Water bottles

Water bottles have become very fashionable. I mean the smaller sort that people carry around in their hand, or stuff into a backpack pocket, especially in warm weather. You see them at any tourist spot. Of course, it's become standard good-health advice to stay hydrated, so there's nothing odd or remarkable about this. Water is free or inexpensive, and a better all-day bet for (say) a day out in London than relying on rip-off restaurants and coffee sellers, or cans of saccharin fizz sold at outrageous prices. 

With a camera to wield, I rarely walk around clutching a water bottle myself, but for donkey's years I've had one in the car, regularly replenished with fresh water from the very source of the Severn or Wye. (Or thereabouts. OK, it might be the Burgess Hill water treatment plant) 

Here, for instance, is the red Sigg water bottle that I've been using until very recently, in the Honda CR-V that I drove before Fiona was ordered from Volvo. The picture was taken in May 2010.

I bought that red Sigg bottle on 14th January 2010 for £14.99, and it has given me faithful service ever since. Here it is in Fiona, in shots taken in January 2012, February 2017 and September 2021:

It was a very satisfactory bottle in most respects. You simply unscrewed the cap and took a swig. A closer look, in pictures taken in September 2021 and March 2023:

That Sigg bottle was very durable. But had three issues, none of them of supreme importance, but niggles all the same. 

First, the finger ring in the cap wasn't a comfortable way to carry it about. Second, it was single-skinned and couldn't keep the water ice-cold for long. It was no kind of thermos flask. Third, unscrewing the cap, taking a swig, and screwing it tight again took many seconds, and it was difficult to do one-handed. So if I was driving along, and felt thirsty, I'd have to wait for some stoppage, at traffic lights perhaps, and hope that I had enough time for a quick drink. Traffic lights often take an age to go green, but too often they'd change to green before I'd screwed the cap back on. 

Anyway, by mid-2023 I was thinking of a replacement bottle. I'd seen all kinds of fancy bottles in other people's hands. It was clearly a thing. 

So I was in Wroes department store in Bude on 25th September, two and a half weeks ago. They had more than one display of water bottles. I had a jolly good look. Hmm! Bottles had become rather sophisticated! There were plenty in fancy colours and designs, to appeal to Young People no doubt. These bottles by Built, for instance:

They seemed well-made, but a trifle expensive, especially the ones with elaborate patterns on them. Well, I didn't need to make a fashion statement. 

However, the other side of that display was thankfully geared to Fuddy-Duddies. More muted colours, but extra features. Ah, I saw exactly what I wanted. These bottles by Judge were just what I needed. 

I bought one in a colour I liked - it cost only £15.00 - and took it back to the caravan for a ceremonial unpacking.

It was taller than the old red Sigg bottle, and double-skinned, so it could keep liquids cold (or hot) for much longer. It had a silicone rubber carrying loop, which could of course be attached to a bag or backpack strap. The large cap unscrewed to allow filling, but was actually a kind of cup, containing a stainless-steel button that clicked open or shut by pressing it. That mean I could - one-handed - unseal the bottle while driving along, raise the bottle to my lips and take a refreshing sip, then pop it back into its recess in the centre console, resealing it once it was seated there by pressing the button. All done by one hand, all done by touch. I didn't have to unscrew or screw up anything, nor take my eyes off the road, and I couldn't drop the cap into the footwell, to roll around under my feet. So much safer.  

Here are some more shots of my new bottle.

And these are the Judge web pages.

The £22.00 they ask for online obviously does include something for delivery, because I paid only £15.00 in Wroes, and it wasn't on special offer or anything. Nevertheless, one for walkers and ramblers to consider, I'd say, although I wanted mine only for the car. I think it looks good there. And it works as intended.

Hmm. The driver's seat has a well-used appearance! That's not surprising after thirteen years and 194,000 miles. I'm definitely going to treat Fiona's interior to a professional valeting in the coming months. That'll restore her. 

No more comments for a while, please

This blog isn't a social media platform for exchanging news and views. It's what I say on the tin: an autobiography, written as I go along. 

Having published a post, I don't look for any comments on it. The sole aim of the post will be to explain or explore what I think about its subject. It won't be calculated to provoke discussion, nor to influence anybody, nor to speak or persuade on behalf of any group. I speak only for myself. 

It's nice of course to generate an interesting and relevant response, either immediately or in due course. I do regularly look through the list of comments made on my recent posts, and I will reply if I feel like it. But I am not looking for a conversation. In particular I will always pounce on any form of commercial advertising, or anything that promotes someone or something. Those 'comments' have always been deleted without further ado. 

