MISS ELAINEOUS VISITS STRATFORD-UPON-AVON BUTTERFLY FARM...

Stratford-upon-Avon is a historic market town in Warwickshire, and is best known for being the birthplace, sometime living place and burial place of British playwright and poet, William Shakespeare (1564-1616).  Situated on the River Avon, it was originally a village before being developed into a town in 1196, when it was granted a charter, by King Richard I, to hold a weekly market.  It retains much of its "olde worlde" charm due to its creaky yet well-preserved timber-framed Tudor buildings and quaint cobblestones.

 

Tourism is the major source of the town's income, with between 2.5 and 3 million visitors annually.  But although he's often regraded as the greatest literary being of all time, and the national poet, not all of the town's tourist attractions are about The Bard!  I popped into their Butterfly Farm, and it really was a delightful experience- don't go home without experiencing it! 

 

Shakespeare and his characters are referenced the town over, and here he is surrounded by four of his characters: Falstaff, Prince Hal, Lady Macbeth and Hamlet. 

It is called the Gower Monument, and was erected in 1888.

Crossing the River Avon looking downstream, using the pedestrian-only Tramway Bridge (so-called because it was built in 1823 to carry a tramway).

Clopton Bridge is located further upstream...

The Butterfly Farm is to the left once you're over the bridge, and was opened in 1985 by naturalist and botanist David Bellamy. 

Outdoor wildlife-friendly pond, complete with Bug B&Bs!

The Butterfly farm is open from 10-6 during summer, and from 10-dusk in wintertime.  It is closes only on Christmas Day.

This butterfly feeding table contained a variety of fruits...

My favourite butterfly is the Blue Morpho.  Peer hard and you can see one perched on a tree...

He (or she!) was decent enough to come and pose for a photo!😊

Maya (an ancient Mesoamerican civilisation that lived within the rainforest) artefacts and statues decorate the Butterfly Farm.

This whole section is called the Discovery Zone...

As the name suggests, it's an informative area...

This is the Emerging Case, and if you're lucky, you might even see a butterfly hatching from its pupa!

Some of the butterflies are bred in house, and some are imported.

Around 2,000 butterflies fly freely around the farm.

The other butterfly houses I've been in are situated at the Horniman Museum, and London Zoo.

I found the statues quite intriguing, and they certainly added to the exotic atmosphere...  

They also house two green iguanas:  Benny and Prudence.

This is Benny- we never saw Prudence.  

This guy's a Rusty-tipped Page, and the butterflies sometimes allow you to get really close.

Looking back through the arch as we headed into the Rainforest Flight Area...

The colourful tropical plants and flowers contain sugary nectar, which is a perfect food source for butterflies.

A warning to the curious!

The Rainforest Flight Area is the largest butterfly display area in the United Kingdom.

The central pool, and this was the most fantastic section of this tourist attraction...

Swimming with the fishes, and you can see koi carp havin' fun in the water...

They were certainly friendly, and seemed to swim over to see me!

To one side of the pool was a cascading waterfall...

It was quite heavenly walking through this zone, and certainly cheered me up (not that I was miserable!)

Another Blue Morpho, and about a third of the butterflies here are supplied by their own farm in Belize.

Dancing Blue Morphos.

The temperature was certainly hot and steamy in here, and thankfully we were able to hang our coats in their cloakroom before entering.

You are invited to learn about why the Maya built such interesting statues...

Through to the Minibeat Metroplolis, and here are stick insects in a glass cage...

Poison dart frogs.  

There are also cabinets containing beetles, spiders and lizards, but they didn't want to come out to play and pose...

In the Rainforest Realm, this is a spectacled caiman, and he's from the same species family as alligators.

That's funny- he didn't appear to be wearing glasses!!!

😆😆😆

Back inside the Rainforest Flight Area, and these are leafcutter ants.  They are fungus growing ants, and they can carry up to 50 times their body weight!

This really is a happy place, and was a delight to visit!

It's goodbye for now, from me and this Peleides Blue Morpho...

It seemed much colder once we'd left the tropical confines of the Butterfly Farm!

Here I'm gazing downstream, having crossed back over the River Avon.

Looking upstream at the Tramway Bridge...

Down on the green by the river, and this is the Young Will sculpture, by Lawrence Holofcener.  It was unveiled in 2016, to mark the 400th anniversary of  the playwright's death. 

Stratford-upon-Avon Butterfly Farm, you were fantastic and I will return!

💓

Until then,

TTFN

The Miss Elaineous

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THE PHOENIX GARDEN YOUTUBE VLOG NOW LIVE!

  My Phoenix Garden YouTube vlog is now live!

Link:-

https://youtu.be/kumbHBOnHhw

The Phoenix Garden sits in an area of central London known as St Giles and, when you're in here it's hard to believe that you're just seconds away from the busy heart of London.  This community garden was established in 1984, and is funded through donations and grants.  There were once seven community gardens in the West End of London, but now there's only this one.  

