Monthly Archives: December 2017

Christmas Eve – Better Than The Main Event!

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I always raise a wry smile when I hear people ask, “Are you ready for Christmas?”

It’s as if that one day demands gargantuan effort and logistical planning for it to happen or be a success!

Now I know to an awful lot of folk in the “Christian” Western World that Christmas is indeed a massive thing, both in its preparation and execution; it’s not for me to say that they are wrong, but some years ago I had reason to re-think my own approach to the holiday, let me tell you about it.

In those days I was still working in the railway industry, I was a senior manager in the responsible for the delivery the safe operation of passenger train services. I had a fantastic team of local operations managers and train-crew who were dedicated to the job that they did, we had a great time working together. Our area of responsibility covered the Southern half of the U.K., it was demanding work but very satisfying.

In the lead up to any holiday period we always saw increased usage of our services as people travelled to enjoy their days off with family and friends. The Christmas period on the railways was and still is, a bit different, as it is the only time of the year that trains actually stopped running for the two-day holiday; so there is just a bit more pressure to get people home before the shut-down!

As the Christmas holiday was approaching we were struggling; a virus was going around that was severely stretching our train-crew resources and sadly a couple of services had been cancelled due to staff sickness. Our resources centre was doing a great job covering the timetable and the remaining staff were really helping out by being as flexible as possible, but we were up against it!

By the morning of Christmas Eve we had shuffled the deck enough to cover every train…except the last one.

Now I had a mantra, that basically said Never, cancel the last train.

I talked through the situation with the Duty Managers in the Control and Resources Centre. We were short of a Train Manager (known as a Guard/Conductor, in other places) for the last 200 miles of the last train, as a result the Control staff had already began to look at the possibility of using replacement road coaches.

I wasn’t at all happy about 300 of our passengers being put on a fleet of buses, especially so late on Christmas Eve!

No, it wasn’t a train like this either, but hey it’s sort of Christmassy!


As a career railwayman, over the years I had been trained in and done just about all of the jobs in the operations department, what’s more I had ensured that I maintained my Safety Critical Competency Certifications too. All our frontline staff and union representatives knew that “The Old Man” was quite capable of doing any of their jobs, especially in an emergency and this was an emergency!

It didn’t take me more than a couple of seconds to decide that if the last service needed a Train Manager that I would cover the shift.

I’ve got to say that Mrs Dookes wasn’t over happy when I told her what I was going to do, but she understood; she knew I was a railwayman and running railways was what I did.

As for the train. Well, from what I can remember it all went well and ran on time with no dramas, but it did have a nice “Travelling Home for Christmas” vibe.

We delivered the passengers to their destinations on time, then put the train away at the end of the run.

A taxi was waiting to take me home, which was about 100 miles away, I walked into our decorated house at one o’clock on Christmas morning…it was still Christmas Eve to me!

Waiting on the table was a candle-lit light meal of delicious goodies that Mrs Dookes had prepared and a chilled bottle of champagne to go with it too!

That’s how we have celebrated Christmas Eve ever since and in a way it’s become our most important tradition of the festive period, better than the main event in many ways!

I was incredibly lucky in my railway career; I worked in some amazing places alongside incredible people doing special things to keep the wheels rolling. Sometimes things were grim, but I have lovely memories of the camaraderie that we shared doing a job that most of us loved.

Tonight, when Mrs Dookes and I sit down to our supper I’ll raise a glass of something bubbly, toast railway people the world over. Then I’ll quietly think of that Christmas Eve so long ago and thank goodness that I’m married to a wonderful lady who understands what makes me tick and who created such a lovely tradition out of my stubbornness not to cancel a train!

Have a peaceful Christmas everyone!

Dookes

Solstice Bells

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“Now is the Solstice of the year.
Winter is the glad song that you hear.”

It doesn’t take much to make me happy, which might seem a bit strange for a chap who owns two big Harley Davidson motorbikes, but it’s true. Today, for example, is one of those things that no-one can own, hold or claim; it’s the Winter Solstice and I’m a very happy Dookes as a result!

It’s probably fair to say that this has become my favourite day of the whole year!

In our Northern Hemisphere it is the shortest day, when the Sun barely shows itself above the horizon and then for the briefest possible time! Sunset today was just before 16:00hrs!

