Brands Hatch Hotel – August 2008

Wanting a night away from parenthood, my wife and I booked a night at the Brands Hatch Hotel.

The hotel is easy to find and entering the sweeping driveway definitely gets you into the feeling that you are going to have an enjoyable stay.

The arrival was slightly marred by a bit of difficulty parking near the entrance thanks to an inconsiderately parked estate sporting a flat front tyre. However, that was the worst part of of stay the Brands Hatch Hotel experience and as niggles go, it really does fall very low down the list.

My wife had booked the night a few weeks prior in order to make the most of a Bank Holiday weekend and to take advantage of the hotels’ reduced Sunday evening rates. We arrived to see a wedding party having photos by the front door, the bride looked lovely (don’t they all) and we didn’t need to pause for long before we spotted a chance to make it to reception without becoming part of the background of a wedding photo. Glancing quickly about I felt certain that there must be more pretty places in the hotel grounds to have formal wedding photos than the main entrance.

The reception staff were as expected, friendly and professional. We had been guided to arrive after 3pm to ensure our room would be ready, however, we were asked to wait about 15 minutes as our room was not quite ready. Time soon used up by having a cup of tea in the bar, which gave us the opportunity to note that the noise of the races at nearby Brands Hatch Race Circuit were faintly audible in the background. I couldn’t help but wish that screens showing the races were on display in the bar and even on the TVs in the rooms. Predictably, to enjoy the races you really need to be track side.

The room was probably the nicest hotel room we have been in for a long time. Which, while it says a lot about the types of hotels we normally stay, does go to show that good quality hotels do not need to be prohibitively expensive. As well as computer connections, the room featured a DVD player, not something we have often seen, but then again, not something we have ever needed either. It was nice to see the inclusion of a couple of sports channels, especially given it was the final Olympics weekend.

Since our stay included use of the spa facilities, we made sure we got value and, once unpacked, headed that way to make use of the steam room, sauna and pools. They were all very pleasant and clean and gave the feeling of a very good quality health club. Chatting to other couples while sweating it out in the steam room or soaking in the spa, it transpired that we were not the only couple with dreams of a relaxing night away from the kids and this certainly is a good place to live that dream.

Heading into the bar for pre-dinner drinks did show up the compactness of the bar when there are many guests with the same idea. Probably a hazard of booking a night away that clashes with someones wedding, the staff were very attentive to the guests and it was a short wait for drinks and thanks to another group heading for the dining room, we were able to sit down for our drinks. Looking at the bill later it transpired that we paid over £5 each for out Gin and Tonics, good job we didn’t spot that until checking out time the next morning, London bar prices will always be a shock to us.

Seated at our table, the service was excellent and the food fantastic. Sometime a restaurant can ruin a great dish by serving it with averagely cooked vegetables which don’t get eaten, so it was nice to see unneeded extras avoided completely, leaving us to simply enjoy three courses of excellent cooking and not feel stuffed and overfed afterwards. It is a pet hate of mine to have restaurants serve plates so full you are effectively forced to choose to have either a starter or a desert. For me a decent restaurant is one that manages to serve excellent food in sensible portions and allows the diner to fully appreciate the food and still be comfortable afterwards, I gladly say that this restaurant is such a place.

Waking up at 9am the next morning was quite a surprise, not something I have done for a very long time. Not since I became a parent that’s for sure. The late waking was no doubt aided by the heavy curtains which very effectively blocked out all the sunlight. Within ten minutes waking there was the sound of a helicopter hovering close overhead and sitting up in bed we caught sight of a helicopter landing on the front lawn to collect a very excited (and very pretty) young lady. Not a sight I have seen very often and much as I would love to think the display was for my benefit, I suspect my presence there had nothing whatsoever to do with the helicopters presence.

Breakfast the next morning brought another pleasant surprise, a buffet style cooked breakfast where all the food on display was still hot and still tasted good. Having been used to hotels taking a breakfast order for you it was nice to see the food on offer and enjoy what I fancied there and then. Though one does wonder how much food is wasted with such a system. Thoughts of wastage aside and one good hearty breakfast later we were on our way again.

Summary:
A great hotel which I recommend wholeheartedly.

Hever Castle – August 2008

It was an overcast Saturday in August when my wife and I visited Hever Castle.

