Remarkable engineering

 Between Christmas and New Year engineers carried out a remarkable price of work on the nearby M27 motorway  outside Fareham where a new junction and underpass is needed to serve the Wellbourne development.

Rather than tunneling  under the busy M27 the underpass shell was constructed beside the motorway (below) . 

Then starting on Christmas Eve the team literally sliced out a section of the motorway which was closed for the Christmas holiday, slid the tunnel section into place, filled up the gaps and resurfaced the road surface, finishing at 4.0AM on Saturday and ahead of schedule.

 What a remarkable feat of civil engineering, the team were working around the clock. The process is well documented by M27 JUNCTION 10 Drone  from which the stills above are taken, (hopefully he will allow) and well worth checking out the full set of videos through which the work is documented daily on the channel - much appreciated daily viewing in the BB household.

Festive Cars

The Boxing Day meeting of Locksheath classic cars was cold but very well attended, with some very interesting cars out in the dry winter weather.

Below camper based on what looks like a Mk1 Ford Escort van, the car and especially the "Pop top" in absolutely authentic 70's colour scheme.

Huge variety of cars on display, quite a contract between this Benford van and what looks like a 57 Chevy, both immaculate.

By now this must be very rare, a late 1980's pickup, complete with "tender" in the bed.

Little Red Corvette, no wonder Price wrote a song about one.

Baja bug conversion on this 1969/70 VW Beetle, complete with rear "lookout" long before the days of reversing cameras.

Probably the best Bugatti ever, I forget but probably Type 35, this one has a supercharged grand prix engine

 Our local YouTube celebrity hot rod builder - Oak Swamp made a good video of the event and also at nearby Wickham, well worth watching, in fact if you watch the ending you can just catch a glimpse of him following Mrs BB's bright GREEN Skoda.

The last Post

 All the best for 2026

 

Knotty Pine

 Of rather in this case oak, grown in an amazingly distorted fashion, I'm intrigued to understand what caused it to grown and develop like this.

And below despite what appears to be a tree growing inside out, given the size of the trunk this tree may be well on the way to being over 100 years old, measured against our own oak which is 106 and half the circumference.

 

Merry Christmas

 This years advent beer calendar from Mrs BB has come up with an interesting collection of winter beers.

 Things have been a little hectic over the past few weeks so I am going to make a start on these today.

 In the meantime I did manage  to get out into the New Forest where Minstead have a fine Christmas tree on the green. I thought it was a nice change from the Emsworth Lobster Pot Christmas Tree although I'm not sure about the juxtaposition of the historical stocks.

Speaking of which the Emsworth Christmas lobster pot is looking nice this year and the day boat alongside and dressed all over is a nice addition.

 

Guessing this might be Emsworth Slipper SC, but whoever this Christmas dinghy is a nice touch, presumably looks better at night when the lights come on.

Have a great Christmas 

Winter Visitors

No not those unwelcome family or friends who have descended unexpectedly over Christmas, just some of our water fowl who have presumably arrived from colder climes and seen enjoying a spell of unseasonably warm weather.

Being somewhat worse at identifying birds than I am at boats the long bill waders look maybe like Godwits? Certainly not redshanks or curlews.

 The geese at the rear are most probably Brent geese enjoying a bit of shelter in the lee of teh old MFV wreck.

Keyhaven History

 Lovely old view of Keyhaven, slightly more crowded these days but still one of my favorite places in the Solent

 And a rather lovely painting which I think was courtesy  of a member of Hurst Castle SC