row, row, row your boat, gently down the AAAAaaarrggghhhh

What's wrong with this picture?


Aaah, the cerulean blue sky, the rolling green sward of the hills in the background, the deeper blue of the water, the outstretched limbs of the trees on the bank, oh dear sweet mother of Jesus the sucking hellhole in the foreground.

My advice, and you can take it or leave it at your discretion, is not to take your loved one out for a romantic jaunt on a lake in a dinghy with a hamper of scones and Pimm's if there's been a lot of heavy rain recently, and furthermore if said lake happens to be a manmade reservoir equipped with what some describe as a "bellmouth overflow" and others (more colourfully I think) describe as a "glory hole spillway", as there is a very real chance that you could drift inadvertently into one of these and emerge as an interesting dilute solution of mince and sawdust at the base of the dam a few seconds later.

The one pictured above is in the USA, but there are a couple in the UK. This interesting page has some pictures of what purports to be the biggest one in the world, next to the Monticello Dam at the end of Lake Berryessa in California, as well as some details of some other interesting (man-made) holes. The obvious hole-related temptations relating to Paris Hilton, yo mama, etc. have, mercifully, been avoided (well, except in the comments).

Most dams handle overspill slightly differently by just having a section removed from the dam over which water can flow, like the near portion of the dam on Wimbleball Lake on Exmoor, pictured here when we were there in September. No actual flow at this point, though, as the water level was relatively low.

And yes, I know that's two dam-related posts in a few days. What of it?