This morning, Clare went off early to the gym, and I did some of the weekly shopping on the way to an early clinic appointment. After lunch and a siesta, I caught the 61 bus into town intending to walk to the Bay Wetland nature reserve along the Taff Embankment footpath. This took me along Wood Street to start with, and gave me an opportunity to take a few photos of St David's House demolition, now about 90% complete with three large machines working, two of them on site clearance, and one using its thirty metre long arm to tear down the building's reinforced concrete structure.
Work had come to a halt temporarily. I identified over the traffic the distinctive but strange sound of a scaffolder working at loosening joints with a power tool. During demolition, building remnants are enclosed by a protective framework of scaffolding covered in plastic sheeting, but how scaffolding is taken down as the work proceeded had never occurred to me. Then, I spotted movement at the top corner of the remaining structure, and aimed my camera upwards in that direction. To my surprise and delight a little later, I discovered I had photos of a scaffolder at work in the most vulnerable place you can think of, close to the pneumatic iron jaws of the demolition machine. Amazing luck at at distance of 120 feet. I can only hope he gets paid well!
My walk to the Bay Wetland nature reserve was rewarded with the sign of a grebe carrying its new chick on its back - a rather fuzzy photo - and a coot with three chicks exploring the extent of their first home in one of the ponds.
Needless to say, it was well nigh impossible to get all three chicks and parent into frame at the same time, let alone in sharp focus. Just glad I caught a glimpse of this moment another year.
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