The charity is run from their multi-purpose building, which was completed in 2016.  It also hosts community and education workshops, and can be hired for corporate events.  The garden sits on land that had been in use as a car park, which itself stood on the site of a World War II bombing.  The site was once the place of many homes and even a pub, but had been used as a fly tip and needed to be cleared.  Rubble was passed through a mini-crusher by volunteers, and this was used to create paths and raised flower beds.  

Come and take a walk in my shoes and I'll show you several nooks, a swing, a beautiful mural and some repurposed odds-and-sods, including a mannequin and a (fake!) horse's head.  I'll also show you a pretty little pond, which apparently houses the West End's only frog population.

I have also blogged about this garden, and here's the link:-

https://elainerockett.blogspot.com/2026/02/miss-elaineous-visits-phoenix-garden.html

Remember to like and subscribe, and don't forget to follow this blog as well!

TTFN

The Miss Elaineous

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A MAN OF HONOUR by BARBARA TAYLOR BRADFORD

 A MAN OF HONOUR

by

BARBARA TAYLOR BRADFORD

THE BLURB:

Orphaned and alone, 13-year-old Shane O'Neill, known to the world as Blackie, must leave County Kerry to find work.

His only chance of survival lies with his late mother's brother, far away in Leeds. There, amid the noise and bustle, Blackie's spark of ambition becomes a flame.

And then, high on the Yorkshire moors, in the mists of a winter morning, he meets a kitchen maid called Emma Harte. And as the Victorian age gives way to the freedom of the Edwardian age, so a young man and a servant girl seize a chance, against the odds, to build a better life...

THE REALITY:

This is the prequel to A Woman of Substance, which remains my most favourite book ever. I saw the first mini-series back in 1985, and it really moved me; I've since re-watched it several times, and read the book three times in total. Coincidentally, I also read A Man of Honour just as the new TV A Woman of Substance series was broadcast. This new series is extremely lacking and they've altered the storyline (for the worse!) and succumbed to ridiculous box-ticking. It's a parody of the original and, although some of the filming/ scenery is breathtaking, I think it's best avoided.

Back to this book, and I sped through it, really enjoying reading about what shaped Blackie (who ended up being Emma Harte's best friend- for those of you not in the know, she's our A Woman of Substance heroine). I did feel, however, that the storyline was rushed, and not properly expanded upon. For example we have Gwen, who disappears. But do we ever find out what happened to her? No, and it seems very odd to leave her story unfinished. Also, the courtship between Robert and Vanessa could have been explored in more depth, as could how his divorce from the rotten Lucinda panned out; and indeed her character in general. Angela's death seemed an all-too-convenient way of getting rid of her, and Blackie's feelings towards dealing with the loss of his first love (lust?!) were, unrealistically, not fully documented. Adrian's relationship with Moira was not looked into properly, and neither was her parentage or the reasons behind her mother's affair. This book was one long line of missed literary opportunities.

I did like many of the characters, however, and loved that Vanessa, Angela and Marguerite were sexually forward. I do love a hussy, and I'm glad that it's not assumed that all women form the early 1900s were morally upstanding when it came to following their hearts and bodies!

Finally, we get to the end chapters, where the Emma Harte, as we know her, is introduced. I know Barbara Taylor Bradford was in her late 80s when she wrote this book, but was she senile? Or was she drunk? There are serious discrepancies here! In AWOS Gerald Fairley was the elder son, and Edwin Fairley the second son- so why have these family placings now been reversed, with Edwin now documented as being the eldest? And why is Adele Fairley, who is mentioned as having silvery blonde hair in AWOS (a trait inherited by her ancestors; Edwina and Tessa) now a dark-haired woman? I think a ghostwriter may have written this book and, if that's the case, then they really should have read AWOS, and Barbara Taylor Bradford's editing team should have been on the ball. As we lead into Emma Harte's life, nothing particularly new is mentioned except that I don't think she would have told her landlady her father was still alive- it doesn't fit in with the original storyline, where she and her “husband” have no relatives between them. Also, the ending is a bit nondescipt.

This book is okay, but it could have been way, way, more.

VAGINA MUSEUM YOUTUBE VLOG NOW LIVE!

 My Vagina Museum YouTube vlog is now live!

Link:-

https://youtu.be/k7V04hum4W8

The Vagina Museum is in Bethnal Green, London, and is the world's first museum dedicated to vaginas, vulvas and the gynaecological anatomy.  The point of it is to create understanding, awareness, and build a society where no one is ashamed of their body.  The museum is small and quite simply curated.  It is clearly a work in progress and everything can be viewed in under half an hour.

Come and take a walk in my shoes and I'll show you a giant, sparkly tampon (would that make it a glampon?!) and an actual, real uterus displayed in one of their three galleries.  Educational and anatomical boards invite you to name intimate details of the female anatomy, and a vulva cushion and vulva art is on display.  They also have a shop, where I found a rather interesting necklace...

I have also blogged about this museum before (it contains a photo of a rather interesting vulva mirror!), and here's the link:-
https://elainerockett.blogspot.com/2024/11/miss-elaineous-visits-vagina-museum.html

Remember to like and subscribe, and don't forget to follow this blog as well!

TTFN

The Miss Elaineous

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YOUTUBE WELLCOME COLLECTION VLOG NOW LIVE!

