This recent holiday is not my first time in Portugal. I have had two business trips for sales conferences to Lisbon when we were bussed from the airport to a hotel. We then sat through several days of presentations then were bussed back to the airport. As a presenter on both occasions I was not bold enough to venture out after 23:00 for late night exploration. Last year we explored Belém a little but did not see central Lisbon.

This year I realised I did not even have a mental picture of the centre of Lisbon. Books and articles on Portugal regularly feature the Jerónimos Monastery (shown above) or the Torre de Belém or the Navigator's Monument. However all of these places are in Belém rather than Lisbon itself. Of course Belém is only 6 km west of the centre of Lisbon but while historically important it is not the capital.

This holiday we decided to take a walk around the city centre and we were pleasantly surprise. We started out at Santa Apolónia railway station and headed upward in a northwesterly direction through the narrow streets of Alfama. This was the Moorish old town and the streets are narrow, crooked and in many cases just pedestrian stairways. It was difficult to follow a particular direction and we ended up zigzagging northwestward and updward.

At the top of the hill is the castle of São Jorge; this was again something I had never seen in photos of Portugal, yet well worth the walk.

The castle was originally built by the Moors but subsequently extended after the reconquest. It is possible to go inside the main keep and to walk along the walls and go into the towers providing you pay the entrance fee.

It also offers great views over the city centre such as the view below to the Rossio square and station to the north west.

The Rossio is at the north end of the Baixa district that was devastated by the 1755 earthquake and tsunami. It is now laid out in a grid iron pattern.

We wandered down the hill towards the Baixa hitting a street where trams made the journey uphill.

Now I must admit I have seen pictures of Lisbon's old trams. The street here is Rua de Santo Antonio de Sé where we also stopped for lunch. Turning left after a few blocks we came into a huge square with a victory arch and numerous government buildings. The square looks out on the south side to the Tejo river.

Despite the fact that Lisbon itself does not seem that well known by most UK people, I think it is will worth a visit and would like to explore more on a future visit.

I old towns I am fascinated by the patterns of roofs if you are looking down from city walls. We recently visited Óbidos which is about 100 km north of Lisbon not far from the A8 motorway. This is a very well preserved fortified town and well worth a look. The roofscape views from the walls are good.

This view is taken from the wall not far from the main entrance to the town. It shows some of the variety of chimneys that are to be seen.

There is plenty of lichen on the roofs implying good air quility.

Chimneys come in a variety of forms including elongated ones (right) here and rounded.

Some chimneys such as these just outside the city wall remind me of lighthouses!

We are now near the end of the "silly season" when the press - starved of the normal volumes of political news sees fit to publish material that normally would not make the mark for publication. However, there are also many stories that make the press that seem  to totally misrepresent fact yet get published if they support a particular political angle. Sometimes I think that the worst of these come in the Euro myth category where almost any story regardless of accuracy is used to attack Britain's participation in the European Union. One such article was a piece from Neil Parrish in the Western Morning News on 27th August 2008. I have wanted to comment in depth on such articles and Mr Parrish's article was a random choice; I have had no particular reason to single him out.

For reference, I am broadly in favour of Britain's EU membership having benefited from the free movement of goods and labour in my lifetime. I have however never been a fan of the common agricultural policy and some of the more grandiose schemes mooted. However I am tired of the bleating of British politicians who seem not to be able to do their jobs.

I picked this one out about the demise of the acre because having registered land for my house in 1999 I have a little idea of what really goes on. I also remember the state of metrication in the UK when at school in the 1960s and 1970s and resent the Orwellian way that some politicians rewrite our history.

Now let's take a look at the article...

Government fails to save the acre from EU oblivion

VERY quietly over the summer, when no-one was looking, the EU took advantage of the holidays to quietly kill off the acre.

This is a wild claim. European law must be ratified by the European Parliament of which Neil Parrish is a member. How can they "take advantage of the holidays"? If he is not happy with the measure what did he do in the European Parliament to stop it? Was he caught napping?

Sadly, from January 2010, our ancient measurement will be consigned to history, no longer to be used when land is registered.

 
Many ancient measures have been consigned to history for good reason. We no longer have bushels, firkins, Winchester gallons, Scottish stones and ells. Phasing out a unit might just be because it is past its 'sell by' date.

Europeans tend to look over the Channel with puzzlement at our imperial measurements and are generally completely unable to fathom exactly what they mean. The pound, the pint, the mile, the hand and the acre may not be totally logical, but they are part of what makes us special. They represent the unique history of our island story, but unfortunately they fall foul of the EU drive for harmonisation and uniformity.

Actually it is not just fellow Europeans who are puzzled by Britain's attachment to imperial measures. Citizens of the Commonwealth, Asia and South America are equally puzzled. In the 1960s Britain said it was going to go metric and those Commonwealth countries who were not already metric decided to do the same. Australia and New Zealand changed over successfully in the 1970s.