It's more than a ten years since I last had to do it, but I have now decided to restrict all comments until further notice. The blog settings have been altered to repel most of them, and those that still make it through to me will have to survive my personal moderation. It will still be possible to email me, but I imagine only a few people will want to do that, as they'll have to give away their own email address. The ban won't matter to my friends and other proper people. If requested, I can make them 'members' of my blog - listed as 'contributors' - and that will get their occasional comments posted as usual.

The blog itself won't change. It'll still be 'Lucy's Travel Adventures' or 'Lucy's Take on This or That', with lots of pictures to illustrate what I'm writing about, and all expressed in the usual way. I enjoy writing - when I have the time! - and there's never any shortage of potential subjects. So things will carry on as before. 

Am I restricting free speech? To be honest, I think much so-called 'free speech' is not worth hearing. There's no point in sounding off at me (or anyone else) unless the message is honest and meaningful. Empty comments - essentially time-wasting junk - just baffle and annoy, and are a nuisance to me and whoever likes to read this blog. 

There's certainly no point in sending inane comments like these, which have started to appear in response to some of my posts. Dozens of them at the same time, a veritable bombardment. Here's a small selection of the latest.

I first noticed the current crop of silly comments a few days ago, all showing up on an old post (about my teeth, of all things, though perhaps the subject doesn't matter) which I had written back in January 2015 (so in fact very few people would see these comments, making them even more pointless). They mostly seemed to come from the Philippines. 

And now, these latest ones on a post about my 70th birthday. 

On the surface it looks to me like a stupid college-student prank. Well, I'm not indulgent where children are concerned. 

I suppose you could say these 'comments' are harmless, not being threatening or obscene - only irrelevant to the post, and irritating to delete. In fact I'm already weary of deleting them. But I suspect there's a darker purpose behind them, and that it's not simply an obscure game. Maybe there's a sinister intention to plant links to my blog via rarely-read posts, with a scam or some other mischief in mind. Well, I don't want to be the unwitting accomplice of whatever lies behind this, so it seems sensible to insulate myself from these communications altogether.  

At some stage, I will quietly allow comments again, but for the present the blog will have to be much like an online newspaper article that nobody can respond to, unless they send a formal email to the editor. Such as:

Madam, I read with disgust your blog post on why you never use hair spray, which totally misses the point and can only inflame the passionate and poisonous national debate on this contentious issue. You deserve severe censure for fanning the flames in this dangerous manner. You are are disgrace. Naturally I concede your right to a point of view, such as it is; but really, what possible qualifications do you have for what you say? None, I assert. So shut up.

Farewell to Wilko

Wilko has gone. Its last day of trading anywhere in the country was yesterday. I made a point of driving to Horsham, where one of the remaining shops still open could be visited. Not to buy anything, of course, although it did cross my mind to purchase a souvenir article, if there was something left that I wanted. No, my purpose was to take pictures as a salute to the passing of yet another High Street stalwart that had seemed to be a permanent fixture.

After the first news broke back in early August that Wilko was in dire trouble, I'd rushed over to Burgess Hill for a couple of shots:

But the store seemed to be trading normally. It had a great central position in the middle of Burgess Hill shopping centre, with W H Smith, Boots and Waitrose very close by, and Greggs and Costa adjacent. The impression was that each of these stores drew in a variety of local people who would find it very convenient indeed to pop into Wilko. At one time the shopping centre included Iceland and Lidl, but they had both relocated to new premises - not that they had ever been direct competition. Nor was there a Poundland or B&M or Range lurking around the corner, ready to take custom away. 

So back in August you would have discounted the news that Wilko's business had become unviable. Maybe, as some town-centre stores had already done - Marks & Spencer and John Lewis being prominent big-name examples - Wilko would rescue itself by closing its more marginally-profitable shops, leaving the best (Burgess Hill being an example) open and serving the locality as they had done for a generation past.

But it was not to be. I was in Cornwall in mid-September, and found the Wilko in Truro, Cornwall's busiest and best shopping town, on the verge of shutting with only two trading days left. It started to hit me that Wilko really was going to vanish.

There wasn't much left on the shelves now. But I was struck how welcoming the store still seemed. It was clean and tidy and brightly lit, not sombre and half-derelict. Quite a contrast from - say - the closing of Debenhams in Taunton back in April 2021, when empty shelves and display furniture were untidily crammed together and roped off, and the restaurant, where I had once had a pleasant lunch, looking forlorn. It was depressing.

The only part of Debenhams still partying was the space where naked dummies had been stashed. They were having one final tipsy blast before finding new careers.

