Red

Grey-green

It had rained heavily overnight but in the warmth of July the paths were already dry by the time I set out for the morning walk.  No sun though, grey and overcast, and you had to pay attention and look for the things that make you catch your breath, that make you happy. I'm trying to make a point each day on my walk to find something that does exactly that.  I would almost term it a spiritual practice but that's far too formal and solemn and not what the exercise is about. Today it was the soft, muted grey-green of the trees (willow, rowan, sycamore) bordering the river. 
 
The start of the river path is marked by a group of three tall and majestic aspens. (I do love the French word for the tree: le tremble).   Is it fanciful to say that these trees have an aura?  Well, too bad because they do.  The leaves rustle and quiver, whispering, at the slightest hint of a breeze. I draw breath and relax a bit each time I enter the glade.

****

It's Tour de France time again!  I'm a fan. This year it's starting in Yorkshire no less, and ITV4 is as usual doing us proud with its coverage.  I have to admit I watch as much for the fabulous scenery as for the finer points of the race itself but there is just enough jingoism left in me to hope, probably vainly, for a British win.  More than that though I hope that the race is clean.

Dog rose

It pays to venture out early on a sun-filled Sunday in early summer. Just me, the sun and nature in all her glory.   Destination: the river path. No-one else abroad and abundant waves of birdsong, near and far, call and response.  Luxuriant vegetation, waist high grasses of all kinds, brambles, goosegrass, thistles, dog roses (a favourite).  The soft murmur of the river, quiet and peaceful now.  For the first time I feel a hint of what I was able to do five years ago, how much I used to love this kind of solitary rural meandering - and nurture a sense that this is gradually being restored.  I feel a timid, anxious mixture of hope and gratitude.

Neighbourhood

 I love this time of year.

I live in a typical 1980s housing development.   A cul de sac of houses, varying sizes, on the outskirts of  town.  One of the pluses is that we are a short distance away from open country and the river, and thus my morning rehab walks generally take me in this direction. A bit further each day.  On other days my head rules my heart and I take the busy, far less pleasant route that leads into town because I'm aiming to reach the nearest letterbox, which will mean independence, i.e. no need to ask someone else to post my mail.

But this morning it was the river walk and a kind of celebration.  I walked far enough to catch sight of the river itself - haven't glimpsed it from this spot for nearly five years.   You have to look closely but it is definitely there, just behind the froth of cow parsley.

Even the walk home can claim its own delights.  One of the houses has what you would call a cottage garden.  Cornflowers, irises, pansies, foxgloves. Shrubs. Bushes. A copper beech.  All gorgeously unkempt and unmanicured, unlike the adjoining plots (mine included).  I'd like to stop and just stare but I don't - the owners might think I'm planning a robbery or somesuch.

And as a bonus the friendliest of cats lives here.  She walks towards me and rolls over in pleasure. Later she allows me to stroke her.  I feel duly honoured.  My sort of garden. My sort of cat. 

 

Movement

Midnight. Through the bedroom window the moon is hidden but the long strips of cloud moving across the sky are back-lit with cool silver. In the distance a car speeds by and across the black fields the river flows on alone and silent. The world turns and when I awake it is still dark. The first train of the day rumbles its way north while I watch Jupiter descend towards the horizon, ice-bright and as fiery and pure as a diamond. The rising sun and a rhythmic swish of wings of a flight of geese and high above a speck of a plane leaves a solitary vapour trail.

Respite

The object of walking is to relax the mind. You should therefore not permit yourself even to think while you walk but divert yourself by the objects surrounding you. Walking is the best possible exercise.

Thomas Jefferson


Sunrise. Day off, the last one ahead of a work scramble to meet a deadline. For the first time for aeons the rain has stopped and the sun is shining. I need to get out of the house. Throw on clothes, a parka and wellington boots and head for the fields with the camera. Nothing like photography, with the focus and attention on the present that it demands, to curb - if not stop - obsessive thinking.

The air is cool and fresh, the sky a pale blue. Puffballs of cloud blown along by a gusty south-west wind periodically hide the sun and the drop in temperature at these times is noticeable. The morning light extraordinary, as it so often is. Crows pass overhead, cawing, then drop from the sky onto a newly ploughed field. A faint deep throb of machinery from the small industrial estate hidden behind a barrier of trees can be felt, rather than heard.

No-one else to be seen. It is midweek, after all, and most people are at work.

Just past the railway bridge, a touch of the surreal.


