Three (well, four) tripoints

Small land locked countries offer a lot of fun to run around and 'bag' geographical curiosities. Luxembourg has three tripoints. I visited the tripoint in the southeast, between Luxembourg, France and Germany, in January 2023 but it wasn't terribly exciting as it falls in the middle of the Mossel
https://ruthwandering.blogspot.com/2023/01/schengen.html. 

The other two tripoints are in the southwest (Lux, France, Belgium) and northeast (Lux, Belgium, Germany).  Added to this there is a nearby tripoint at the German, Dutch, Belgium border. It turned out this was the next one I found returning from a day trip to Aachen, Germany.

31 August 2024

The German, Dutch, Belgium border is a tourist attraction. The plus side of this means it's easy to find and beautifully marked, the downside is that it is covered in people. However I did manage to walk from Germany to The Netherlands and to Belgium in under a minute which was much fun.

    

Next up, and a 90 minute drive away, was the German, Belgium, Lux border.  This was far less developed and therefore quiet.  Just how I like my borders.  It also happened to be in the middle of a small river.  In the photo below, I'm standing in Belgium with Luxembourg to the right (you can just about see the top of their concrete block) and Germany is across the stream.  Or, seen from the German side, Luxembourg is across the river on the left and Belgium on the right.

To complete the Luxembourg tripoint trio I went to Rodange, in the southwest of Luxembourg, to find the French, Belgium, Luxembourgish border.  This wasn't straightforward as the tripoint is on a watercourse behind an industrial estate and bordered by flyovers.  What an inconvenient place to put a border ;-)

What I liked about this border is that only Luxembourg had made any ra-ra about it.  And they have even put their pillar on the Belgium side.  So behind me, across the stream, is Luxembourg, to my right, across a leat, is France and I'm in Belgium.

Mappa Mundi Revisited

On a recent visit to Herefordshire I just couldn't resist the opportunity to re-visit the most wonderful thing ever in Hereford Cathedral.

For cartophiles this holds one of the most wondrous maps ever, the Mappa Mundi.  It is the largest known T in O map dating back to the 12th Century: the rivers Don and Nile are the top of the T, and the Mediterranean is the stem, East is 'up' and the O holds the heavens.  This is the third time I've visited it and each time I am awestruck by its size and magnificence.

The chained library is also fascinating to visit and holds books dating back to 800 AD and is the oldest known surviving chained library in the world.  Hereford Cathedral rocks.  

I also did a few walks and managed to find a few perfect distractions, this one on top of Coles Tump (Tump being a local name for a small hill) TP5235.  

Whilst traversing part of the Black and White villages of Herefordshire I managed to espy a drive-by-trig between the villages of Weobly and Eardisland.  It was a short hop over a fence into a muddy field, and a hello to TP5307.  Nothing like a trig or two to make a perfect trip!

Luxembourg and German Survey Markers

On my recent travels I've done my usual and, nose down to pavement, have picked up a few little beauties as I've walked around.

The first seven are from random pavements in Luxembourg.

And a height marker in Luxembourg City.

Just across the border in Trier, Germany, there is more of the same. 

And then when I was down by the Mousel, on the Luxembourg side, I found not only a marker but a whole trig pillar!

 

Uzbek Benchmarks

I visited Uzbekistan in 2019 and espied numerous height markers on some fantastic buildings.  I wasn't really looking for them (honest) but they just jumped out at me at every mosque/madrassah.  I saw markers in walls at Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkand.  The survey marks had Russian text as expected, as the USSR had significant influence in Uzbekistan from the 19th Century until its independence in 1991.

A Russian translator has told me that the script on the markers is a truncated form of the word for ‘level’ followed by the abbreviation GUGK, which in Soviet days stood for the Main Administration for Geodesy and Cartography, which came under the USSR Council of Ministers (ie. Government), and which has now become the Russian Federal Agency for Geodesy and Cartography.  The rest of the numbers are no doubt unique to each bench mark.  