 My Wellcome Collection YouTube vlog is now live!

Link:-

https://youtu.be/OxZStB-dkLg

The Wellcome Collection is a free museum and library in Euston, London, exploring health and the human experience. Aside from their fixed exhibition, entitled Being Human- where you can sniff a sculpture that's supposed to smell like human breast milk, and play with a pandemic jukebox- they also have temporary galleries. One of these contains a banging drum nose sculpture and blow-up arms that are references to deafness and the need to communicate, and the other contains a birth scroll dating from 1500 AD. The latter exhibition has quite a harrowing feel about it; as it's about prayers and cultural, spiritual rituals that were- and to some extent still are- put in place to protect the mother and baby during childbirth.

Come and take a walk in my shoes and I'll show you these, plus a truly fantastic reading room, with comfy, slob-out cushions. They also have a red fake fur neural tube dress, and a ballgown made of 6,000 contraceptive pills. This museum is certainly not boring!

I have also blogged about this collection before (it contains photos of some interesting medical instruments, which are no longer in the museum, so you'll enjoy it), and here's the link:-

https://elainerockett.blogspot.com/2019/12/miss-elaineous-visits-wellcome.html

Remember to like and subscribe, and don't forget to follow this blog as well!

TTFN

The Miss Elaineous

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THE CASUAL VACANCY by J.K.ROWLING

 THE CASUAL VACANCY

by

J.K. ROWLING

THE BLURB:

In the idyllic small town of Pagford, a councillor dies and leaves a “casual vacancy”- an empty seat on the parish council.

In the election for his successor that follows, it is clear that behind the pretty surface this is a town at war. Rich at war with poor, wives at war with husbands, teachers at war with pupils... Pagford is not what it first seems.

From the smallest of elections in a sleepy British town, J.K. Rowling conjures an epic, emotional and completely readable tale that has had millions of readers hooked.

THE REALITY:

This was the first J. K. Rowling book I have ever read. Had I been a child when the Harry Potter series was released, then I would have devoured them as they would have been right up my street. But I was an adult and, by that stage, not in the least bit interested in fantasy or sci-fi. Incidentally, I've not seen any of the Harry Potter films, nor the television adaption of The Casual Vacancy. This looked to be quite a tome, and I'm a big fan of a tome/ saga. So therefore I was quite surprised (given that and the author's credentials) to find that I couldn't finish this book. I didn't even get half way, and what I did read was a struggle to enjoy.

I'll start with the positives... The characters are varied in nature, interesting and well-described. They are also universally unlikeable, but I don't hold that against a novel- after all, I love Wuthering Heights, and just about every person in that classic is despicable. The sections were also relatively short, so the book was well-paced, and shifted along nicely (despite the subject matter dragging, if that makes sense.) But... The storyline did not enthral me. I mean, the thread of a councillor dying and having to be re-elected seems just so banal and pointless. It's hardly like a whodunnit, when the race is on to find the perpetrator, or a rags-to-riches story where you're interested in finding out if the main character succeeds. Also, the location of Pagford did not charm me in the least (maybe that's because I'm not familiar with village life?) What is it with these “famous” novels and me? Another book I had to put down was Zadie Smith's acclaimed White Teeth. And I think this has offered me the solution to my lack of interest- both books were just too gritty and real. When I read a novel I seek escapism- if I want real life then all I have to do is open my front door.

A bookseller said to me, when I mentioned that I was struggling to get through this book, “There are millions of great novels out there- if you're not enjoying the one you're reading, then just put it down and pick up something else.” So that's exactly what I did. Maybe one of you can give me your opinion of this book?

YOUTUBE VIKTOR WYND MUSEUM OF CURIOSITIES VLOG NOW LIVE!

  My Viktor Wynd Museum of Curiosities YouTube vlog is now live!

Link:-

https://youtu.be/ZZMYfNSR6qA

Friends, fellow oddballs and downright weirdos... Roll up! Roll up! Join me for the thrill of a lifetime!

Today I've been to the Viktor Wynd Museum of Curiosities, which is in Hackney, East London. The building it is situated in is home to The Last Tuesday Society, which puts on literary and creative events with a macabre twist, such as seances; masquerade balls and taxidermy classes. Upstairs they have an atmospheric cocktail parlour, and that decadent, late 19^th century artists' poison- absinthe- features on their menu.

A warning to the curious- if you're easily offended, with delicate sensibilities, then don't come here or watch the video! If, however, you are as disgusting and perverted as I am, then you will love this museum.

Come and take a walk in my shoes and I'll show you shrunken heads; animal skeletons; a chocolate John Major; an eight legged sheep and a two-headed sheep. I will also show you a jar containing Madonna's panty liner (yes, really), a box containing Russell Brand's pubes, and a jar containing Amy Winehouse's poo, which you can sniff for an additional fiver!

I have also blogged about this museum, and here's the link:-

https://elainerockett.blogspot.com/2018/12/miss-elaineous-visits-viktor-wynd.html

Remember to like and subscribe, and don't forget to follow this blog as well!

TTFN

The Miss Elaineous

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