What a question! It has been three years since I “retired” from the rat race. Three years of lazing about living the life of the idle rich. I wish. During the past three years I have travelled, photographed, explored and made a general nuisance of myself. Most of my adventures can be found on my other blogs – Walter Hampson Photography, Adventures of the Intrepids . In fact since my last blog here I’ve been that busy that all three blogs have been neglected. Having spent the last week getting two of the blogs updated I’ve now got to this blog. Problem is I have nothing new to add here having told all on the other two blogs. Our (Susan and me) biggest adventure in July was another trip up the Rhine. This time I thought we had cracked it, Amsterdam to Basle. I had envisaged the route as up the main channel on the Rhine Delta via Nijmegen, Arnhem, Dusseldorf to Cologne. Thence Cologne to Koblenz. Koblenz to Rüdesheim thence through to Basle. Alas, I should have checked things a bit better – most of the cruise was at night, so we missed the trip from Cologne to Koblenz., then the trip from Rüdesheim to Speyer. OH well – lets hope our return trip on the Danube goes better. Mind you we were very lucky with the weather a balmy 38c in Strasbourg.
August a busy month in Edinburgh with the Festival and Fringe. 
Susan gets heavily involved in the fringe, acting with the Mercators and going to support SCDA shows. I tend to wander around Edinburgh and take shots of the street theatre, visit museums and of course we have the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo to look forward to as well. This year we had our fellow Intrepid with us and once again we had a good show. However, we learnt a lesson from this show, never go on the second week as that is when the BBC are there filming the show. It is hard enough getting clean 
shots without the added BBC paraphernalia getting in the way. August was also the month I tried a different type of photography, sports. We went to Knockhill for the BTCC event on the Saturday/Sunday. I’ve never been to any form of racing so the challenge was to get some decent shots of the cars. I ended up getting a complete sequence of a car going off track at the hairpin and crashing into the protective fence . Thankfully the driver was declared okay and took part in the final race of the day. Oh yes August was busy and exciting. More to come in September
September arrived along with continued good weather. 
Must admit we had a good summer (apart from the usual days of rain in Edinburgh for the Festival). We met with a friend who had not been out for a while, in fact her expression was “My wheelie bin gets out more than me”. This is not surprising as she recently underwent brain surgery. We were impressed with her recovery and were very pleased she cam with us on our tourist day out. It all came about when we saw a very nice picture of the blooming purple heather on Arthur’s Seat, Holyrood Park. All was going well until I took a little spell. I made a mistake and behave rather too stubborn for my own good, result was a minor angina attack. 
Thankfully I had the correct medication with me and after a little lie down for 30 mins I was fit enough to go back down. What better place to go visit and regain a of peace and equilibrium than go visit the Kyoto Friendship Garden at Lauriston Castle. This is one of my favourite places to visit and a tour inside the castle is well worth the small sum of money charged. I believe our good friend Ali enjoyed her day and we are hoping she will make time in her busy schedule to come out
and play with us again. I promise no Angina attacks this time Ali. From one park to another, we paid a visit to Edinburgh Zoo on the 14th September. It had been 3 years since our last visit. Sad to sad to say that the zoo has gone even further down the slippery slope of not catering for the visitor and being expensive. It was an hour before we saw our first animal and that was a pacing Leopard. Having seen zoos in Europe and the changes made in London Zoo I can only say that Edinburgh Zoo needs to wake up and start catering for families and visitors. Oh well I better stop being catty or I could end up in a cage.
The 14th September found The Intrepids at Stirling Railway Station waiting for a Duchess to arrive. This was no ordinary Royal visitor this was a very special one. I have a good partner and a very good friend who fall in with my suggestions for days out and put up with my foibles and quibbles. The Scottish Railway Preservation Society had put on a steam hauled special around the Fife Circle. The trains was being hauled by the Ex-LMS Coronation Pacific 6623 Duchess of Sutherland. These steam locomotives were classified as 8P – the most powerful class of steam locomotive in the UK. She was well turned out with her bright work bright and her greenery polished. This visit reminded me of an incident when I was still a school lad when I saw a sister engine at Kennishead station. Little did I realise at that time it was the last working trip of the “City of Glasgow” the year being 1963. 
When she pulled her train out from Stirling the “Cocky Youth” of yesteryear was looking through my eyes at a memory come alive. This time that youth also felt the sadness of the older recycled teenager. The railways of today are reputed to be cleaner, trains faster I’ll not dispute that. However, they have no soul, no life a steam locomotive to me was a living thing. You never see the youth or today waving to a train driver of the modern tin cans, yet they will wave to the crew of a Steam Locomotive.
Scotland played host for the Ryder Cup at Gleneagles in September. I had read that as a special tribute the latest tourists attraction at Helix Park – The Kelpies would be illuminated with a golden light. It was also announce that for a trial period the car parks would be open 24/7 and no longer shut at 8 pm. Alas Susan was not available due to SCDA duties, so Sid and our good friend Ionwen headed out to Falkirk and a visit to Helix park. We did take our cameras. 
I was and still am pleased with the shot I got.
Wonder what October has in store? It will be fun finding out and continuing life in Retirement.
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