Stennes Sones Orkney


The Solstice marks the turn of the seasons when the days begin to grow longer and the warmth of Summer begins its long return journey.

It’s also the real beginning of Winter.

I written before how the relevance of this turning point has become stronger for me as I have grown older; I understand the ancient people who venerated the turning seasons and the Celestial Calendar.

It appears that since the dawn of time our forbears have found reason to celebrate a festival of light in the depths of the darkest day of the year. So why not have a party to celebrate the ending of one celestial year and the beginning of a new one?

Sounds good to me, but then I am a Welsh Wizard/Dewin Cymreig!

Let’s not forget that many other cultures and religions around the world also celebrate festivals at this time of the year and have the rebirth of light firmly as their focus.
The Christian Church has celebrated the birthday of Jesus Christ, Christmas, on December 25th since the 4th Century when Pope Julius I chose the date in an effort to replace the Roman Feast of Saturnalia. In several languages, not just English, people have compared the rebirth of the sun to the birth of the son of God.

It’s also interesting to reflect that the origins of many “traditional” Western Christmas decorations such as the Yule Log, Tree and Wreath can trace back to pre-Christian times.

Familiar decorations of green, red and white cast back to the Wiccan traditions and the Druids. The old Pagan Mid-Winter Festival of Yule also included feasting and gift giving, doesn’t it all sound very familiar?!?!

When I was younger we always did the usual Christmas decoration stuff, including a highly non-authentic artificial tree! My late father did little to dress the tree, but had his own take on the whole decoration thing that he insisted on doing himself; every year he would garland the house with boughs of green holly and evergreen, it was only then that I truly used to feel that things were being done properly. I suspect that my Celtic blood has a lot to do with this and I still carry on that tradition today in Dookes H.Q., I adore the house smelling of pine and other evergreens! image

Many Pagan religions had a tradition where it was customary to place holly leaves and branches in and around dwellings during winter. It was believed that the good spirits who inhabited forests could come into their homes and use the holly as shelter against the cold; whilst at the same time malevolent forces and spells would be repelled.

Mrs Dookes enters into the spirit of the season with her splendid handmade evergreen wreaths. This reflects another Celtic tradition, the wreath’s circle has no beginning or end and the evergreen represents life in the depths of winter.

Whether you are celebrating Christmas, Hanukkah, Yule, The Solstice, Dongzhi, Yalda, Saturnalia, Malkh, any other festival that I may have missed, or just looking forward to having a restful holiday, have a truly wonderful time and maybe spare a thought, or penny, for those less fortunate.

Thanks for joining me for the ride this year, it’s been a ball and I hope you will saddle up with Harls, Baby and I in ’18 for more two-wheeled adventure and opinion!

“Praise be to the distant sister sun,
joyful as the silver planets run.
Ring out, ring solstice bells.”

Catch you soon.

Dookes

With grateful thanks to Ian Anderson and Jethro Tull for sharing the Solstice over many decades!

Liebster Award

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Way on back in the earlier days of their blog my dear bogging friend Lili, of fantastic cakes and rock climbing fame nominated me for the “Liebster Award.” I was pretty chuffed at the time (Chuffed = British slang for pleased) and duly did what was required of me and posted a response as required by the award; you can link to that here.

Fast-forward to the present and out of the blue that USA based Scottish Photographer, Blogger and International Chocolate Connoisseur, Alba has challenged me with another “Liebster.” This is of course both very cool and a bit humbling; after all it is an acknowledgment by another blogger that you must be doing something right, therefore thank you Alba!

As part of the deal with the award I have to answer a series of questions set by Alba; so here goes, this should be fun!

1. Why do you blog?
I started blogging as a way of recording some of the motorcycle tours that I do. I used to tour around and send friends emails to let them know where I was and what I was up to. It just sort of seemed the logical thing to progress to, I hate “Face-Twit” and blogging enables me to capture thoughts and moments that I can look back on and relive the moment. It has also enabled me to develop some posts into magazine articles, which is pretty cool!
The blog has developed into something more than just being about touring on motorbikes and I’m pretty pleased with that. In the not to distant future I’m looking at overhauling the site, changing a few things around and maybe going “Premium.” So I may need the considerable skills of Alba in the field of Website development!

