July summary: political history and a glimpse of dystopia

July was a momentous month in the UK's political history, when after the general election of July 4th Labour overturned 14 years of Conservative rule with a massive landslide victory, making Sir Keir Starmer the 7th Labour Prime Minister and the 7th Prime Minister to serve the UK in the past 14 years.

King Charles officially appoints Sir Keir Starmer as Prime Minister

What was particularly remarkable about Labour's huge majority was that 5 years previously Boris Johnson's Conservatives had effectively wiped out Labour with its own huge landslide victory. Down here in Cornwall, the Conservatives held all six seats on July 4th. One day later they had none, four going to Labour and two to the Liberal Democrats, who became the 3rd place party with the highest number of MPs in 100 years.

Let's now hope that Labour's promise of change is one for the better. Maybe a good omen: Sir Kier Starmer is the first Prime Minister to have graduated from my alma mater, Leeds University, and his deputy leader, Angela Rayner is the MP for my home town of Ashton-u-Lyne!

And political history was made across the Atlantic when former President Donald Trump escaped death by millimetres when a bullet from an intended assassin scraped his ear at a Republican convention. Citing "divine intervention" his popularity soared above his Democratic rival, President Joe Biden, who stepped down from the Presidential race a week later due to failing health and endorsed his vice president, Kamala Harris, as Trump's opponent in the election contest.

Just when you think you have seen everything: Trump supporters the day after the shooting

Sporting history was made in July when the England Men's football team reached a major final for the first time on foreign soil. After a very dull start in the tournament they came alive in the semi-final of Euro 2024 to beat The Netherlands 2-1 to take them to Berlin and the final against Spain. But all credit to Spain, who were the better side and proved worthy of their 2-1 victory, England failing at the final hurdle as they did 3 years ago against Italy in Euro 2020 in London, which was delayed a year due to Covid. Spain had much to celebrate on July 14th, as a few hours before their football victory 21 year old Carlos Alcaraz demolished Novak Djokovic in the Wimbledon tennis final, denying the Serbian his 25th Grand Slam victory.

We were lucky in June to have unseasonable winter sunshine in Cape Town for Physical Separation '24 and Mill Circuits '24, but the weather a few weeks later in July was horrendous with torrential rain and flooding in the area around the Vineyard Hotel.

Flooding at Newlands, Cape Town

And July was pretty miserable here too, but we managed to dodge the rain and drizzle in the middle of the month with family visitors from Luxembourg and northern England.

Matt: The Telegraph

At the Chain Locker, Falmouth: Barbara, Amanda and son Will and my sister Pat and her husband Bill

At home with Amanda and sons, Jon and Kathryn and family and Barbara's sister and husband

My dystopian nightmare has always been a total collapse of the world's computer systems, caused by massive solar activity or a malicious cyber attack, and on the 19th of the month the world's biggest ever computer outage grounded thousands of flights, stalled banking and healthcare services, and badly hit other sectors. The cybersecurity firm, CrowdStrike, was responsible for the worldwide outages, a minor software update affecting many MS Windows users and providing a strong warning of how fragile our digital world is, our total reliance on electronics to sustain society and our daily lives.

Summer bloomed again on the last week of the month and Barbara and I made use of the hot and sunny weather to visit the surf capital of the UK, the bustling tourist mecca of Newquay, 25 miles from Falmouth on Cornwall's north coast. It is noisy and crowded in summer, but we found  tranquility in a one and a half mile walk from the busy harbour in the town to Fistral, the country's number 1 surfing beach.

Newquay harbour

Approaching the famous Headland Hotel at Fistral beach

Fistral beach

En route to Fistral we passed the historic Huer's Hut, thought to date from the 14th century. The hut was used by a huer at the time of year when shoals of pilchards were expected in the bay, a call on his horn raising the hue and cry alerting the townsfolk to the arrival of the fish. The hut also made history in 1967 when it was used as one of the locations for the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour during the group's 3 day stay in Newquay.

The Huer's Hut: with (right) George Harrison and John Lennon and crew members in 1967