As ever – I’m a bit late with this one. Remembrance Sunday, whilst the rest of the family were filling a pew, S and I were out on a spree, storing up memories for our futures. He was happy, in his impish hat, because to begin with at least he had many more puddles to explore. We knew well about these puddles because the night before we had been out in the downpours that created them, walking between firework displays, including one ill-advised trip through Eaves Wood in the dark – although it must be said that the show it took us to at Holgates Caravan park was spectacular. *
This morning wee were heading for the Cove, as suggested by TBH, because she had run round by the shore earlier and was surprised and impressed by the stream she found on the south side of the Cove. In fact that stream flows whenever it has been wet, which means pretty much all of the time in the winter.
First things first however – S knew that I was carrying snacks and had first demanded his share as we left the house, so we settled down for a minor munch…
S was happy with his ‘nack, the sun shone, what could be finer? A crow settled in the tree on the cliff top high above our heads and after some familiar cawing, began to issue clicking trills which called to mine nothing so much as the calls of dolphins. Quite surprising.
Anyway, S’s appetite momentarily appeased, we wandered over to examine the stream. That makes it sound easy when in fact S found the wet shale very difficult to walk on. But when we got there he had a paddle in the stream and in the mud of the bay and was very happy.
The stream is quite sizable for a temporary affair.
It rises up amongst the shale towards the back of the beach. It’s hard at the top of the beach to be clear exactly where the edges of the stream are and where all of the water is coming from, but there is one obvious spring where the water boils furiously…
S took me back to the bench, confident that I would have another snack for him secreted about my person somewhere (he was right). Then he wanted to look in the smelly cave…
The dark shape in the bottom right of the picture was a large rust coloured lump.
We’ve seen pieces of this stuff here before, but this was much larger then any we’ve found before. To give an idea of the scale, that’s a half brick poking out slightly left of centre. So this is man made? Or conglomerate of man-made waste, perhaps another remnant of the Victorian rubbish tip here?
Below the cave the sunlight was glinting on a vein of white crystalline material – quartz?
As we left the Cove via the cliff top path to the Lots, another (or the same) crow landed in a tree above our heads and emitted a series of very expressive soft squawks and moans quite unlike what I would expect to hear from a crow. Perhaps it was trying to tell us something?
We finished our walk with another autumn favourite – kicking up leaves.
*(And here I am on a Friday night, contemplating another early start tomorrow whilst the reading on the barometer plummets and the rain lashes down outside creating yet more water features.)
Beating The Bounds 