Units like the acre are not unique to Britain, after all it was introduced by the Anglo-Saxon invaders. Not surprisingly the Dutch and Germans had a similar unit - the Morgen - if they are puzzled, then it is only to ask why we have not modernised.

After repeated attempts to rid us of our other imperial measurements, European bureaucrats finally got one over on us by managing to kill the acre when no-one was looking. Hidden deep down in page 30 of the minutes of the last EU Agriculture Ministers' meeting was the sentence that killed it. Ministers approved it with little debate and no protest from the British Government.

 This is not the root cause of the acre going. When the UK joined the EU in 1973 it agreed to adopt the metric system confirming a decision taken in 1965. However some derogations were negotiated e.g. allowing the pint for draft beer and the acre for land registration.

Acres are odd units for land registration, as land registration relies on maps. Our Ordnance Survey maps are based on a one kilometre grid and this is nothing new. The same system has been used since the 1940s. A hectare being a 100 m by 100 m square fits perfectly with an OS map as there are 100 hectares in every OS grid square; ten rows and ten columns. Not surprisingly the UK Government - which had the option to retain the acre - started replacing the acre with the hectare or square metres in 1995 and this was compulsory from 2003. When I purchased my building plot in 1999 the land registration was metric.

Furthermore the EU rules governing units of measurement come from the Units of Measurement Directive - reviewed in 2007 - and not the EU Agriculture Ministers' meeting. The agricultural ministers would have to implement what was agreed in the directive. This directive was subject to a public consultation and any UK citizen could have taken part. The UK Government made strong representations to the consultation as did some industry bodies. If the loss of the acre was so important what did Neil Parrish do to mobilise his constituents?
 

The humble acre is one of Britain's most ancient units, measuring 4,840 square yards, and has had an illustrious history. The word itself represents this history, coming from the Old Saxon word of aecer, meaning open field, and the Latin word "ager." This Latin word is also the root for "agriculture". Its exact size was first set out under a law passed in the reign of Edward 1 in the early 14th century.

from Garway

I agree that the acre has a long and important history - and I like the word - in fact it dates back to the 9th century when it was defined by a furlong and chain. It is rooted in our European history and is close to the Dutch 'akker' or German 'Acker' which mean cultivated fields. Like most imperial units it has its origin in invaders from the Continent - just like the Romans introduced the mile.

I can't help feeling that to throw away a word and a unit of measurement with such a tradition, and to replace it with the "hectare", measuring 2.471 acres and hated by most farmers I know, is a sad betrayal of our entire agricultural tradition.

Obsoleting a unit is not the same as throwing away a word; we talk of "milestones" figuratively although they have been obsolete for decades.. 'Old money' in other words £sd had an even longer tradition going back to Roman times. Yet despite its antiquity it was absolutely necessary for our finance system to phase it out and use modern decimal currency.

Nobody I know can define the acre. Area units are normally based on squares e.g. square metre or square foot. The acre is an awkward oblong unit - one furlong (furrow long) by a chain. Who understands chains these days? The acre was the size of an Anglo Saxon strip field - we have abandoned strip farming between the 17th and 19th centuries in the UK - an obsolete concept. The acre - like 'old money' - is an important part of our past but belongs in a museum.

A hectare is a sensible unit being 100 metres square - about the size of a rugby pitch. For London dwellers it is about the size of the pedestrianised area in Trafalgar Square.

I know some people involved in agriculture and have never heard that hectares are the subject of widespread hatred. Indeed a friend at church who is an agricultural chemist tells me they are very useful. His company does soil surveys to ensure that farmers target precisely where fertilizer is needed (based on soil analysis) to save indescriminate fertilizer usage. They take one sample per hectare (using GPS to position the sample) and of course this fits with OS maps.

I accept that in reality, it probably won't change everyday life for Westcountry farmers too much. The acre has not formally been used for several years. Hectares are currently used in tandem with acres for most documentation and so this ruling will make little practical difference to most farm sales.

In other words this is saying that the issue is a storm in a teacup!

In what now appears a cunning plan by the EU to lay the foundation to kill the acre, all Single Farm Payment claims are already made in hectares, and have been for some time. 

Single Farm Payments need to be based on the same rules in every country so the hectare was an obvious choice. Since the UK has already phased out the acre for Land Registration how can this be an EU 'cunning plan'? The acre was already gone when land registration started to use hectares and square metres in 1995.

However, psychologically it is a hammer blow to the British countryside, reminding us once and for all that no-one can avoid the arbitrary rules of the European Union. The humble acre may have given us the very template for the mishmash of fields which make up the British countryside, it may be well-loved, easy to visualise for our farmers and have existed since the 14th century, yet all this is no match for the pen of European bureaucrats.

