I've joined an online band, following a question from David Wilson on the handbell ringers Facebook group. The original query was looking for someone to practise Phobos, but so far we have focused on Bristol Royal, attempting a quarter a couple of weeks ago and then succeeding yesterday. It had been a long time since I had done any online ringing - more than two years - and the memories have come flooding back. Yesterday the internet behaved slightly better than the first attempt, although there were still some sticky patches that took a lot of concentration to get through. Everyone stuck to their work and the method ringing was very good overall. It was a first quarter of Bristol Royal for David Wilson and Tom Farthing, and a first of Bristol Royal in hand for Cara Capewell. The fifth member of the band is Jeff Ladd, so we are a three-countries group (UK, USA and France).
The next method is Vernet-les-Bains Delight Royal (below), named after Jeff's tower. It's Phobos above the treble (well, a royal version of Phobos, so Remus) with a 2nd place lead end. It doesn't have the full Phobos backwork though, because bells below the treble escape from the back four places. As a result, the place bell order is different and less familiar. The pointy frontwork looks a little bit tricky, possibly. We've fixed an attempt in two weeks' time, so let's see how we get on. At the end of yesterday's session someone asked "Will Vernet-les-Bains be more or less difficult than Bristol?" - for me, the answer is "much more difficult" because Bristol has become so familiar.
