Last night at approximately 8pm I finally “captured” the final BeeInTheCity. I had to really push myself to make the journey to Manchester Airport to see “80 Ways Around The World”. I was cold, wet and tired. But – it was worth it. The sense of achievement was immense, although I felt a little emotional knowing that my bee adventure was now over.

During the past couple of weeks I had travelled miles by car, train and walking. I had taken approximately 5000 photographs (not all of bees!) and had met some wonderful individuals and families on my quest. The time, money and effort spent on my mission to photograph all of the 101 giant bees has definitely been worth it. I have discovered areas of the city I have never ventured into before, despite living in Greater Manchester for over 20 years, and have learnt a lot about the amazing history of the area; the suffragette movement, the music, culture, people, technology and much more.

Perhaps one of the highlights of Bee in The City was the need to visit venues and attractions I have never thought of visiting before – The People’s History Museum, Manchester Cathedral, The Whitworth, to name just a few. Not being a tourist in the city, it is easy to forget that these places exist. Before the end of this year I plan to properly visit each and every tourist attraction that has hosted a bee. It would have been great to have spent more time in each of them whilst I was there, but there was a task to complete!

Over the next few days I plan to upload a photo of every bee to the Giant Bees Page, before starting to create the pages with the galleries for each individual bee. I’ll also be making my list of my favourite bees for the blog and eventually creating a giant A1 poster for the office.

Now seems like a good opportunity to thank everyone involved in Bee In The City – Manchester City Council and Wild in Art, Biffa for keeping the statues clean and tidy, the sponsors, artists and designers, the venues that have hosted the bees, and of course the people of Manchester (and beyond) who have supported such a fantastic project. Without you, none of this could have happened, and I could not have had such an amazing adventure!

Keep up with developments to the site via twitter.