 
No, the mishmash of long abandoned strip fields was the template for the acre not the other way round. How is phasing out an obsolete unit a "hammer blow" to farmers? The land still has the same area regardless of the units used. The land will produce the same whether measured in acres or hectares!

Originally, an acre described the amount of land that could be ploughed by a man and an ox in a single day, and while I accept that most Westcountry farmers no longer plough their land in this way, our entire agricultural heritage is based on holdings measured in acres. More importantly, farm sizes sound a lot bigger when they are measured in acres.

 
I am relieved that Mr Parrish acknowledges that his constituents have moved on from strip farming.

However why is it an advantage that "farm sizes sound a lot bigger when they are measured in acres". Anybody buying or selling land needs to compare like with like. They need to know that a 100 hectare farm is bigger than a 70 hectare one (or equivalent in acres). Would Mr Parrish prefer to specify farms in square metres? That would make the numbers much bigger!

In an ideal world a compromise could have been sought. Many other countries seek opt-outs of EU policies which affect or impinge on ancient traditions – and we could have done the same. The EU is constantly attempting to downgrade our traditions and all this achieves in doing is driving people more and more eurosceptic. Our Government always seems to let them get away with it – and it makes me wonder if this is their intention.

 
Why are we clinging on to imperial measurement traditions in the 21st Century? It is a sad reflection on the demise of numeracy and science in the UK that such drivel is stated by politicians - though I suspect the motive is simply to blame the EU at any pretext. Imperial measures were developed for an illiterate and innumerate society. Metric units are designed to be used for calculation in other words for modern numerate people.

It is no secret that our imperial system of measurements drives the Europeans mad. For years, the EU has been trying to persuade our Government to give them up. It dreams of a Britain where people drive (preferably on the right) in kilometres, weigh themselves in kilograms, drink litres rather than pints and measure their land in hectares. For years, it has put the pressure on and generally the Government has been able to resist.

 
This is really the Orwellian bit. An objective look at our history will show that the UK wanted to modernise its manufacturing and professional practices in the 1960s by adopting metric. This was a good decade before joining the EEC. Successive Conservative and Labour governments failed to see the conversion program through and we now have had decades of mess.

Having had a miserable few years struggling with long division and multiplication in imperial units and 'old money' in the 1960s, I can assure Mr Parrish that learning imeprial properly should drive anyone mad. I recall when my school textbooks were switched from dreadful imperial calculations to sensible decimal currency and metric units around 1970 by then Education Secretary Margaret Thatcher. My practical numarcy improved by leaps and bounds. We were told that the UK was going metric in a few years and needed to be prepared. Governments have let down two generations of children by teaching one system and retaining the old one.

Then came along Directive 80/181/EEC on units of measurements allowed in member states. Once again the pint, mile, yards and hands were threatened and once again the UK was able to negotiate a derogation – or an opt-out – to continue using them. A word of caution here, though – a derogation only puts off the decision for a few years, so expect them to be challenged once more in the future.

However, because of the Common Agricultural Policy, the EU has been able to tie in payments to hectare measurements. Gradually, the acre has become less and less important in practical terms. Granted, we all continue to refer to acres unofficially, but officially virtually everything is done in hectares. As a result, in July's Agricultural Ministers' meeting, the final abolition of the acre was on the agenda.

Now you would have thought for such an important event the UK would have sent a cabinet minister, as most other EU countries did. But no. The UK sent only a junior minister from Defra. Now Jonathan Shaw is an able politician, but surely for a debate on the future of the UK's oldest unit of land measurement, our Government could have taken it more seriously and sent the Secretary of State?

As the meeting developed, it became clear why Hilary Benn didn't bother to attend: there was little debate and no protest whatsoever from the British Government. We could and should have stood up to the EU in this case – and with a bit of a fight, we could have secured a reprieve for the acre.

 
This seems like a 'porky' to me. The acre issue surely had already been decided in the Units of Measurements Directive (80/181/EEC) review in 2007. The outcome of the review was approved by the European Parliament on 29 November 2007. The issue was already decided before Mr Parrish's meeting so no wonder Hilary Benn did not attend.

While I always enjoy attacking the Government, the real villains in this piece are the EU. This kind of pointless interference into every little nook and cranny of our national life is exactly what annoys people about it. We face major agricultural challenges in the next few years, particularly with food prices rising – yet the only response the EU can offer is to ban the acre. They really should get their priorities right.

 
Now Neil Parrish comes clean. This is what his article is about!

Food price rises and the state of farming are important. What the dickens has using acres got to offer in terms of helping with price increases?

Unfortunately, though, the deed is done. No-one will have the right to sell or even advertise their land in acres and I wonder just how long it will be before we see more metric martyrs being prosecuted for daring to mention the word "acre" in idle conversation in the pub.

