These photos come from two short, late strolls to the Cove and across the Lots with TBH, back in mid-September. On both occasions we set off as the sun was setting, on days when the weather had been poor and, not learning my lesson the first time, I neglected to take my camera on both evenings, so had to settle for using my phone to take pictures.
Farewell to the sun.
Rain on Humphrey Head.
When Mark E. Smith passed away earlier this year, somehow I never got around to mentioning the great pleasure he and The Fall had given me over the years. (Every Fall fan has their own personal favourite album, mine is ‘Slates, Slags etc’, perhaps not an obvious one). This week, sadly, Pete Shelley of the Buzzcocks has passed too.
I can’t pick out a favourite Buzzcocks track – I listened to the ‘Spiral Scratch’ e.p., their first two albums and the ‘Singles: Going Steady’ compilation endlessly for many years. Not so much recently, which, listening back to them again now, is obviously my loss. They say that you know that you are getting old, when police officers seem young, but a more telling measure must be when the singers you admired in your formative years start to shuffle off to the great gig in the sky.
We’re surely overdue some sunset photos from the Cove?
These photos date back to consecutive Friday and Saturday evenings back in September. The Saturday was notable because A started a paper-round. I joined her in order to learn the route in preparation for the many weekends when she isn’t available, for one reason or another.
The Tower Captain spotted me delivering papers recently and asked whether I was making a bid to be the nation’s oldest paperboy. Cheeky ***!
I usually pad out these brief posts, from a short familiar walk to the Cove and across the Lots, with some music. Something by Eli ‘Paperboy’ Reed seemed appropriate, but, as often happens, I got distracted whilst searching for a song to use and somehow found myself listening again to Labi Siffre’s ‘I Got The…’.
It’s been sampled frequently, most famously for Eminem’s ‘My Name Is’. (Which is exceptionally dull by comparison with the original, in my opinion at least). Interestingly, two of the session musician’s on the recording were Chas and Dave. Labi Siffre has been mentioned on the blog before, when I visited the last resting place of Arthur Ransome and his wife Evgenia, because when Siffre appeared on Radio 4’s ‘Great Lives’ he championed the case for Ransome and his ‘Swallows and Amazons’ books.
Back at home, I redecorated the kitchen. Again. In white. I have a mania for repainting white walls in white. Still, that’s that job done and forgotten about for………at least a month or two. It wasn’t all bad – whilst I was painting, we had several visits from Roe Deer – of which more to follow. I also listened to a great deal of Radio 6 and have become quite addicted to being reminded of great songs I haven’t heard for years, or, better yet, hearing great songs I’ve never heard before.
I also got out for occasional strolls from time to time. This day brought two walks – both organised around errands.
TBH and I walked over to the Silver Sapling Campsite to search for TBH’s missing (new) glasses in amongst all the tents which were drying out from their ordeal at the Red Rose Jamboree.
It was a fruitless search, but there were lots of Common Darters about, so not a complete waste of time.
Later I was in Arnside. I think A must have had a piano lesson. I strolled along the promenade…
…admiring this chap’s kite-surfing skills.
I must admit, it looked like great fun.
He had a small audience and was definitely playing to the crowd, leaping up and using the kite to briefly, but spectacularly, fly through the air. Very clever. I bet his kitchen walls are not a pristine white like ours though.
This is one of those tunes which I would have missed, but for my new found enthusiasm for Radio 6. It seems apposite, or at least the title does. Doesn’t Baxter Dury sound like his dad here?
Eaves Wood – Castlebarrow – The Row – Bank Well – Lambert’s Meadow – Burtonwell Wood – The Green – The Clifftop – Woodwell – Bottom’s Wood – The Lots – The Cove.
A dull and damp day, so I didn’t take all that many photos, except of the host of insects which were feeding on a clump of Devil’s-bit Scabious at the edge of Lambert’s Meadow. None of them came out too sharply, but I’ve chosen this one of a hoverfly because I liked the neat pattern on it’s abdomen.
Red Bartsia.
Water Mint.
Speckled Wood.
And finally, not really relevant to this post, but here’s a song by the brilliant Tony Joe White, who died last week…
I decided to take an evening stroll down to Leighton Moss, thinking that on previous summer-evenings I’d seen Red Deer swimming in the meres near to Grizedale Hide and that maybe I would see them again.
Dryad’s Saddle.
Distant Great Spotted Woodpecker.
In the event, whilst I did spot a couple of deer, they were partially hidden in amongst the reeds. Fortunately, there was plenty more to see.
I particularly enjoyed the antics of this Little Egret. Unlike Herons – patient hunters which don’t generally move very much or very quickly, Little Egrets wander about, stirring up the mud at the bottom of the pond hoping to dislodge likely prey.