We went because we spotted an advert showing that they had a special African event with some African birds of prey and a Cheetah doing a running display. The castle visit therefore became part of an extended night away together while our daughter spends a night with her grandparents.

Two things made the castle visit more relaxing for us as a couple than any other attraction we have visited in recent years; the lack of a child and the lack of a camera. We were now able to admire everything without constantly keeping a four year old entertained and safe and being free from the desire to try and get the best shot possible of every photo opportunity is strangely liberating, even if its not the mode of choice.

Due to the aforementioned night away, we arrived at midday to find parking in a field, being well directed by visible staff. Parking was still very close to the entrance and ticket booths. The ticket queue was significant with about 20 minutes waiting until we got our hands on our tickets. Ticket prices are reasonable with adults paying about £10 each (add £2 if you want access to the Castle included in your entry) and children £6 with under fives free.

The gardens are very well kept with interesting hedge designs that even children will admire. There is plenty to wander about and do and adventurous youngsters will have no end of places to explore. The water maze is small and easy to solve, but that’s not really the point. Having sat and watched many kids enjoy it, having fun and getting wet seems to be the order of the day rather than engage in stimulating challenge.

The Castle is interesting and very informative with some spectacular artifacts on display and plenty to learn if you are weak on the history of Anne Boleyn. However the whole experience is feels rushed due to the way in which the Castle rooms are sectioned off and you are routed through in a specific way. There are probably some good reasons why this is done, but I much prefer to wander if a more random fashion and spend my time in rooms that catch my interest without being conscious that I am getting in the way of a queue of people behind me. Over half an hour should be allowed for this tour, just hope that the young one with you does not need a loo break halfway round. The really big downside to the Castle visit is the queue to get in, we didn’t see it reduce at all over the lunch period and when we joined it the wait was over half an hour before we started the tour. I think that adding an extra cost to the castle visit means people feel they must do the tour to get the full value from their ticket and since the relative increase in cost is small, people feel they may as well pay the extra, the result being the huge queues experienced. Hever have made a mistake doing this and they should have a single price for everything.

The birds of prey display was not up to the standard of that experienced by us 2 weeks prior at Warwick Castle and some occasional sound issues further compounded the disappointment. This is a shame because I can never tire of watching birds of prey climb and swoop, be it in the wild or at a show. It was clear that the majority of people were there for the Cheetah display and having a Cheetah out in the open air to run for crowds and raise awareness of the plight of Cheetahs in the wild is a great idea. The Cheetah on display was a young Cheetah and it was obvious we were not going to see a spectacular example of a Cheetah at high speed. Judging by the reaction of many in the crowd, not everyone appreciated this subtlety and obviously expected far more than they saw.

Refreshments:
The restaurant on site was massively over subscribed, thankfully we had enjoyed a huge breakfast beforehand and didn’t need to break for lunch. The grounds offer many places to enjoy a family picnic and thanks to the close proximity of the car parks, sending dad back to the car to collect lunch is a very real possibility.

In Summary:
Definitely worth the visit and somewhere I will visit again.

Warwick Castle – August 2008

It was a lovely Saturday morning in August when my wife and I visited Warwick Castle with our young daughter. We had planned a weekend with friends and Warwick Castle was on the way.

The Castle is easy to get to by car, well signposted and the car park is large. The walk from the car park to the Castle entrance was longer than we expected and little daughter was asking to sit on shoulders before we even arrived at the ticket booths. Signs in the car park reminding you that you need to purchase a £2 token to exit raise the cost of visiting the castle.

Fortunately for us, a friend had a get in free voucher for one adult and with darling daughter getting in free as an under 4, our entry cost was significantly less that we would have paid otherwise. We felt that the full entry cost was been higher than we would have been happy to pay, but since we were only paying the entry cost of 1 full adult, we were very happy with the price that we paid for entry. My opinion is that the cut-off age for children getting free entry is too low. Paying close to £10 entry for a 4yo is too much. Paying for the tickets also became rather confusing, on arriving at the ticket booths there is a clear sign for a ticket booth which takes cash only. It wasn’t long before a group of people crowded together wondering how they were going to pay for entry as alternative payment points were not obvious. It wasn’t until a member of staff pointed out that we all had to go through the arches to the Castle entrance for more ticket booths, which would take other payment methods. Quite why the tickets booths are separated like that is a mystery and while, in hindsight its obvious now that one must go through the arches into the entry courtyard, for a first time visitor it is slightly confusing.

