BONG!

It's a bit of a rubbish photo, but my excuse is that I didn't have my camera with me so I had to use my phone.

This morning I went on a tour up the clocktower to see Big Ben strike ten o'clock. Any resident of the UK can go on the tour - you just need to ask your MP to book you a place. The tours run from Monday to Friday and there are about 15 people on each tour.

The tour guide was fantastic and we took it easy up the 318 stairs that wound around the shaft into which the weights that pull the bells drop down. We went up and up and were handed ear plugs for the big moment. I was an arm's length away when the hammer pulled back and the bell was bonged. The bell itself is 13 tonnes and is the third-heaviest bell in the UK (the heaviest is Big Paul in St Paul's Cathedral and the second-heaviest is in Liverpool Cathedral). From the belfry (the slit-window area above the clock faces) we could see the Olympic beach volleyball in action and Buckingham Palace. Walking behind the clock faces was fun. Apparently the glass is so brittle that pecking birds can break it. Once, a flock of starlings perching on the minute hand slowed the clock by five minutes. On accuracy, the clock has to run to the correct second and penny weights (actual old pennies) are added or taken off the pendulum to regulate its swing to the correct speed. The air pressure in the clockwork room can make the pendulum speed up or slow down, and so the weights are adjusted regularly. It was refreshing to see a mechanism that doesn't rely on computers to work.

There was a Feast meeting in the evening. We're all set for Sunday! Let's hope the sun comes out for the market this time. We haven't been that lucky this year. I'm very excited by the first appearance of Baltic Bicycles in the area I help to run.