The Adventures of Scootz and Thunderbird's photostream

The pictures in this special montage mark what would have been the 40th Birthday of my late friend, companion and partner Andrew Bird, and were taken between 17th July 2008 and 17th March 2009 during And's visits to see me.

Usually on the anniversary of And's death and his birthday I ride down to Beachy Head to lay flowers and spend a little time remembering him at the spot he died. However, this year as it would have been his 40th Birthday, I had hoped to travel up to And's hometown of Cannock in Staffordshire to lay flowers where his ashes were scattered on Cannock Chase, but unfortunately my health ruled out a long ride to either place.

I decided instead to do a creative composition using shots from our days out on my motorbike and in the evening I was going to release a Chinese Lantern as my tribute and remembrance of And on his birthday.

I did ride over to Two Tree Island to release the lantern but the blasted thing wouldn't light for some reason and then after all that I found myself stranded for 2 hours after the battery died on my motorbike, leaving me waiting in bitterly cold conditions for the RAC to come and jump start the bike; which was literally a five minute job to get it started and the battery charged up so I could ride home!

I'm sure And would have laughed his head off at the irony of the situation I found myself in, as he always had a devilish sense of humour! :-)

I forgot I'm not longer Pro on this account so Flickr only has the large size viewable, so very sorry for that.

See where this picture was taken. [?]

Now to the reason for my visit to the South Coast on Sunday (as some will already know), not that I ordinarily need an excuse to visit this beautiful part of the country, but this trip has become somewhat of an annual pilgrimage to lay flowers in memory of And (maelstrom4ever) on the anniversary of his suicide at Beachy Head.

After what happened last year at Beachy Head I had to keep my precise travel plans quite secretive, so rather than head down there today which is the actual anniversary of when he was found, I travelled down on Sunday which is most likely the anniversary of the day he actually died.

Whilst Eastbourne was bathed in beautiful blue sunny skies, a few miles up the road on the South Downs the weather was inclement with a thick sea mist descended over the Beachy Head Cliffs which made any attempt at some decent photography neigh on impossible.

I found it really eerie up there so I didn't linger for long, laying just this small bouquet of And's favourite coloured flowers. I couldn't even see the Beachy Head lighthouse so I just selected this spot near to where I think I laid flowers last November.

See where this picture was taken. [?]

It would have been And's 39th Birthday on Sunday and naturally I wished to mark this is some way so I rode down to Eastbourne and Beachy Head to lay flowers as a remembrance at the place he tragically died.

The weather really was quite atrocious with heavy rain and strong gusty winds, particularly high up in the South Downs, so I was unable to take much of a shot as I dare not risk mounting my camera on a tripod.

I'm pretty sure the little cross that I bought and the flowers are floating somewhere in the English Channel by now.

I was going through my old yahoo email account today and came across dozens of emails that And and I had exchanged in the two years we'd known each other. I had completely forgotten that And had sent me the pics he'd taken of me during his visits.

So, I have put together this collage using Picasa with a selection of And's pics of me taken with his Olympus bridge camera, to share with a wider audience for the first time. The shot And took of us at Colchester Castle is much better than the shot I took that some of you may have seen before. My personal favourite is the top right of me photographing an autumn crocus at RHS Hyde Hall Gardens.

(Top left) - And taking a pic of me taking a pic at Colchester Castle Park
(Top centre) - Me at RHS Hyde Hall Gardens
(Top right) - Snapping crocus at RHS Hyde Hall Gardens
(Bottom left) - Trying to hide under a tree at Hampton Court Palace
(Bottom centre) - And's self-timer shot of he and I at Colchester Castle
(Centre right) - Me wandering off oblivious at Hampton Court Palace
(Bottom right) - Capturing a rare smile from me near Brighton Pier

See where this picture was taken. [?]