Entry and ticket costs were the only disappointments of the day, once we and had entered the castle grounds it was fun and distraction all the way. We really did enjoy our day there and the Medieval experiences that went on were good fun for children and adults.

Arriving at 10am was definitely the right thing to do as it enabled us to wander unimpeded on the castle walls and around the rooms. Later in the day, specifically the afternoon, the queues to for these were significant and would probably hamper the enjoyment somewhat, especially with a toddler in tow. Staff on hand in the rooms were helpful and informative and seeing them in period dress added to the value factor. We estimated that at about 2pm the number of people on site was three times the number who were about shortly after we arrived, yet the grounds did not feel crowded and there was still plenty of room to wander about freely. There were noticeable queues at the food stall and to get onto the castle wall.

The entertainment on display was good with well choreographed fights and amusing incidentals. It made for good entertainment for the whole family.

The trebuchet on site claims to be the largest in the world and is certainly an impressive site. We managed to miss the firing of it, which is a shame as it was something I would have really liked to have seen.

The day we visited included a birds of prey display which was well presented, informative and hugely enjoyable with spectacular flights from the birds.

Refreshments:
For lunch we bought burgers from a stand, one of several on site, and picnicked on the lawn. There are table you can eat at and there is a restaurant with children’s menu available. Eating early is advised as the queues build up. Taking in your own food means having to carry it from the car park (note the walk length) which, unless you have a pushchair to put it in, you may not wish have with you all day.

In Summary:
Definitely worth the visit and somewhere I will visit again, though I will try to avoid paying full price again as well.

Sometimes Technology Just Lets Us Down

Sometimes technology simply, and for no obvious reason, lets us down and we feel lost without it.

This week was my turn to experience the frustration, and even anger, and being inconvenienced by technology. First it was my wife’s Sony Viao. Just inside its 12 month warranty we noticed the screen would fade to black and back to normal again. For a while there was no discernible pattern, until I noticed it was related to the angle of the screen. A little manipulation of the screen angle usually brought the picture back. On a laptop within warranty, this is obviously not acceptable, so it was returned to our reseller, dabs.co.uk. Within a week Dabs had refunded the full cost of the laptop (nice customer service Dabs), but it would have been nice to have had a slightly more personal email explaining the refund and why as well as the formal refund notice we received.

With refund in pocket, it was time to go hunting for a replacement. We looked at several and eventually plumped for the Samsung R700, after cnet.co.uk gave it a particularly good review. We decided on the older R700 over the newer R710 because there was a wait for the R710 and no one was giving the full spec of the delivery machine, even though they had a price for it. Not knowing the exact spec we were going to be paying for is a good reason not to buy. So order placed with Dabs on a Friday evening the an excited wife received her new toy on Monday. Initial opinion of the machine is on a par with the CNET review. It feels sturdy and the keyboard is nice to use, the screen clear and easy to read. Its when I settle down with it for a couple of hours of setting up for our home network and the software that Mrs Limey requires that things start to go wrong. The first sign is on a post install reboot, the laptop appears to boot okay with all the right noises being made, but the screen remains blank throughout, only to be resolved by a hard power-off and back on again. Not good, but hopefully a one-off, I hope. The next post install reboot repeats the process. Now I am concerned. The next gives me reason to be very frustrated, this time the screen is covered with a series of vertical lines of varying colours and subsequent reboots don’t change the situation. This laptop is not .

Having been without a laptop for a few weeks, the wife is starting to get a little jittery about access to her emails and facebook profile, the thought of a couple more weeks is almost too much to bear. How did we get so technology dependent?

To Dabs’ credit, collection is quickly arranged and we are hoping the replacement will be okay. Since there was no second choice to the Samsung R700 we have chosen to have the faulty one replaced with the same model in a hope the faulty laptop was a one-off. We shall have to see.

To add to the evenings frustration Mrs Limey also noticed that our Richo R6 digital compact camera had two faulty buttons on it. The camera had only been back with us for a few weeks, after being repaired for a faulty screen display and previously we had sent the camera back for a issue which came up just after we bought it. So this is the 3rd time the Richo has failed on us.