Back to Wilko's better-managed and more cheerful swansong. The store had been a presence in most towns of any size, catering for those looking for nice household goods at very reasonable prices. So there was certainly one in Canterbury in Kent, where I had an opportunity of taking end-of-an-era pictures only last week. This visit was a touch more poignant, as there was a board on which customers had been able to write farewell messages and remarks. Wilko had been a grassroots local institution, with a definite ethos. I for one felt that its demise would hit many people much harder than losing (say) an M&S. 

Canterbury was very much a student city. I could well imagine that the local Wilko was a welcome if not essential one-stop source of inexpensive domestic essentials for the university population. But also for anyone struggling on a low income.

And so to Horsham yesterday, and the final death-throe of a once-mighty nationwide chain of stores. I remember when the Horsham Wilko was opened. Like many, it was on two levels, but it was built around a feature lift, as well as having escalators and stairs. If it had a problem, it was that it was situated at one end of the sprawling Swan Walk shopping centre, and not at its hub. But a popular store, nevertheless.

Gosh, Pick & Mix. Horribly reminiscent of long-gone Woolworths! And now it was Wilko's turn.

Once again, everything left well-lit and clean, as if prepared for restocking. It was one of the reasons why a cheerful air prevailed, instead of despair and gloom. (Although no doubt the staff were apprehensive for their future, and inwardly sad and perplexed that Wilko had stumbled and fallen)

Wilko had proper modern self-service checkouts, as well as traditional ones. It was hard to see exactly why failure had come, considering that the stores were airy and attractive places, with goods you'd want to buy. I felt it was such a shame.

I thought of many past visits to Wilko stores for one reason or another, in towns as dissimilar as Port Talbot and Colchester. M--- had liked Wilko (or Wilkinson, as it was then) and I wondered how she felt about all this. I was thoughtful as I took my pictures. Nobody stopped me, by the way. Perhaps they felt it was fitting that someone made a record of what a Wilko store had looked like, even one with near-empty shelves. 

Leaving through the upper-level entrance, there were people with their phones out, taking souvenir selfies in a celebratory way. So I didn't look odd, getting my own shots, smiling as I did so - although generally speaking it does look strange when anyone includes a shop in their picture. (Perhaps people think commercial premises are 'un-photographic' and anyone taking pictures must have a dark motive)

I need to confess that I never bought much from Wilko. My purchases over the years were confined to kitchen items, plastic storage boxes, extension cables and odd things like ant-killer. I suppose I went into the Burgess Hill Wilko once every two months for something. Certainly not daily, or even weekly. If there had been a lot of people like me, then Wilko would never have generated much turnover! I wasn't the typical customer. 

Wilko had been around long enough to become part of the ordinary scene, and perhaps for that reason taken for granted. Rather like Woolworths had been. It was always a bright and pleasant place to shop, and there was never any sense that it was cheap and downmarket, as many cut-price shops can be. It offered value for money, not shoddiness. The choice was adequate, the quality was fine, and the prices were always very competitive. Wilko had a clear identity, was handy, and it stocked a wide range of things. But it wasn't a loud and aggressive retailer. And on today's High Street, extra effort is needed. You have to keep reinventing, or at least re-branding, yourself, regularly refreshing your public face. Newer and brasher retailers focussed solely on low prices, rather than serving a community, had no problem taking trade away. 

None of this explains why nowadays I seem so interested in photographing the last days of this or that well-known shop. I didn't do it much before 2000, even though a long list of shops had bit the dust by then. By 2010, with online shopping taking off, even more had died, and yet I hadn't started shooting the passing of well-known stores as I do now. 

In 2023 the average large town centre can boast only a Marks & Spencer as its anchor store - if lucky. Most chains of department stores have shut. Worthing, for instance, once had a Debenhams and a Beales: both gone. Bournemouth now has no department store - I don't rate the revived Bobby's (the original Bobby's became Debenhams, which died roughly when Beales did) as a proper department store. Soon only John Lewis will be left, but only in locations here and there. 

Smaller towns are often more fortunate than cities, supporting a well-loved locally-owned department store such as Goulds in Dorchester, Fields in Sidmouth, Banbury's in Barnstaple, and Wroes in Bude. (Is this solely a West Country thing?) But the impact of business rates and other costs could do for them too. I would be very sad at that. Wroes and Fields especially.

I think I can look back to different High Streets, full of shops like the British Home Stores, C&A, Littlewoods, Dolcis, Country Casuals and Timothy Whites. The shake-out has been long and relentless, and is not over yet. I am not stuck in the past, but having experienced the past I can take a longer view than many. Are town centres going to die? Yes. It's no good supposing that a host of coffee shops, pizza outlets, gyms and hairdressers will draw people in like a wide range of decent retail shops used to do. In particular, difficult and outrageously expensive parking will kill off trade - I'm looking at you, Brighton.