This year’s Christmas quiz has three questions. Send your answers by filling in the form below. The winner will win enormous amounts of street cred. No Googling. Answers will come on New Year’s Eve.
Christmas services in Wanstead hit a hitch
The traditional lineup of Christmas services in Wanstead churches will be a bit different this year with the absence of any services at Wanstead United Reformed Church. It has had to cancel all its services because its heating has broken.
There are still plenty of services to choose from, though, which are detailed in the listing below.
Good tidings
You have to admire the optimism of the folk behind Wanstead High Street’s soon-to-be newest coffee shop.
The Wagon Wanstead is getting ready to open in the former clothes shop Le Voyage – in what must be, by any standards, a crowded market. It’s just two doors down from the much admired Bare Brew and with 5SP not far in the other direction it’s surely going to be a challenge to bring something new. But at any time, and at this season especially, we wish them good luck in their new venture.
The Wanstead firm keeping people upright
The sound of crunching ice is music to Carl Marsh’s ears. His Wanstead company is helping people all over the country stay vertical on ice and deal with the challenges of winter weather.
Carl, of Seagry Road, set up Icegripper.co.uk after having lived in the Alps. It has now become one of the biggest websites specialising in winter footwear and has grown a dedicated audience all over the UK – and even some in places such as Finland. Snow boots, overshoes, special gripping attachments for shoes – they’re all its domain, and Carl has now started offering IceGripper’s own branded walking boots and ice grips.
He said: “I know it’s not only kids who love the snow – the number of people I’ve seen out walking in Wanstead over the past couple of days shows that. But nobody wants to be falling over – that’s where I can help.”
The company offers free delivery to anyone with and E11 postcode. Customers can also click and collect (free of postage charges) from Carl’s E11 base where he keeps a small amount of stock.
Wanstead snow pics, 2022
It’s some years since we’ve been able to run this much-loved feature, but today’s the day. With thanks to Melanie Hartt for these fine pictures. Please send any you would like included to info@wansteadium.com.
And this delightful addition to the canon from Ellen Pugh:
The bird feeding question
Bird flu continues to take its toll on wild birds – including the much admired black swan Bruce, who was formerly a beloved feature of Eagle Pond.
And a debate is raging between those who fear feeding birds encourages them to come into contact with each other and thus risk spreading the disease, and those who think feeding the birds strengthens them and will make them more resilient.
Richard Arnopp of the Friends of Wanstead Parklands has set out their position on feeding – for the time being their advice follows that given by Epping Forest, which is that people should not feed birds. His full statement is below.
Richard Arnopp of Friends of Wanstead Park writes:
Avian Influenza – “bird flu” – has been much in the news in recent months, and nobody who visits the Friends’ Facebook page could be unaware of the impact it has had locally.
Bird flu is not new. It was first described in 1878 as “fowl plague” but has certainly been around a lot longer than that. The virus naturally spreads most readily among wild waterfowl and shorebirds worldwide and can infect domestic poultry and other bird and animal species. Unfortunately, many of the wild species which are most at risk are migratory, often over vast distances, and carry the virus with them.
Continue reading “The bird feeding question”