The river flooded recently. My guess: an angler’s chair, temporarily moved to higher ground. A group of mallards are swept downstream by the force of the current and I watch them until they disappear from view. They speed past, imperturbable, bobbing on the surface of the water. I stop and turn around, looking for my visual touchstone, the ridge of the Black Mountains on the western horizon. The wind strengthens, buffets a mass of gold-brown leaves on the oak tree, but they cling on tightly, reluctant to leave their branches.

At the hawthorn bush I turn for home. Under the arches of the bridge, a hint of the macabre. A doll’s leg half buried in the mud, left behind by the floodwater. No sign of the torso.

****

A lunch meeting in town. Good talk. Then back to prune the ivy that grows up the side of the house. It is starting to grow over the electricity and gas meter boxes and must be cleared. Cut back the lavender and trim the dead fuchsia stalks, raw material galore for the compost heap.

The cat sits in the November sun and makes a show of supervising my efforts, but his heart isn’t in it. After a few minutes, with a twitch of the tail, he wanders back indoors.



I didn’t have high expectations for the day. It surprised me with its perfection.

Halloween

The most recent attempt to finish a Harry Potter novel. Failure once again in spite of the cat’s unexpected attempt to up the fear factor (moral: always have a camera to hand). I realise I am in a minority.

****

One stormy night this week a friend and I cycled home in the dark along the river path. A section unlit, overgrown and so narrow that we pedalled silently in single file, headlights bobbing in the dark like a pair of foolhardy fireflies. Rain beat in our faces and the cold cut to the bone but exertion and waterproofs minimised the discomfort.

Elemental. The river to our left, a dim, eerie grey-green, its surface ruffled and harried by the force of the wind. Bare willow branches tossed this way and yon, in terror or ecstasy. Wet face and hair and a pulse of wild exhilaration.

****

Halloween

Imminence. Deep darkness
wraps itself around us:
hidden lanterns glow.

River Path

Click to enlarge.


Brown water murmurs
and churns,
its current
tugging fretfully
at the willow branches.
Come with me.

....

A boy on a red bicycle
hurrying to reach
his future
anxious to overtake me,
saying excuse me
pedals by.

....

I move aside
and watch them pass.

Deluge

Compared to the flood-induced misery in other parts of the world, or even just down the road or across the border, this is nothing. Mere inconvenience. But the rain certainly has been tipping down these past two days. Wave after wave of it, sweeping in off the Atlantic.

This morning, a quick bicycle ride to the supermarket.



The usual route was impassable.



His owner and I compared notes on floods and rumours of floods.

After lunch, between downpours, a dash to the fields at the back to check on the river where I meet up with two neighbours doing the same thing. We riparian dwellers (a new adjective to me, h/t the Environment Agency website) keep a close eye on the water levels in our locality. Our little development hasn't flooded yet but ....



... cattle grazed here a few days ago, now it belongs to the ducks. (Apologies for the smudge on the camera lens. A raindrop.) A sudden roll of thunder provided an apocalyptic soundtrack.

****

You can always rely on the BBC to be prepared. An outside broadcast unit was in town yesterday. They had obviously taken note of their own weather forecast.

River

I'm lucky. I knew I wanted to live near the river and now it is just a five minute walk away, bordered by fields where cattle graze.

Sometimes we regard it with apprehension. If enough rain falls in Wales, then sure enough a day or two later we are flooded. The reason these fields have survived being snapped up for housing is that they do double duty as a flood plain. No insurer would look at anything built on them.

I remember the first time I saw it in spate. It is terrifying. Angry. What shook me was the volume of the noise made by the rushing water. Stained reddish-brown by the topsoil gathered from flooded fields, the river boils and it roars. Whole tree trunks and branches are caught up, swept through the town and onwards downstream as swans, ducks and humans retreat to higher ground to wait out the torrent. Mostly though the Wye wears a tranquil face, a fisherman's and a canoeist's delight. At one time it was used for navigation - the path in the photos below was once a towpath - but no longer. Dog walkers and hikers now keep the grass short.

****

The internal combusion engine holds sway. The powers that be have recently decided that a major bypass should be built to cross the river just beyond where the cows are grazing in the bottom picture, near a rookery and the nesting site of a pair of buzzards. It will take years; the plans will be protested for many reasons, not all of them scenic and aesthetic. I'll do my part with local environmental groups, but I suspect the outcome may be inevitable.

Now I walk these fields with a sense of foreboding and try to to imprint on my memory the solitude, the sound of running water, the exact detail of a leaf, a bird. All of them ephemeral.

Love of place. Not dissimilar to love of a person.








The usual advice: it really is worth clicking to enlarge the photographs.

Links:

River Wye, Wikipedia
Wye Valley, Wikipedia
Wye Valley, AONB
CPRE transport page