2. If you could visit anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?
I’d like to be able to visit anywhere in the world that I wanted to and have the freedom and peace to be able to do that without the restrictions of Politics, Fanatics, Race-hate, Dictators and Wars…
…as John Lennon said “You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.”

Broadly though, I’ve pretty much gone everywhere that I really want at the present, my only current “Itch” is to go to Nordkapp/Northcape in Norway, it’s the most Northerly point in Europe. I would naturally have to go on a motorbike.
Why?
Well, because it’s there of course!

3. Star Wars or Star Trek?
Star Trek. No doubt at all.

4. Favourite Movie?
Diamonds are Forever.
Pure escapism James Bond before it all got too commercial.

5. Favourite Book.
Tricky this one.
I’ve a number of railway and engineering technical tomes that I really enjoy dipping into from time to time, but would be far too boring (and specialist) to recount here.
Fiction-wise I like Ian Fleming’s “Goldfinger” and I had a lot of fun retracing some of the route described in the book on one of my trips a few years back.

In the footsteps of James Bond.

If you click here you can read about it, there’s more than one post though!

6. Favourite Song
Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen.
“Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau,” the Welsh National Anthem – I have tears running down my face every time I sing it at a rugby international!

Do you like to Cook and what is your best dish?
Yes, I adore cooking. Best dish, well I make a pretty ace Game Pie!

My Game Pie.

8. What makes you laugh?
I’m very British when it come to my sense of humour, so I love irony and satire. I like laughing at myself too!

9. Most embarrassing moment?
With skin a thick as mine, embarrassment doesn’t come into it!

10. Singing or dancing?
With my Welsh Blood, naturally it’s singing!

11. T.Rex or Dragons?
Hmm really tricky.
I loved T.Rex in those far off Glam-Rock Days of the 1970’s; Marc Bolan was just fantastic and amazingly it was 40 years ago this year that he died in a car crash.
Dragons live in my beloved, magical, Welsh mountains…if you know where to look! The Red Dragon/Y Ddraig Goch is found on the flag of Wales.

The Welsh Dragon at Mametz Wood, The Somme.

I’ve got one on each of my bikes too, Dragons that is.
I’m going to have to say Dragons…!
Did you know that T.Rex made an album called “Futuristic Dragon”?

There you are then, I hope that answers your questions Alba.

Now at this point I’m supposed to come up with my own string of questions and pass it on in a chain letter sort of way, but ‘cos I like breaking the rules I’m just going to suggest a few sites that I follow and are well worth dropping in on!

Two Wheeled Life

Midihideaways

Old England to New England

Finding Myself Through Writing

Louise’s World Travels

Aging Gracefully My Ass

My Ride Blog

Motorcycle Rambler

My Own Private Idaho

2 Wheel Travellers

If anyone feels like having a go themselves and linking me in on their answers here’s a few questions from me:

1. How do you decide on a subject for a blog post?

2. What has been your own favourite blog post.

3. Vinyl or digital?

4. Have you ever been surfing? (No not the internet – real surf, as in the Ocean!)

5. Where are you planning to go on your next adventure?

6. If you could go back in time to witness something in history what would it be?

7. Have you ever seen a ghost or UFO (or both)?

8. Rolling Stones or Beatles?

9. Most precious item that you possess that has no monetary value?

10. Who do you most admire and why?

11. I have a spare pillion seat on the back of my Harley, where shall we go?

Catch you soon.

Dookes

A Golden Anniversary – Or 50 Years of Roller-Coaster Emotions!

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Sport is a funny thing and one way or another is pretty much guaranteed to polarise people.

With Sport you generally find that there are two kinds of folk; those that are largely indifferent and those that are passionate about it.

So cards on the table, I’m definitely one of the latter!

Which is a bit strange really, as pretty much no-one else in my immediate family is at all sports orientated…that is except my late Uncle Pete. He was like me, sports mad!

In his younger days Pete played football, lots of football (that’s soccer in some parts of the world!) and he was by all accounts pretty good at it. Good enough to be in the squad of a professional football club; until sadly a knee injury cut short his playing career. Ironically if he had the same injury today he would be fixed up and playing in a matter of weeks, such are the advances that sports medicine as made.

