What have we been up to?

Friends, family, followers...

My sincere apologies that it has been close to two months since my last post on The Kite Experiment. I shall update and awe you with some stories of caves, hunter gatherings, visitors and other sorts of business.

The canal in Nottingham...


it is still a pretty picture for a large city.


Just a 10 minute walk from the city centre, the canal is positioned below the castle. It lines a lean 'Tinkers Lean' where Delia likes to explore and chase the wildlife as well as escape the hisses of other cats and growls of dogs walking by.

The towpath is a paved path right the way from the river trent to Beeston and there are endless walkers, commuters, and cyclists passing by.


With a thick hedgerow of bushes and trees there is alot of wild action too. Not to mention the amazing array of fruits! Which we had to get our grubby mits on. Well they are free and we are skint so the two go hand in hand.


We are still not sure exactly what these little fruits are, plums? Qunices? Damsons? Any thoughts??


With a tub of these fruits, Leigh made a delicious crumble. They were a little tart but very juicy-lucy.


The potatoes have been growing happily on the stern...


Leigh thinks they are ready, I beg to differ, so we did a test.


I pulled one out to have a look...


Now do you really think this King Edward is ready??


I have been working here in Nottingham, pulling pints at the cafe bar of Nottingham Contemporary (art gallery)


And Leigh and I have been formulating a plan to start our own business. So I have been attending various business courses to find out the finer points of 'cash flows' 'profit and loss' and meeting other like minded people. It is very early days but we are doing our research as we go, chopping and changing our plans and ideas to find the right sort of business which runs to suit how we wish to live. Our first main idea was a mobile cafe, something like this...


But this idea may have to be tweaked depending on raising capital and the market. Lots to work out yet, but our own business is a sure future plan.

I have spent alot of time cracking on with some of my creative projects, and have finally started on my delay FX pedal! Horrah!




I have been tinkering with the guitar again and got some lovely tunes on the way.


Leigh and I bought between us a portable amplifier. Finally we have sounds that are louder than an ant.


The Roland Micro cube is a battery run amplifier that I can play my guitar through we can plug our laptops into, mp3 players, FX units... basically anything with a Jack lead. As I am writing this Leigh is filling the boat with his beautiful washes of electronic music. You can see his 'Flotel' website here.

Leigh has spent his time in Nottingham making brillaint music, gigging...


and exploring the delights of battery operated devices often running several items at once - funny man!


I have also finished my bee-house project.


It was a gift for my mothers birthday but that time came and went and I still had two nails angrily sticking high out of the ply and pieces of bamboo rolling around the bedroom. It came to me over a couple of days when I was in a good mood and relaxed about continuing the diy project. Calm and collected I pulled the nails from the ply roof and set about fixing the base in place with screws (pre-drilling the holes this time!) I even covered over the screw heads with slices of a thick branch. Gluing the bamboo inside the triangle of roof and base was a sinch. After a couple of coats of wood stain it was ready to be gifted. But I was miles from mum to give it to her....

Then, my lovely brothers came visiting their lil' sis.


I handed the gift to them to take back to mother-bird.

I showed my brothers the sights and delights of Nottingham. We went for lunch at the Olde Trip to Jerusalem, the oldest pub in England (apparently, recorded back to 1189AD),


which is built into the caves underneath the castle. It is a fascinating place to visit.


And they loved the renovations to the boat.


It is coming towards the end of July, our time in Nottingham is coming to an end. We are planning to set off again for London on the first of August, yes that is my birthday! I will keep you all posted on our adventure 'dahn sath'. So for the mean time, I wish you all well from the Dove of Belgrade. I'm popping to sainsburys now (literally a two second walk behind the fruit bushes) to get some sunday roast food. Thank you all for staying with me on the journey. xxxx