Despite being very unsuperstitious, in fact I’d describe myself as anti-superstitious, I must admit I am wondering what the 3rd technology failure is going to be.

I managed to fall foul of my first web page virus this week

As an IT professional I consider myself very aware of the dangers of computer viruses and how to avoid them. I have had to clean up other peoples computers many times and have yet to get an infection on my own computers.

So how was it that, on a clients site, a major corporation no less, with anti-virus software installed locally and some form of corporate Internet firewall, I managed to infect the PC I was working on?

The virus in question was IE Antivirus, a spoof anti-virus program, which hijacked Internet Explorer, automatically redirecting to its own URL, regardless of the URL I actually typed in. For obvious reasons I shall not give out the URL it redirected too, I really do not want to encourage the spread of any virus.

The Symantec description of the virus is here.

Looking at the Symantec description of the virus, it would appear that the purpose of the infection is to get the infected user to register the anti-virus software, by paying of course, in order to get rid of the virus. Thereby not only giving money to the virus writer, but also your credit card and address details. It should go without saying that there is no way you should trust any anti-virus software that so forcefully attempts to encourage you to buy their product. It seems obvious that the virus and the removal software come from the same source and the idea is that desperate and less computer literate users will be fooled into paying for the software and the author gets an income and your details for selling on to goodness knows who.

It does make me wonder if the software actually does remove the virus and if there is another sting some time later to coerce yet more more money out of infected users. Or even if, once the initial infection is removed, what other, more sinister things might be going on now that you have given the software unlimited access to your data. Either way, there was no chance whatsoever I was going to give money to this source for a removal method that I had no reason to trust.

How I got infected.

How I got infected is a little embarrassing to say the least. It was Beijing 2008 Olympics opening ceremony day and like many across the globe I was keen to get some news and sights of the opening ceremony and so entered the appropriate search phrase into Google. Among the results was a blog entry talking about the opening ceremony and in the responses to the blog posting were several items claiming to be links to live updates on the opening ceremony.

LIke a fool chasing gold, I blinding clicked each of the links, not even thinking about what might be behind them. One of them said a download was required to view the associated video. You’d have thought that alarm bells would have rung loudly at this point, but no, on I clicked and by the time I realised what I’d done, it was too late.

On initial infection the virus redirects your browser to its own website and pops up a spoof warning of virus infection and attempts to convince you to download and install its own virus removal program. It was at this point that I realised my daft mistake and did not proceed with the download. I did not want to risk an further compromise of the system and I certainly was not going to trust an anti-virus solution that pre-infected me with a virus, in order to get me to install it to remove the virus.

Initial attempts at detection and removal.

With damage done, it was time to identify and remove the bugger.

The locally installed McAfee anti-virus completely failed to block the infection, and so did the corporate firewall. A post infection scan of the PC using the installed McAfee also failed to find anything.

With Internet access effectively disabled, I had to start up a colleagues PC in order to start investigating. A search of the name of the web page that Internet Explorer was being redirected to showed that this nasty little virus had infected a significant number of people, with posts in all sorts of technical forums moaning about its presence. Yet none giving credible removal descriptions. The only removal method I could see was to download some software, with a suspicious sounding name, that required a registration fee in order to perform the removal.

More searches on the virus revealed it has several guises, all relating to anti-virus removal. Several posts recommended software to remove it and all seemed suspicious. None of the recommended software names were recognised industry leaders in anti-virus software and all required a payment before the virus would be removed. Deeply suspicious, I decided that trusting in these anonymous suggestions was a bad move and failing to find any other removal instructions I decided to start the removal attempt myself.

Removal Failure

Having removed virus infections of other computers before, I was confident that I could be done with this one as well.

First up was to boot into safe mode and have a play. It seemed obvious to search the registry for the names that I was seeing come up as redirects. This drew a blank, as did a registry search for the executable names that I had uncovered in the Internet searches.

Time to try more scan options.

