Yellow and blue

This is a bridge across an old dry dock or shipyard entrance on the banks of the River Hull. The dry dock is now thoroughly silted up as you can see below.

Snowdrop 2

The Blejan Eyhre under repair at Bridlington in May last year. The name translates from the Cornish as Snowdrop. Unfortunately in August the ship caught fire and sank 17 miles east of Flamborough Head; both crew members were saved.

It's that time of year

Photo by Margot K. Juby

In the paper today it mentioned that it is now snowdrop season, this is news for people who obviously don't get out much. So, for that same bunch of people, here are some snowdrops. There are obsessives (galanthophiles) who collect these small flowers, personally I'm not that impressed.
For those of you still under snow and frost your snowdrop time will no doubt come.

Clarence Flour Mills

If you close your eyes and hold your breath then this 1950s flour mill will turn into a 21st century hotel and super-dooper development, with permission for a casino (let joy be unconfined). This monumental building is next door to the Drypool bridge that I bored you with the other day. OK you can breathe now ...

Spes Super Sydera

Hope above the stars, in case you were wondering; the motto of Trinity House School. So what is this rather ornate crest doing on a decrepit old building that is slowly sinking into the river? A bit of research reveals that this is the old buoy shed used by Trinity House who are responsible for navigation and lighthouses around the coast of the UK. It's a grade 2 listed (listing?) building put up in 1901 now used appropriately, given its precarious position, by a diving company. The swan-necked crane was presumably used for lifting old buoys out of the river.

Drypool Bridge, Hull

The Drypool bridge was built in 1961 and replaced a much smaller bridge. It is designed to lift to allow river traffic to pass under; fortunately for road traffic this happens infrequently these days. You can appreciate that when the river bridges are under repair Hull's cross town traffic grinds to a halt.

For those with an engineering interest this is a bascule bridge; you can see an animation of how it works here.

Arctic Corsair

Moored behind the Museums Quarter is the Arctic Corsair, a trawler from Hull's fishing fleet of the 60s and 70s. It's now a museum piece and you can clamber on board and have good look round though on the day I was here it was locked up.
You read more about this ship here and also here.