 
What twaddle! 'Old money' was phased out in 1971 yet we talk of a car 'turning on a sixpence'. Why should anyone be prosecuted for mentioning an 'acre' even if it is no longer a unit in use? The hundredweight (cwt) was phased out but there is no law against using it in conversation.

Neil Parish is a Conservative MEP for the South West of England and chairman of the European Parliament's Agriculture Committee

 
It riles me that we pay people to represent us at the European Parliament and while their job is to scrutinise European directives and laws, all they seem to be able to do is to blame everything on the EU. An abdication of responsibility?

I do not like the Orwellian way with which Neil Parrish MEP attempts to rewrite history; though he is not alone on this! The final irony is that it was the last Conservative government and not the EU that effectively killed off the acre for Land Registration. In other words Mr Parrish's own party killed off the acre despite trying to blame Brussels over a decade after the event.

I am glad that the UK government decided to retire the acre - we need modern units for modern Britain! However it is galling that polticians attempt to represent a UK decision implemented in 1995 as a 'cunning plot' from Brussels in 2008. So where is integrity?

Last year I intended to post a tip on car rental in Lisbon. We were wanting to find a way to transport a family of five plus surf boards from Lisbon airport to the Peniche area. Checking out the usual rental companies at Lisbon airport suggested that the only option was an expensive people carrier. Our agent at Baleal Rentals told us that if we took the taxi to Santa Apolónia  we could rent two Seat Ibizas for less than a people carrier. He was right! We duly booked online. The limitation is that there is one choice - the Seat Ibiza - but at a great daily rate.

InterRent is located at the Santa Apolónia railway terminus which is close to both the river Tejo and the ancient Alfama area of Lisbon. It is a bit over 10 minutes taxi ride from the airport and the ride only cost €7. Last year we found the rental office an an obscure part of the station. There was a young and friendly man - who speaks excellent English - who seemed to run the entire operation single handed. He would deal with our booking, check our documents and ask us to sign the contract. Then he ran out of the station and drove back with the vehicle; he did everything in a helpful and friendly manner which makes a pleasant change from some surly rental staff at airports. He seemed to be the only InterRent employee although I cannot imagine he does the cleaning and servicing of the cars as well.

The good news is that they are still there at Santa Apolónia but have moved their office into the main forecourt. There is still a good 6.99€/day basic price to which you need to add insurance, extra driver fees, etc. Despite the extras it is still a great deal.

Furthermore the excellent, friendly internet employee with a toothy smile is still there working as hard as ever! He always has a friendly smile and speaks French as fluently as he speaks English. He now definitely has at least one colleague to help drive the cars around.

I sometimes wonder if people in this country think there was some sort of golden age in the 1940s and 1950s. A lot of people seem to be very nostalgic about the past while paying less attention to the future's challenges.

That thought crossed my mind again with the launch of the first steam engine for 50 years. Don't misunderstand me, I am certainly not knocking the determination and achievement ot the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust; they should be congratulated on their achievement. It is just that there seems to be too little attention focused on building a railway fit for the 21st Century.

While countries like France, Germany, Italy and Spain have been steadily been building their high speed railway networks, we are stuck with a mere branch line from Calais to St Pancras. The original plan to have Eurostar trains run through to Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow were quietly dropped. It took 3 decades to come to a decision on CrossRail in London while Paris has already got 4 RER lines and German cities have their cross-city S-Bahn lines.

Similarly Heathrow airport is served by the branch line for the Heathrow Express. Heathrow is close to the Paddington to Reading line and to the Staines line from Waterloo. Heathrow ought to be a railway hub for trains coming from Paddington, Reading, Waterloo and Basingstoke.

Our visionary Victorian railway engineers like Robert Stevenson and Isambard Kingdon Brunel must be turning in their graves! We should value our history but not at the expense of our future.

A challenge that Mrs O and I have had for many years is synchronisation of holidays. My American employer is absolutely driven by a quarter end rush - end January, end April, end July and end October. Mrs O's holidays are driven by the local education authority. Result is that she wanted to go on holiday at the end of last week and I could get one day off to help set up the tent.

Checking the weather forecast around the middle of last week suggested that the weekend would be showery. We hit the road on the early hours of Friday and reached our Cornish destination in good time. We set up the tent then went for a 10 km walk along the beach to a supermarket then back along a direct return route.

Yestereday we did a wonderful walk from Rinsey to Porthlevel by striking inland and then returning along the coast path. It was a thrilling 4 hour trip. This was followed by a BBQ at the campsite.

This morning we went to a church service in St Ives where we heard a sermon on Daniel chapter 9. The sermon focused on how Daniel not only confessed his own sins, but confessed the sins of his nation Israel. It went on to deal with asking for God's forgiveness. There was plenty that could be applied to me our to our UK nation at present.