Another McAfee scan, still in safe mode, failed to find anything, even after an update. The next option was to fall back on a known web search that I have used before, ActiveScan from Panda Security. A full scan warned it could take some time, and take some time it did, close to 2 hours, the result was nothing found. Time to try something else. At home I use the free anti-virus and firewall software Avast!. Of the various home solutions on offer its the one I find the most useful and least intrusive. They also offer a free online scan, sadly this too found nothing.

By this time I was getting desperate, the day was nearly over and I really wanted to have the virus removed before it was time to go home. I had time for one more try. So I headed for the Microsoft website and downloaded Microsoft® Windows® Malicious Software Removal Tool and Windows Defender, both failed.

Dejected and somewhat annoyed I gave up and headed home for the weekend. Maybe I would have better luck on Monday. Except I was off on Monday and a colleagues was covering for me.

Success!

Said colleague had much better luck than me and after confirming the negative results from the software mentioned above found and downloaded Malwarebytes, installed and updated, it removed the virus and all has been good since.

So I had my first Flickr Favourite This Week

Now I am sure that everyone secretly wants all their photos to be popular and for praise to be heaped on them. But surely its better to receive praise that you consider yourself worthy of getting.

I’ll huff and I’ll puff

Originally uploaded by vteclimey

Take this photo as an example. Its of my daughter having a go at blowing the biggest bubble she can manage. The subject of the photo has pretty much come out as I intended, namely the circle of the bubble wand encircling her face.

While this is what I hoped for, the fact I got it is more accident than design. I was holding the wand in my left hand and the camera in my right, at hip level. So with no way of seeing the viewfinder I simply zoomed out and took about a dozen photos over a 5 minute period. The result was two images with her face within the circle, this one and the next one in the sequence, where the bubble has popped and she is squinting from the spray.

Now, while the moment captured is certainly lovely and I am sure I will look back at it in the future and have a chuckle. Photographically I am very disappointed in it. The need to zoom out to be more certain of capturing the the intended subject has included lots of distractions and the washing line growing out of her shoulder is a catastrophic failure when wanting to take any half decent photo of my kid in the garden. When you add in that the camera wasn’t even level (okay I can crop to fix that) the photo really does not stand out as anything special.

Yet, after all that, it is still the first of the photos that I have uploaded to Flickr that has received a favourite and the first of my photos that has been commented on by someone who I do not already know.

For me, this photo essentially proves the point that was made in a photography podcast I listened too last month. Which was, ‘It is better to take a great photo of something average than to take an average photo of something great’. Now being my daughter, there can be no greater subject that I could take a photo of, but have I actually done her any justice but taking such an average photo of her?

This leaves me in a quandary, what do I do now. You see the reason why I uploaded the photo in the first place was because a bunch of people I know all run a friendly monthly photo competition and out entries are judged and critiqued by last months winner. So I uploaded it more to fill my quota of 3 images than anything else, and because, well I liked the subject and wanted to see if the photo really was as average as I thought it was. Now that last months competition is over I would have deleted this photo, but suddenly I am left wondering, what is the etiquette for deleting a photo with a positive comment on? Is it an insult to the two who felt prompted to compliment it to delete it?

Yet another tedious blog

Should I start with ‘Hello World’? Maybe not, but how do you start your first blog post? Especially when you have no idea where it is going to go, what the intended audience is, or even if you’ll even bother to post another.

I am still asking myself why I even bothered starting one up, but hey, I’ll give it a go and if it turns out that I have nothing interesting to write about then I guess that will become painfully obvious and I can give up and go back to my XBOX 360.

As an IT worker specialising in Document Management, I suppose there is some logic to wanting to dip my fingure into the world of blogging. However, I have no intention of rambling endlessly on the highs and lows of the various issues and bugs (sorry features) that blight my professional life.

Being an incurrable Honda obsessive, I suspect that there will be at least one post thats related to Hondadom, or should that be Hondaism? Also expect to see posts about photography, I have owned my Nikon Coolpix 5700 since 2002 and will at some point be seeking a suitable digital SLR to replace it with.

On a much more personal note, I lost my Mum to pancreatic cancer this year, she faced it bravey and with the dignity that she faced all the challenges that life threw at her, she survived almost 4 years from the intial diagnosis and 3 years after the whipple procedure. Also this year I have been finding out what I can about my family history and am looking forward to the adventure that tracing ancesters brings. I still feel the loss of my mother greatly and imaging it will be that way for some time.