Route 38

In a moment of madness I decided that driving the A38 was a challenge I needed to undertake.  It's a local road to me, living in Devon, but I realised it headed far north, nearly to where my daughter is at university.  Driving it became irresistible.

So after visiting her in Sheffield the other Sunday, my friend and I drove to Mansfield to start the big drive south.  This is the first sign we saw.

It doesn't get much more exciting than that. 

I have since found out that I chose to drive the longest double figure A road in the UK.  It is a glorious 470 km plod from Nottinghamshire through the Midlands, the Severn reaches and down to Bodmin in Cornwall.

Sunday afternoon/evening must be one of the best times to drive this.  It trundles through all the big cities on the way south.  Birmingham was quiet, which was a relief, and familiar territory as my other daughter had lived there for 4 years, some of it on Bristol Road (the old A38 as it turns out).

Bristol was a fiddle and I think we lost it at one stage.  Once through this I was on home turf: Bridgwater, Taunton and Wellington.  And then it completely disappeared at Tiverton!  So it was a run down the M5 to Exeter.

Last weekend I finished if off driving from Exeter down to Bodmin.  I always love driving over the Tamar bridge.

And there's even a route 38 cafe to mark this iconic road.

I think next time I drive back from Sheffield, though, I'll stick to the motorways.

Astronomical Clocks of Southwest England

On a roof tour of Exeter Cathedral over the summer I did my usual and swung by the magnificent astronomical clock on my way out.

Then, in a random conversation with someone, I discovered that Ottery St Mary had one, so off I trogged.

I then discovered that there were four of these 14th-16th Century beauties in the south west and, as I'd already found two, it seemed churlish not to bag the other two.  So a month ago I visited Wells Cathedral.This clock dates between 1386 and 1392.

And then last weekend I finished the set with Wimborne Minster.

What wonderful creations of art and science these are!  Added to that I had the joy experiencing such amazing architecture of these cathedrals/minsters/churches, such as this unique archway in Wells.

And this stunning ceiling in Wimborne Minster.

I listened to a lecture recently about building these cathedrals and I'm in awe at what people achieved without a fraction of the equipment and technology we now have. The reason we still have these ancient buildings is that they are continually maintained.  Being places of worship, they have been cared for over the centuries, unlike castles which sit in ruin.

By the way, if you ever want to see an up-side-down sundial, Wimborne is your place.

And, oh dear me, I've just found a list of 18 wonderful astronomical clocks.  Exeter and Wells are there - but there are maybe 16 others I now need to find?!

Career Lessons Learned: The Tripod of Experience, Qualifications and Networks

I have had a great surveying career and now, as I stand at another crossroads wondering in which direction my career will take me, I have been reflecting.  I have picked up lots of advice during my career but two things have stuck.

A.  Be careful with the impression you leave with others

Be kind and respectful to colleagues, clients and competitors.  One day they may be your competitors, colleagues and clients (note order switch) and we all remember how people have treated us over the years.  Dissing others will come back to bite us.  We have all bad days so be gracious to others when they do.  And hopefully they will to you too.  For sure there are those we hope to never work with again but, by and large, they are thankfully few and far between.

B.  Build a broad and stable career base

By this headline I mean more than just experience.  A colleague once said to me that one's CV is the most important item in your briefcase: you can lose your job and arguably your money, but with a solid CV and reputation you can pick yourself up, brush yourself down, and rebuild yourself.  Wise words indeed.

Your portfolio of experience is just one leg of the tripod to support your career.  Added to this one needs the pillars of professional qualifications and a network you can reach out to.  I worked for 25 years in a large, wonderful and successful organisation.  During that time I gained qualifications and networked extensively.  I was often asked why I bothered with external qualifications since I had a job for life.  Yes, indeed I did if I chose it, but I knew that if we ever parted company I needed a richer career platform.

So now I'm on the road again looking for a change of employment grateful that I have my trusty tripod to support me: my CV containing a wealth of experience, professional qualifications and a network of contacts who may be my future colleagues, competitors or clients.  Let's go and turn another corner.  This amazing career isn't over yet.