After a short lunch, it was back on the train home. The downside is that I probably face an awful pressure in the coming week. The upside is that the trainride is beautiful - sorry no photos! This is one of the only connections in the week directly from W Cornwall to Hampshire and while slow from Penzance to Exeter is reasonalby fast after Exeter.

I was fairly upset to part from my wife knowing that we will not be able to enjoy things together. Nevertheless I should not omit the blessings of the train ride. The views over coastline were absolutely spectacular whether it was Par to Gribbin Head, the river Teign around Teignmouth or the red sandstone cliffs around Dawlish or across the Exe towards Sidmouth. The white cliffs of the Jurassic Coast were also visible. Similarly to my trip from Inverness to London there were great city views. Rail journeys not only offer good countryside views but usually pass through cities in a way that motorways do not. There were great views of the centres of Truro, Exeter and Salisbury.

So now, I'm back at home awaiting a difficult week at work...must not feel self pity!!! Ughh!!!

Have you ever had the feeling that you are being ripped off by insurers or other financial service companies? I have that feeling from time to time and I got another nasty dose of it yesterday.

One example was when I bought a second hand car for Mrs O at a "car supermarket" in West London. We had just moved back from Germany and a friend had recommended the place. There was certainly a good choice of vehicles. I signed up for an "extended warranty" agreement which seemed like a good idea given that I had no friendly mechanic to inspect the vehicle. A year later there was a serious mechanical failure and my wife arranged for the vehicle to be towed in for repair. I realised that we should call the extended warranty company and called them after the event. I was told in no uncertain terms that I had invalidated the warranty by not phoning the company before arranging for the car to be towed and repaired. When I protested that this was a ripoff the call centre referred me to the clause in the agreement. Indeed deep in the small print there was a clause to that effect.

One of my sons is on an InterRailing holiday in Europe. He asked if he was covered by my travel insurance policy that I have through my work. I duly read the main sections of the policy but not the detailed small print. I concluded that he was well covered for things like theft of baggage and loss of tickets or passport. On Sunday he called from Krakow Poland to say that his rucksack had been stolen from his youth hostel with practically everything in it. I thought I would call the insurance company to get a claim form and was horrified to be told that he was not covered. His youth hostel had no lockers left so he had put a padlock to close his rucksack to protect it. I was duly referred to a clause in the policy which says that if a bag is unaccompanied claims are only valid if they are locked away with receipt to prove that it was locked away. I think you need a lawyer to help you make a claim. Despite that I am glad that my son was unharmed.

Aaaarghhh!

I am very aware that people may not want to contantly blog ... but I do not want to have a lot of "stale" connections in my "friends tab". I have therefore pruned all friends with no contact in the last 100 days. If you want to remain in contact with me then please: a) forgive me and b) issue a new invitation.

I hope you understand why I do this.

Yours

O.

Well, I managed to do a short shot of sitting in my taxi on the way to the airport. The exciting moments are when two streams of traffic cross with no traffic lights (or roundabout) but since I do not know my way about those are hard to predict. The following 60 seconds are tamer.

Note that the early part has traffic lanes market - advisory only.

I am writing from Hyderabad. I was here a year ago and took the same route as I did then. However this time all the airport buildings I have used were brand new.

I started out from Heathrow Terminal 5 which thankfully seems to be working properly now. The buildings are far taller than other Heathrow ones and you spend a lot more time in either lifts or escalators. However the design makes much better use of the building footprint than the older, flatter terminals. There is also far more natural light and with atrium spaces between the levels it is much more airy than say Terminal 4.

I knew that there was a new airport under construction in Bangalore but had not appreciated that Bengaluru International was already open. The old airport was very dingey and old fashioned. The immigration queues also seemed very long. Arriving this time was a very pleasant experience with a short queue for immigration, a well-designed baggage hall, then a long wait for our 747 to be unloaded (a local contact said this was due to customs insistence on screening every bag).

I had an internal flight to Hyderabad and the new check-in area was very open with a very high ceiling. Note the extensive marble flooring!

I flew to Hyderabad with IndiGo airlines which required a short bus ride to the plane. Judging by the excavation work another similar sized terminal will be on the way.

Hyderabad airport was also new. the old Begumpet airport was handy for the city centre but clearly not up to date. The new Rajiv Gandhi International is about 50 km outside the city and is another airy design with plenty of natural light. A modern highway takes you to the edge of Hyderabad although it has a strange feature - speed bumps - at intervals.

After two days in our Hyderabad office...it is off to Bangalore again this evening but this time with Kingfisher airways.

So this is the departure lounge...

I am not a great football fan but having been brought up in E Hampshire I am delighted that Portsmouth have won the FA Cup! There are several reasons for that:

1. First and foremost I was brought up as a Scot in E Hampshire. My loyalties have been forever shared between these two backgrounds. Portsmouth was always my local club no matter how much I admired Manchester United or (Alex Ferguson's) Aberdeen.
2. As a kid Portsmouth was always in the middle of the second division so I am delighted they are at the top
3. It is a long way from the "Peortsmuff rules OK" graffiti of my childhood.

