AT 80 years old, Walter Warburton amazes his family by keeping up with computer technology at his college course and intricate needle craft in an embroidery class.

And he does all this with the help of Honey, his three and a half year old Golden Labrador guide dog.

Walter, of Worsley Road, Swinton, has been registered blind since 1995 and travels to Bolton Community College's visually impaired centre several times a week.

He is now in the third year of his word processing course and loves to keep busy.

He said: "I believe in doing something to keep your mind active. It's too easy to shut down and do nothing."

And this is not the first course that Walter has attempted. He has also taken part in an embroidery course when he was the only man in a class full of women.

Every week, Walter travels from Swinton with his wife Mary, aged 88, and Honey, to Moor Lane bus station.

Mary then takes him to the college in Manchester Road.

The college has specially adapted screens on their computers to enable the text to be made bigger for Walter.

And since he retired from the physics department at Salford University, Walter spends his relaxation time listening to the radio and to talking books. He said: "I love listening to books by Dick Francis and Catherine Cookson, and I have recently started Richard Branson's autobiography which is very good."