When The Story of Holly and Ivy was first published, it was set in the Buckinghamshire market town of Aylesbury. In later editions the location was switched to somewhere called Appleton. (There is a village of Appleton in Oxfordshire, but the descriptions in the book don’t fit it.) Has the book lost something as a result? “And where does your grandmother… Continue reading
Posts tagged Aylesbury
Sleek and silent killer returns to the skies of an English market town
A pair of peregrine falcons is raising a single chick on a nesting platform at the top of the 200 feet high County Hall in the centre of the Buckinghamshire town of Aylesbury. The falcons have been nesting here since 2011, and I don’t think our sense of wonder should diminish. All round the world, totemic… Continue reading →
Aylesbury’s peregrines hatch a new champion of the skies
Since I wrote the following, the single egg hatched, on Monday, April 28th. The young bird is being fed by its parents now. http://www.aylesburyperegrine.org.uk/pcam.html — Aylesbury’s pair of peregrine falcons are tending their first egg on their purpose built nesting platform at the top of the 200 feet high County Hall in… Continue reading →
Peregrine falcons from English town fly in to international conference
The family of peregrine falcons that successfully fledged in central Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, this year has shot to International (well European) stardom. Two officers from the two local councils involved in the scheme addressed the first international conference on the protection of birds and bats in buildings in Zvolen, Slovakia in November (2012). You can see… Continue reading →
Should the Paralympic flame be lit at Stoke Mandeville for every games?
The case for choosing Stoke Mandeville in Aylesbury as the place to light the Paralympic flame every four years. What do the following locations have to do with the Paralympic tradition? Parliament House, Canberra. The Hephaestus Temple in Athens. And the Temple of Heaven, Beijing. All of them suitably solemn and dignified locations, I’m sure,… Continue reading →
Flash of feathered lightning over an English market town
Imagine you had the chance to watch some young lions out on the African savannah taking their first gambolling steps under the protective eye of their mother. Or if you were on hand in the Arctic when a polar bear showed its young how to slide down a snow slope. Perhaps it is the idea… Continue reading →