Colds and cold

On Sunday night bumble bees invaded my nose and my head filled with soggy wool. The first winter cold...and a growing sense that the December deadline for Disney artworks was looming nearer. Tried to work but couldn't. Warm bed and cats the only option. I became very aware of the precarious position of freelancing, when time is money and there is no company safety net. Then the snow arrived. And the news that I can relax about the deadline because the project people are away on a business trip...so yesterday we escaped to to the woods with a Thermos of hot chocolate.

The pathways were scattered with pheasant tracks and deer prints. Scurrying in the undergrowth from foraging birds and the trees dripping a musical splattering of melting snow. We headed for the end of woods, where the stalky pines are lined up in eery regiments. There is a cold, stern atmosphere here - thickly layered pine needles muffle footfall. Foxgloves and Fly Agaric thrive in the acidic soil. If fairies live here, they are dark, trollish creatures, lurking in rotten, mossy stumps.

The sun was a fleeting visitor and the chill fell heavily. The only animals to be seen - some young milkers foraging in the fading light.

This morning, the snow is melting and my cold is - almost - gone.

Woodland creep

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A wonderful sunny afternoon and the woods were calling. Our nature reserve is a little like any small town; the most popular central part is the best looked after, with easy paths and carefully managed trees. The seasons are shown at their best and the beech grove soars to the blue Heavens, a silver temple with a fine carpet of copper and rugs of moss.

Wander further, and it becomes a little unkempt..the trees straggle lazily and the paths are more tussocky. It has a bohemiam, ramshackle air, so enchanting that you almost don't notice you are entering the industrial zone...

Now there is sign of Human Activity. Regimented pine trees planted close, huddling together to create a dark, dank atmosphere. Here and there are scattered newly hewn carasses, logs piled in chillingly neat rows. The stench of pine sap hangs low beneath the boughs.



I pass the old shepherd's hut.

It has been nailed shut for many a year and I always creep past it, not wishing to disturb...whatever is inside. I fancy that if I went too close, the door would burst open and there, nailed to the rotting walls would be...







I hurry on to the outskirts, to the forgotten lands, where elder and hawthorn have grown ancient and untamed. Thick fingered ivy creepers smother entire trees, and where trees fall, they remain, growing mossy and fungus laden. There is a scritchy scratchy frailty to these old shrubs, brittle branches jostling and snapping. Yet Spring will see them lift their hearts to the sun and cover themselves with gauzy veils of greenery again.

From distant fields I hear the baying of hounds and the eerie wail of the hunt horn. Somewhere - despite the recent restrictions on hunting with dogs - a fox is being pursued. The primival sound of the hunt draws nearer and fearfully, like a hunted creature myself, I head back into the heart of the woods, away from shadows and death. Back to where the silver birchs stretch languidly to the sky, trailing slender fingers through the blue. In the undergrowth lie many casualties - the tall beauties who have been felled by the recent blustery winds; Autumn has been too rough with his toys. Already fungus are establishing miniature cities on the living and the dead. I pass the Fairy Pool, a still, fuggy mirror which may have something lurking beneath its still surface.

The short afternoon is dwindling into sunset. Now it is time for home and tea. I have wandered through the woodland for over two hours, and not met a single soul.

Winter wanderings

Mindful of the warning of the weather forecasters (..."it's going to RAIN HEAVILY this weekend...") I played hooky today and went for a long walk. It has been a mild, damp October, but now Winter is tapping his finger on Autumn's shoulder and saying 'excuse me...MY turn, I think'. The recent winds have layered the ground in a thick blanket and there is a hushed atmosphere as the woodland prepares for the big sleep...

The fungi are almost over...there are a few stragglers, and like latecomers at a party, they are a bit odd and often slimey...

Such dramatic lighting - we are situated many feet above sea level and the landscape spreads out beneath a bowl of sky. You can see the weather changing in the next county and watch as the winds kick the rainclouds into Oxfordshire.

The bareness of the hedgerows has revealed bright jewels...


















...but evening draws in quickly now, and the path leads homewards...to hot chocolate and home made apple pie. Some compensation for the dark and the cold.

A walk in the woods

Sunday was a golden day, when summer and autumn decided to play together nicely like good children. They even shared their toys; summer brought along some late butterflies and opened the last hedgerow flowers, while autumn scattered his first bright leaves and pushed up a gorgeous array of toadstools.

After a mind numbing 12 years in retail management, Andy is starting to draw again. So armed with drawing board and assorted pencil type things, we visited the local nature reserve.

I left him in front of a tree stump and pottered off in search of fungi. There are 200 species to be found here. Here is the Stagshorn fungus -

After an hour or so, even I had had enough of the wonders of mycology and returned to find the first step on the road to recovery.