Uncle Pete was also my Godfather and he took things seriously enough to not only take me to buy my first pair of football boots, but also to my first football match – a very lowly non-league affair. The seed had been sown though and I began to hanker after going to a “proper” football match, a league game!

That’s how, exactly Fifty Years ago, my late Father took me and a few of my young friends to my very first “proper” game.

Watford F.C. v Grimsby Town

Football and indeed football grounds were very different in those days, particularly in the third tier of the English Leagues. The home of Watford Football Club since 1922 was and still is, Vicarage Road Stadium. To be honest, calling the place a “Stadium” in 1967 was tantamount to breaking the laws of Trade Description; glamorous it was definitely not!

In this aerial photograph from the time you can see that the ground was shoe-horned in between residential suburban housing and to the extreme left Shrodells Hospital. I remember queuing to go through the rickety old turnstiles on Vicarage Road itself, that’s the road cutting across the top of the photo. We stepped onto the banked concrete terrace behind the goal at the Vicarage Road end and I fell in love with the place!

At the far end was the “Rookery Stand,” that’s the light grey shed-like structure at the bottom of the picture, actually it was simply more terracing with a roof over it! To our right was the Shrodells Stand, which had some seating and on the opposite side of the pitch stood the grandly named “Main Stand” that also was about 50% seating. From that dear reader, you may be able to deduce that the majority of Vicarage Road Stadium was for you to watch football standing up and largely without any protection from the weather. Happy days!

For some reason we made our way to the area in the bottom corner of the photo, between the Shrodells and Rookery Stands. This was football at it’s most basic, the area was simply a compacted bank of ash, but it was magical.

In those days the pitch was only loosely described as grass; it appeared to be around 60% mud, 30% sand and possibly 10% grass/weeds, but to my young eyes it was the original field of dreams. As the sun dipped in the early winter sky and the simple floodlights came on, it got even more magical.

The game itself was a thrilling affair to a first time supporter, as I was suddenly becoming. Little did I know that the peculiar thing about supporting a team is that it gets into your very DNA. You share the euphoria of great victories and promotion with the despair and depression of defeats and relegation. All this was still in the future though…

Watford went on to win 7-1! Could it ever get any better than that?

Well, yes it could, but it would take nearly 15 years when eventually my beloved “Hornets” as Watford are known, eventually won promotion to the top-tier of English football, the old “First Division.” The next season, 1982-83, they finished runners-up; still their best ever finish.

I still have the programme from that match and it’s interesting to look at the team line ups for that day 50 years ago. Playing at full-back for Grimsby and wearing number 3 is one Graham Taylor, at that time a young 22-year-old. The same Graham Taylor who later would become manager of Watford, guide them to successive promotions and the glory days of the early 1980’s and subsequently manage the England national team. Sadly Graham passed away suddenly earlier this year.

Over the years though it’s been quite a roller-coaster of emotions. Yes there have been incredible highs, but oh my, those low points have also been very dark places too!

Today Watford F.C. play in the Premier League, the highest level in the English football league system and the team squad is drawn from a wonderful mix of nationalities. The club was founded in 1881.

These days living 300miles away I don’t get the opportunity to visit Vicarage Road very often, but I diligently follow what my beloved “Hornets” are up to every time that they play.

Yesterday then was the 50th anniversary of my very first Watford F.C. experience.
The Hornets hosted Tottenham Hotspur and the match ended in a 1-1 draw.

Vicarage Road Stadium today is truly worthy of the name; it’s a wonderful amphitheatre with an all seating capacity of 23,700 and great facilities, quite a change from the days of standing on a mound of ash!

Vicarage Road Stadium today; from roughly where I first stood 50 years ago! Photo by Jbb503

Why back in 1967 did we go to watch Watford F.C.?

Well I told you my late Uncle once played for a professional football club…

Guess which one????

Yep, Watford!

As for me; well I never really was much good playing football, except as a Goalkeeper and you don’t need many of them in a team.
With my Welsh blood, it was always going to be rugby that I embraced and excelled in. I played for a number of clubs, at a reasonably good level, before finally hanging up my boots in my mid-thirties after 24 years of playing the game!

Catch you soon.

Dookes