A nearby tree had seven Cormorants perched in it…
I knew that Herons and Egrets like to congregate to roost in the evenings, but perhaps Cormorants do too.
There were some Proper Birders in the hide, nice chaps, who told me that there were both Marsh Harriers and Bitterns nesting nearby. They were hoping for a sight of the Bitterns, which didn’t materialise, but we did see both adult Harriers, although somewhat distantly…
I find that I can only sit in a hide for so long before I start to get itchy feet and when the sun disappeared, perhaps for the last time that day I thought, it was time to move on.
Anyway, I wanted to get home before it got too late. On my way back around the reserve, I diverted slightly to take in the view from the Sky Tower…
From there I watched a pair of Swans and their large family of cygnets swim across the mere in a stately line and then, reaching their nest, enter into a noisy dispute with some Coots, who obviously felt that they had squatters’ rights.
Then I noticed some sort of commotion in the water, between the two islands of reeds in the photograph above. Fish were jumping out of the water, but not the odd fish rising for a fly, this was lots of fish and the fish were seemingly leaping in groups, with the activity moving around the small area as if something were pursuing the fish beneath the water. I’ve seen this sort of thing once before and that was just after I thought I’d seen an Otter dive into the water from the Causeway which crosses the reserve. In the middle of the area where the commotion was taking place the RSPB have built a small wooden platform. There were numerous birds on that platform and they were all obviously aware of what was going on too. The ducks all took to the water and headed swiftly away. The heron peered at the fish momentarily before unfurling its wings and also departing. Only the small white birds, which looked to be terns of some sort, didn’t seem to be bothered. Meanwhile a second area, along the edge of the mere, had also started to liven up with fish jumping this way and that. Perhaps there were a pair of Otters down there, doing a spot of fishing.
The area where this was all happening was right in front of Lillian’s Hide, so I thought I would head down there to see what I could see. When I got there, the fish were no longer leaping, but a disturbance in the reeds alerted me and there was my Otter, swimming along the channel in front of the hide. I lost sight of it, but there was another chap in the hide and, when I told him there was an otter nearby, he came up trumps by spotting it swimming away.
Not as good as my photos from this winter, but it’s not often that I get to see an Otter after work, so I was very happy.
The heron returned and I could see now why the terns were so unperturbed – they weren’t real – I suppose that this is an attempt to attract actual terns to nest on this faux island?
Buzzard.
By the time I was walking back across the fields towards home, I’d missed the sunset, but there was still lots of colour in the sky.
The moon was half hidden by this great swathe of pink clouds. Using the zoom on my camera I watched the moon as it was repeatedly veiled and unveiled by the clouds.
Searching for a title for the post, and reverting, as I often do, to songs titles half-remembered from my youth, I thought I could recall a song called Kaleidoscope Moon.
A bit of googling however, reminded me that the song I was thinking of was actually ‘Kaleidoscope World’ from the album of the same name by Kiwi band The Chills.
Other songs on the album were called ‘Rolling Moon’ and my own favourite ‘Pink Frost’, so maybe I had dimly muddled these three and somehow got ‘pink’, ‘moon’ and ‘kaleidoscope’ from the three songs. I’m surprised that I seem to have managed to almost completely forget this band, although some fragment of a memory was clearly lurking in the recesses of my mind, and I’m very happy to have been serendipitously jolted into recollection.
These photos are from a couple of weeks ago now. The dying embers of a beautiful sunny evening. As usual, I was in Kirkby Lonsdale for the boys Rugby practice on a Wednesday, and went for a wander along the Lune…
…past Ruskin’s View, through the churchyard and on to Devil’s Bridge. The display of Daffodils by St. Mary’s, and other flower strewn churchyards I’ve seen since, have had me digging out Francesca Greenoak’s book ‘God’s Acre’ which is about the flora and fauna likely to be found in a British churchyard, and, in turn, the title of that book put me in mind of the 10,000 Maniacs song ‘Lilydale’.
Come as we go far away
From the noise of the street
Walk a path so narrow
To a place where we feel at ease
Strange how my mind works: I haven’t listened to that album, ‘Songs from the Wishing Chair’, for years, but, at one time, I listened to it so frequently that I seem to be able to play it mentally on demand on some kind of internal radio.
Meanwhile…
April’s milage keeps me on course for my arbitrary 1000 mile target for the year. Once again, I didn’t match the early enthusiasm of January or February, despite the lighter evenings, but a couple of bouts of illness go some way to account for that. Not to worry, as of today I’ve clocked just over 450 miles so far, so I’m still ahead of schedule.
Right – off to find ‘Songs from the Wishing Chair’, time to get reacquainted with an old favourite.
Steep is the water tower
Painted off blue to match the sky