The last time I was so happy with football was when Alex Ferguson's Aberdeen won the European Cupwinner's Cup. I was not just delighted that a UK side had won such a great trophy  but that Aberdeen had broken Glasgow's "Old Firm".

Well done!

What is it about the United States? I admit to having a love-hate relationship. For most of my career I have worked for US-based employers and have had a demanding, but rewarding work environment. I have been mainly fairly treated and occasionally seen dodgy practices, but would not single out the US for that as I have seen the same in Europe. I have also found many people in the US to be extemely hospitable opening up their homes on light aquantance; something I have not often seen in more 'reserved' countries like the UK or Germany. However the flip side is that I have often been confronted with a superficial, shallow welcome - "I'll invite you round before you leave" - which is not sincere and which would lose considerable face in most European countries.

For the last 20 years I have hypothesised that the US is a bimodal country while most European and Asian countries are unimodal. Just take body mass and fitness. Over this period I have noticed that the US has significantly more "spacehopper" shaped people, yet also more superfit people who spend a massive amount of time, energy and money keeping fit.

OK, I have been digressing... When it comes to politics I have often had a much more critical view of the United States and its projection of economic and military power. The same applies to HMG here too! I have often felt it was important for us in the UK to take a distinctly different stance on some issues while remaining allied on most issues. Iraq was a classic failed opportunity. Iraq was a horrible dictatorship but not a haven for terrorism before the US/UK invasion. Why did we not speak out? I could write resentful essays on this...but I am getting even further from the subject! .

Despite my love of many places and people in the US over the last 35 years, one thing I have never understood is the attitude to energy. In 1973 there was a major energy crisis that affected most of the western world. At that time I recall from my school lessons, the USA was the largest single supplier of oil in the world yet was still dependent on importing oil from the Middle East. This struck me as being very strategically dumb given both the level of energy wastage in the US then with massive "gasguzzling" motor vehicles, virtually no public transport and the high political risks of the Middle East. The obvious solution was to be dramatically more energy efficient and be independent of outside oil suppliers. There was also good research taking place in the US at that time (as good as anywhere else) on saving energy yet little seemed to be applied in practice. But OK.. that was the view of a then naive teenager!

But what was strategically dumb in my teenage years seems to be repeated in my middle age. SUVs are widespread in the US even though they depend on energy from politically dodgy sources. The US out of all large developed countries is the only one that has a fighting chance of being energy self-sufficent but does exactly the opposite of achieving that. What an own goal!! It makes me sad for my really good US friends.

So what about George Dubya? On one hand he is disarmingly honest about some of his past sins like drinking, yet fails to see the moral issues around things he has initiated e.g. Guantanamo Bay. I think that US foreign policy has some rightful concerns about security but has screwed up most of the rest. Since we British have naively followed Dubya we ought to be doubly ashamed as our history should have taught us better. But back to Duwya, he has just asked the Saudis to increase oil production so that the price he pays to import it goes down. Why should a country like Saudi Arabia that is economically dependent on oil redcue its own income to suite George? It is not surprising they did not warm to the idea.

Having just got back from Finland, I often think that it is odd that just 2 hours of time difference can be disturbing. I never seem to have problems going to France or Germany with just one hour time difference. Yet on the flight two fellow passengers - one British and one Finnish discussed the same thing.

I suppose fundamentally getting up two hours earlier than normal is a bit of a stretch. There is either the choice of getting up very early and getting the early connection from Heathrow. Alternatively evening flights get you into your desitnation late in the evening. A risk is that despite it being bedtime you feel wide awake and then face getting up at an early time Finnish time. Basically there is always one or more very short nights of sleep.

Often on the return journey I fall asleep on the evening flight home. I then need to be alert to drive home safetly, then cannot relax to sleep at a sensible time. Yet another short night ensues....

Another issue might be the differences in light. In winter Finland seems a lot darker. In summer Finland seems a lot lighter.Maybe I am just a wus, but I find Finnish trips with one or two nights away a lot more tiring than those to France or Germany.

Yes, I have been Finlagged!

Every country has its strong and weak points. Today I went to a lovely country pub after a walk in a spectacular copse full of bluebells.

Two things though were crazy but are widespread:

a) the use of brim measure for draft beer
b) the use of carpets on the floor

Brim measure guarantees that you spill part of the drink on the floor. Carpets guarantee that the drink gets absorbed and that the customers walk over a sticky floor. Why not have glasses that are big enough to avoid spillage combined with a rough tiled floor that is easy to keep clean without being slippery?

O.

As a BA frequent flyer...but with a company that books only the lowest available fare I have had mixed experiences of our "national" carrier. Whenever my company has been forced to pay for a higher level class I have had excellent service....but on lower (usual) fares the experience has been more dodgy.

