Thinking of visiting Brownsea Island?

I couldn’t find much in the way of guidance for camping on the island when I was heading over there, so I thought I’d give a few handy things you might wanna know.

Expect a big queue for the ferry, but it also fits a lot of people, so don’t panic.
You will be given a map, it is pretty helpful, but doesn’t mention a campsite, in fact no signage anywhere points towards a campsite, you need to go to the ‘outdoor centre’.
When you arrive at the campsite, the staff are all super nice, but just like all the wildlife on the island, don’t be tempted to feed them.
So learn from my mistake here, you will be offered a cool box to keep food cool and fresh. Take them up on the offer, even if you have nothing that requires a cool box, as this is the best way to keep your food safe from the local fauna.
Mosquito repellant is probably a good idea if you aren’t a fan of scratching constantly, however, they are not a huge problem if you forget.

I will update these as I think of more, but the best advice I can give is, go visit Brownsea Island, it’s stunning.

If you have any questions, or anything you think I can answer, feel free to post a comment.

First camping of the year

Firstly, it’s worth noting that as I type this, the new forest ponies are having some sort of meeting just outside my tent. It has been a strenuous day, and I’m very glad to be laying in my sleeping bag.

I decided it would be best to be in a field by sundown, so dug out all my camping gear and packed up my bag. Tried packing light and completely failed. 17.5kg later, I went to find a train to Brockenhurst. Not a bad journey and was under the impression it linked straight to a bus that would take me to the campsite. This was incorrect. Had a noisy walk by the main road until I rocked up to the campsite, where it promptly started raining.

Rained intermittently until the present time, although sunny too. Had brought no food so had to walk back into town to pick up some grub. It rained. Got back and made some hotdogs and all was right with the world again. I pitched my tent way too far from the toilet block however, so will remember that next time.

The collection of food cost north of twelve quid, so will bring my own next time. I am going to attempt to sleep and will update you in the morning, or later on if sleep eludes me.

Views, Foods, and Booze

Well this is kinda repeating a previous post that for some reason refused to publish to Apple News, so I will simply do it again and hope this is more successful. This time however I would like to start with the views. I have been pretty high the start of last week, but it has given me the opportunity to take some nice pics.

Perched on a rock over a drop of certain death

On the edge of a road, only a thin aluminium barrier from a fiery automotive plummet to more certain death

It is worth mentioning that these photos only seem to portray about 40% of how awesome these views were. Especially the pic above, which was terrifying. Two steps forward would literally be the longest step down I would ever take.

This next pic is a giant pan of chicken, pork, mushrooms and cheese. Could possibly be one of the tastiest meals I have ever eaten. The waiter brought two plates with it, as he assumed it was for two people. How little did he know. 1kg of meat and cheese was no match for my majestic frame. Admittedly only managed about 75% of it, but damn it was tasty.

Lastly we have a shoutout to the beer. Bear in mind that I included a two litre water bottle just for scale, as I did not have a banana to hand. A six pack of the green bottled beer cost less than a pint of Peroni in most bars. That’s 12 litres of good beer for less than a UK pub pint.

Anyway, thanks for reading, even though the readership numbers have vastly reduced, there will be good news and more to follow. Peace.

Let’s all be Brave

Ok this is just a quick chat about a new browser called Brave. Brave is a concept in browsers that helps keep your browsing private, and helps you support makers of original content by supporting them without having to sell your data to advertisers. Brave is linked into a new cryptocurrency called BAT (Basic Attention Token) which you hold in your browser and can tip your favourite contributors with. BAT is currently priced at about 25p per coin, so you will not be breaking the bank if you tip someone you enjoy reading or watching. The browser itself can also simply disperse your BAT on a monthly basis, based on which sites or contributors you have watched the most. You can set the browser to pay out 20 BAT a month (about a fiver), and it will automatically show you who will get what percentage of that, based on your viewing time, page views etc.

Anyway, bottom line is that watching Youtube earlier had Brave block over 350 ads and trackers in the hour I was watching standup, so even if you decide not to support contributors, it is way more privacy conscious than most other browsers. Ooh I forgot to mention that if you decide you do want to see the occasional advert, Brave will pay you for them, so you can pass those BAT onto the people you enjoy, so that they, we, can continue providing content.

