A slightly weird email arrived today from the Royal Parks in London promoting a new website and marketing campaign they are running to encourage people to have picnics in the Royal Parks.
What’s weird about it is that it is now September, and the key picnic season is well and truly behind us (especially as I look out of my window as I type and notice it is pouring down with rain), but also in my experience the last thing the parks need on a hot summers afternoon is yet more people having picnics!
St James Park at the very least is packed about as full as it can get without people ending up uncomfortably close to each other.
The accompanying photos also look a bit unlikely – as pelicans rarely get that close to people, dive bombing into the lake in Hyde Park is frowned upon and I wouldn’t want to be dining that close to deer during the upcoming rutting season!
Anyhow, their new website is at www.picnicintheparks.com and if you want to give them your phone number then you could enter a competition. I don’t give out my phone numbers unless there is a very good reason, so your chances of winning are a fraction of a percentage point higher.
Those photos are terrible! Why photoshop stuff that isn’t true when you’ve got great parks and nice views already. And the timing is way off, as you say.