With T5 being trumpeted as a great new checkin and transfer experience I was a bit sceptical. BA has been very successful in attracting transfer business. I recall a decade ago when I lived in Munich that I could get a Munich to San Francisco flight for less than Lufthansa. For me an attraction was the chance to meet parents or sisters during the ugly inter-terminal transfer. However T5 has proven to be a nightmare.

I was therefore greatly relieved that my flight to Helsinki yesterday was through T1 and not T5. It was checkin as usual but a 1 km walk to the old domestic lounge ... but that was no big deal.

I am greatly troubled by the T5 stories. I do not give "a monkeys" if Denver airport screwed up their baggage system for months after opening. Heathrow T5 was trumpeted as having a doubly-redundant baggage system and 'terminal designed around the baggage system'. Both claims would give me great confidence that everything would work smoothly from day one (or at least from day two!).

However, it is clear that other airports do better than BAA/BA (I do not care who is responsible, you both profit from my tickets!!). Munich airport in about 1991 moved its entire airport (I'm convinced this was not  a smaller undertaking than BA moving to T5) from Riem to Erdingermoos in one night without major mishap. Beijing (whatever we may think about the government) moved their airport recently to a totally new site without major incident. T5's transition has been a poorly thought-out exercise (even if the terminal is architecturally interesting). My friends working at BA say that many staff warned about problems but they were ignored.

I have had the impression over the last decade that BAA is focused on running (admittedly good) shopping malls rather than air transportation systems!

My wife could only get this Monday off work and getting the Monday overnight sleeper back home would have been too late for her. We therefore looked for a day train service from Inverness to London using the National Rail website. We were amazed to find that we could get singles on the Highland Chieftan direct service to Kings Cross for just £16/person. At first I thought this was a mistake, but booked immediately.

I have never previously been on a day train between lnverness and London. I recall decades ago my grandparents taking a train from Euston to Inverness (the Clansman?) which took at least ten hours. The current service is operated by National Express via Edinburgh.

The train is an InterCity 125 which despite its quarter of a century age was well fitted out inside. There was even a free wireless internet which some people were using. Importantly the windows were clean unlike the journey up on the Caledonian Sleeper!

We left on time at 7:55 and rapidly left Inverness and sped up towards Slochd summit. There was a "big sky" view back to Ben Wyvis from the Moy area.

A few minutes before Aviemore, we got a good view of the Cairngorms. The picture taken leaving Aviemore station shows the Lairig Ghru pass that goes between the highest Cairngorm peaks. I was pleased to see that the train was fairly full a good 70% occupancy.

The countryside in the Spey valley became more and more desolate as we went upstream. After Dalwhinnie where was a view to Loch Ericht and shortly after that we sped over Drumochter Pass. I recall taking the train from Inverness to Glasgow as a student and we certainly seemed to be going a lot slower then. This train also stops far less - only at Aviemore, Kingussie and Pitlochry between Inverness and Perth.

After Drumochter Pass the Sun came out and we got a glorious view towards Loch Garry (above). The hills seemed less desolate as we went south through Blair Atholl.

The train slowed by the pass of Killiecrankie and then stopped at Pitlochry. South of Pitlochry the landscape softened as we headed out of the Highlands to Perth.

Between Perth and Stirling, there were big sky views across to the Southern Highlands such as the view above to Schiehallion.

We crossed the Forth just before stopping at Stirling. After Stirling we sped across the lowlands towards Edinburgh. The last glimpse of the Highlands was just before Linlithgow.

You get a glimpse of Edinburgh Castle as you pass below it on the way into Waverley station. We stopped there for a good 15 minutes and then headed along the coast towards Berwick upon Tweed and the English border. There were good views of the Firth of Forth and the North Sea. After speeding through Berwick we passed along the sand dunes of Northumberland before stopping at Newcastle.

By Newcastle the train was at least 90% full. I was pleased that a steward went 4 times through the train with a large rubbish sack between Edinburgh and London. On so many trains in the past the bins have overflowed on a long journey.

The remaining journey offered views of Durham Cathederal, York Minster and Peterborough Cathederal. However with the train full it was not easy to get up and take photos. There was a large catering staff on the train (at least 4) and a good trolley service.

We arrived in Kings Cross ten minutes early. The entire journey was 7 hours and 50 minutes.

 Comfort, cleanliness, service, views, punctuality and price.

I do not know how typical our experience was but we were very pleased with this service.

Mrs O. and I had a long weekend trip North of Inverness to visit a close relative. We have sometimes driven up (which loses a day or two counting the return and you arrive or return exhausted) and sometimes flown from Gatwick or Luton then rented a car in Inverness. This time though, I thought it would be good to travel by train and to see some of the countryside between S England and the Highlands, then rent a car in Inverness to go further North.

