motorways. There is no advertising on buses. There is no advertising in buses -- except ads for TFL (Transport for London) services or NHS (National Health Service) PSAs. Bus stops have no adverts. Even small posters advertising local bands playing at the local pub are few and far between. I have seen very few people smoking. So few that when I do see someone smoking it surprises me. Vaping however, is everywhere. So much vaping. You are allowed to smoke in the outdoor seating areas of restaurants here. Very weird.  I have yet to figure out how to walk down the sidewalk here. In Canada, we roughly walk down the sidewalk the same way we drive. Not here. There seems to be no consistent way to give way to a person walking toward you. Some people will veer to the right, ...
Read more