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This tickled my fancy when gazing up at the train departure board at King's Cross in London. Very telling that the test for their system was to have a delayed train...

Gordon Brown today hailed the chaos at Heathrow Terminal 5 as a positive step towards curbing air travel and its associated environmental damage.

The large number of cancelled flights was helping to contribute to massive savings in CO2 emissions. Bringing the government back on track with its environmental targets.

David Cameroon, leader of the opposition, said this was a big turnaround for the government: "Originally the Labour government was going to achieve its environmental targets by taxing the public on the necessities of survival." He admitted that Mr Brown had pulled off a political coup by "cutting down on emissions that were easy to control and won't hurt people's day-to-day living".

Even environmental groups were left reeling from this sudden change of heart. A spokesman for Greenpeas was reported as saying, "we applaud this switch of policy by the government; air travel is a luxury and puts CO2 into the area of the atmosphere where it causes most damage." In the meantime a spokesman for Friends of the Girth said "...we're going to have to radically rethink our position with regards to the British Government's plans for expanding airports. Clearly larger airports now result in fewer flights..."

As part of our ongoing (ongaring) service to you, we trawl through our archives and bring you interesting photos of yesteryear. Two years ago, as part of our nofear monkey tour of europe we spotted this amusingly entitled hotel in Bruges:

Those of you with a smattering of French and a knowledge of our simian obsession will no doubt realise what the joke is.

For some reason or another I needed to do a walk from Hadleigh in Suffolk, and due to various circumstances I also couldn’t obtain a car for transport. I could have cycled to get one, but after discussing the various logistics I decided to opt for a car free, and slightly more adventurous approach to achieving this.

Today we headed over to the Welney Wildfowl Reserve, one of several sites run by the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust. We were lucky to have a really nice day for it, warm sunshine and not too strong a wind considering we were in the depths of The Fens.

The visitors centre is an mazing building, built as a modern take on a fenland barn and fitted with solar panels it fits in well next to the banks of The One Hundred Foot Washes. Armed with camcorder (with flat battery - currently recharging), and also with stills camera we visited the main hide to capture the feed at 3.30pm. Before the feed took place there was a brief talk by an employee of the centre. She informed us that normally we would be able to walk across the washes to the Old Bedford River. The flood water contained in the washes was currently preventing various local towns from being drowned, the old system of waterways and washes is still working well apparently.

Feeding time transformed the water into a white-water frenzy. I took another few snaps. Here we see a mixture of Whooper and Mute Swans feeding with various ducks, plovers and mallards to name but two.

This seemed like a good place to come again, with binoculars. After the flooding has subsided this would enable a more interesting exploration of the wetlands.

I noticed this sticker at a local railway station recently. Someone clearly has a grudge against traffic wardens. Also spotted (but alas, I had no camera at the time) stuck to a table on a train, was a sticker that read "Get a free digital camera and a Nazi uniform, become a traffic warden twat".

Someone must really hate traffic wardens to go to this effort! I plan to thwart his efforts with an "Imagine sitting down and telling your child your job is so unfulfulling you spend your spare time sticking meaningless labels on public property". (oh the irony)

We in Cambridge are in the rather ignominious position of having risen to fame in recent hours thanks to the arrest of a local man suspected of carrying out the recent letter bombing campaign that has been cleverly down-played by the media. In this time where environmental impact is being discussed so relentlessly why is this dichotomy of freedom versus the environment coming to a head only now?

For several months now I've been toying with the idea of turning up to a Cambridge Critical Mass ride. On checking their website however I've now discovered that they have admitted - in flowery terminology - that turnout for these events has been much lower than is required to keep them viable.

For those who don't know a "Critical Mass" ride is essentially a protest ride by cyclists where they ride en-mass to show that there are cyclists in that city and that they should be respected by other road users. To be honest I'm not surprised that the Cambridge (UK) version is not as popular. If you look at cities where Critical Mass events take place regularly, Frisco, NY, London etc what you see is that these are large super-cities where cyclists are under represented and cyclists are essentially in fear of using the roads.

Cambridge does not need a Critical Mass, since there is no reason - at present - to protest about under representation or about attitudes from other road users. In essence if you want to see large groups of cyclists using Cambridge roads and cycle facilities, merely watch the everyday traffic in the city. Photos coming soon!

If there were a spate of accidents involving cyclist casualties at the hands of motor vehicles, or a change to council regulation with respect to road planning and cycle accomodation then I'm sure protest rides would gain more interest. At the present time though it would seem that it is an unecessary protest.

In preparation for my cycle ride from Land's End to John o'Groats next August (more on that story later), I decided that as well as regular 50 mile training rides, I ought to do a 3 or 4 day tour around East Anglia.

My trusty "Cycling Britain" lonely planet guidebook has some great rides, as well as recommendations for places to stay and eat. This guide is only four years old, but imagine my surprise when I realised just how much inflation seems to have taken hold in England's B & B industry when comparing todays prices against those in the guidebook.

For example, in 2001 a stay in the Church Farmhouse at Uggeshall "start from £22 per person". Today, their cheapest price is "from £35". Quite an increase, but possibly reasonable for 4 years. Unlike the next one on my list.

The Northcliffe B & B in Southwold charged "from £22 to £30 per person". Today, those prices are "from £70.00 per room per night inclusive of breakfast and VAT". Hello! More than 3 times the price than they were 4 years ago. What are the owners doing, serving beluga caviar for breakfast??

Perhaps it is just Southwold that has suffered from crippling inflation, so let us move next to Wells-next-the-Sea, near Blakeney Point. Lonely Planet says for the Eastdene guesthouse "charges from £18 per person". Eastdene says "Singles from: £30 Doubles from: £50". Not bad, almost a doubling in price. Incidently, Eastdene was one of the cheapest guesthouses in Wells. Others went as high as £230. I'd expect a handjob and a massage included for that price.

Now, perhaps I am a little naive when it comes to Bed and Breakfast accomodation, and maybe these prices are not only negotiable, but also peak season prices. Even so, I am staggered by the sharp increase in pricing in only 4 years. I do wonder if these places are often fully booked.

Before anyone mentions it, I am entirely familiar with the concept of using youth hostels for my accomodation needs, but they are few and far between on the East Coast of England!

One of the pleasures of travel is in taking delight in the simple things. This year's nofear cultural bummel was to Daneland, and more specifically Zeeland.

Whilst taking in the sites, sounds and smells of this country we became aware of the prevalence of the sound of unstifled coughs, hawkings and phlegmings of the inhabitants of this island. All around us, men, young and old alike, seemed to revel in the acoustic resonance of their lungs, throats and mouths. To such an extent sometimes that we wondered weather or not there was a biological attack in progress. (Although some may say that in many ways this was a biological attack)

There was insufficient time to determine whether or not the behaviour was sociological or a product of the environment, being close to the sea air. During our trips to the 'Netto' supermarket chain we noticed the feast of cough drops and pastilles available for sale, of which the photo above is an example of just one.