In January we looked at rail prices and found that we could get Bargain Berths from the First Scotrail website at £19 per person for a single. This is less than a fifth of the normal price and obviously easier to get at less busy times.

The sleeper appealed for a few reasons:
- no stress at the airport
- a chance to eat out at Diwani near Euston station
- no stress driving late at night to our final destination.

As somebody who loves Highland scenery the thought of waking up high in the Spey valley was very appealing too; especially as the days are getting lighter now.

Duly fed at Diwani we boarded the train. The sleeper trains must be a good 25 years old - I vaguely recall them being introduced in the early 1980s - but they are in reasonable condition inside. Getting on the train you are immediately struck by the narrowness of the corridor leading to the berths. Our cabin is shown above with bunks, shelves, a sink under the black rucksack and little room to move. Our conductress was really friendly and helpful. She looked neither Scottish nor English and it turned out that she was from Galicia in Northern Spain! She seems to be happily resident in Inverness.

The small cabin space is partly due to the loading gauge of British trains. We built the world's first railway lines and established a track width standard that was adopted by most of countries. However, on the Continent when the first international trains were being introduced they agreed a standard width and height of the coaches (UIC) which is broader and higher than those here. Britain was not interested in adopting the standard as we were an island with no plans for a railway link to the Continent at the time! Now of course, with the Channel Tunnel, our Eurostar trains are narrower than the equivalent TGVs and need a retractable step to bridge the gap to the platforms in France and Belgium.

Some years ago I took couchettes between France and Spain and the higher and wider coaches were an advantage. The couchettes allowed triple bunks with the same amount of sleeping comfort as we had with Scotrail. Furthermore - and this was a real advantage - the train started with the upper bunks folded and we could sit comfortably before going to bed. In contrast with the Caledonian sleeper, you cannot sit on the lower bunk comfortably as the upper bunk is too low. We resorted to one of us sitting on the upper bunk and one on the shelf over the sink!

The sleeper train at Euston must be the longest passenger train in Britain. At 21:15 a single train leaves with a portion for Inverness, another for Fort William and a third for Aberdeen. The train is split in Edinburgh in the early hours of the morning. Each portion of the train has a "lounge car" with independent seats and the possibility of buying food and drinks. Some years ago my son and I had a wonderful time sitting in the lounge car from Fort William southward enjoying the wonderful views to mountains and of red deer on Rannoch Moor as the evening drew on. However two years ago we did the same Inverness trip and were very disappointed with the refreshments. This time we had our own wine in the confines of our cabin!

On this trip we slept very well and were not woken by the jolting of the train as it was split in Edinburgh (that happened last time). We woke just over the Drumochter pass (which at about 450 metres is the highest railway pass in the UK) and saw that there was a dusting of fresh snow.

We could see light in east as we trundled downwards along the Spey Valley.

There were views across bogs, lochs (this one must have been around Kincraig) and to the Cairngorm and Monadliath mountains. Sadly the windows of the sleeper train were filthy on the outside and I took the photos from the doors of the carriage; did Scotrail think nobody would look out of a sleeper window?

After Aviemore we were given a little airline-style breakfast tray and coffee/tea. The train then went uphill again leaving the Spey Valley for another pass - Slochd summit 401 m - which is quite a desolate area with boggy ground and some pine forest.

After Slochd we had the final run into Inverness. At one point the sky seems to open up and there is a great view northwards to the Black Isle and beyond that to the snow of Ben Wyvis. Many years ago I remember a fantastic view inland to peaks in the middle of the highlands (probably the Fannich range) but the visibility was only clear near to the sea.

Near Culloden there is a great view to the Black Isle, the Kessock Bridge and beyond to Ben Wyvis. The above photo does no justice to the view. A few minutes later we arrived on time in the middle of Inverness at 8:30.

We arranged a car rental with Arnold Clark and they picked us up just beside the train and took us to their nearby rental office. The station is also conveniently next to the Eastgate Shopping Centre where we had breakfast.

Overall impressions:

Views from the train, friendly service, sleep, price, overall experience
 Cabin space, ability to sit before and after sleeping, windows
Did not try the lounge car this time.

Sadly I suspect that sleeper usage is dying in Britain. It is potentially very good value for money - even with a normal fare - as you can potentially cover both the travel and save a night in a hotel. However the overall experience could be improved. Stowing the upper bunk in the first hours of the journey would be a major improvement.

On the Continent I know that my colleagues make far more use of sleeper trains than my friends and colleagues here. I think that there is more space and a better experience for business travellers there. Nevertheless I think far more could be done in the UK. For example (as combined travel and saved hotel room) a double bed cabin would be a good idea; a really good evening meal/bar and breakfast service would also be worthwhile.

Anyway I can recommend this way of transport if it fits your constraints.