You can download Brave from this link here: https://brave.com/bun192 and for transparency, I will get some BAT if you download it and use it for a month. I do like getting BAT, but I also like people keeping their own data, so give it a go, it can’t be worse than explorer :D\

Here is a link to some of their FAQs to have a read also. https://support.brave.com/hc/en-us/articles/360026361072-Brave-Ads-FAQ

Have a good day in paradise my friends, while it is still a paradise.

Nothing but Nature

After a hospital appointment, I had half an hour left on my electric car rental, so decided to go for a quick jaunt in the countryside. Apart from accidentally getting thirty miles out of my way, and returning the car late, I did get this photo when I just had to stop at the side of the road to enjoy the misty countryside.

There is nothing insightful in this post, I just wanted to share this regal looking flapper being admired by the cow in the background.

First Time Since The Sun Left

As productivity has completely slumped as we draw ourselves even closer into winter, I have not completed anything of any value, blog-wise.

To break up this inactivity, I felt it was worth posting a couple of links for a couple of cool, yet free artistic endeavours.

It is worth noting at this point that the cover photo for this post has relatively little to do with the contents, but it is a photo of a friend’s neighbour’s contribution to chrimble spirit down in the southern hemisphere. Now that’s sorted out, I will continue.

The guy who puts together the playlists on the side bar has dropped something new that’s worth listening to and sharing worth everyone you know. Soundcloud link here:

https://m.soundcloud.com/ramupgrade/sets/interstellar-trash

Also worth mentioning is the fact that I have five referral codes for Crypto.com worth $20 each if you sign up and get an account. It is worth doing fairly quickly as they are about to launch Visa cards in the USA, and last time they launched cards, the coin price quadrupled. https://platinum.crypto.com/r/vurvacwxsm

They are first come first served so don’t be too upset if they’ve already gone; either way, it is a thoroughly recommended way to enter the world of cryptocurrency.

That’s it i think, i hope this turns out ok, as the latest update to WordPress has made it hard to edit on the move, so if it looks dreadful, I apologise and will endeavour to fix it when i get in front of a desktop.

New Radio Station

If you have a look over there on your left, or if you’re on a mobile device, click the + at the top of the page, you will see a radio station link. That little box plays some awesome tunes, personally selected by RAMupgrade on SoundCloud. Do give him a look and show him some love. The tunes are all pretty damn good, but do be aware some naughty little words may sneak their way through, so don’t play at kids parties or wakes.
Worth bearing in mind that it will stop playing if you leave this page. I know this sounds obvious, but I have killed a couple of good tunes by absentmindedly clicking a link, and BOOM, silence. Each time you refresh the page you will get a new playlist, so if you don’t like the genre you’re hearing, just tap that f5 and see what else is on offer.

As usual, to clarify, I receive no financial or non-financial reward for linking his stuff, it is just well worth hearing.

First review, and this is a finance app

Now luckily for you all, I am a very inquisitive person, and I like to always make sure I have the awesome things. To properly ascertain what is awesome, it means I have to buy, join, and subscribe to a lot of things. I put myself through his sacrifice so you don’t have to. So one night I found that Apple’s App Store was showcasing personal finance type apps. Out of the apps on display, I downloaded and joined a few, and gave them a test drive.

The first shout out has to go to Yolt. Yolt is an amazing app that you add your current bank accounts to, and it takes the data and gives you an overview of what you are spending your money on, how much you have left, and the establishments that take the most of your hard-earned. It is very simple to use and you just need your online banking details to get started. Enter your bank details and bolt will download your transactions as far back as your bank will provide them. It puts your transactions into categories, and it isn’t too bad at getting them right first time. Any categories that are wrong you can change, and it will change similar transactions and will learn for next time.

If you have more than one bank account or credit card, this is a valuable bit of kit. It is free, it is licensed and regulated, so I feel confident it is secure. I haven’t gone to the rigmarole of checking all the security info on their website because, fuck it, life is short.

I will pop the link to their website here again, do go and have a look. Since Microsoft stopped supporting their “Money” app, this is the best replacement I have seen, so it gets a solid thumbs up from me. I get no personal payments or benefits from you using this link, so feel free to use it or Duck them.

It is available on iPhone, and also on android, if you are that way inclined.

Thanks for reading this far 😀

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