It is probably a week since I last walked any of my regular local routes. The weather was perfect today so I even got going before lunchtime. In the strange days we are living in, time has become warped and I have almost arrived at the position of ignoring it. That’s not all that different from my usual lifestyle. I’ve been setting a bi-weekly quiz for some friends during the lockdown and one of them commented today that if it wasn’t for the regular Thursday and Sunday questions he wouldn’t know which day of the week it was.
Since I was last out the countryside has subtly changed. The lambs have grown fatter, the grass has grown longer and the flowers have moved into another cycle. Gone are the bluebells, sorrel and primroses and more colour is now evident in the hedgerows with stitchwort, buttercups, vetch, ragged robin and blue speedwells.
Comfrey and Cow Parsley.
Red Campion.
Buttercup.
Stitchwort, chickweed.
Speedwell.
The hawthorn has flowered replacing the blackthorn and what is noticeable is the sweet aroma from it. Its blossoming marks the point at which spring turns into summer, and the old saying ‘Cast ne’er a clout ere May is out’ almost certainly refers to the opening of hawthorn flowers rather than the end of the month.
Hawthorn.
The small amounts of road I have to walk on are a nightmare with some of the worst driving I’ve witnessed for a while. I read that the police are out to catch speeding drivers this weekend at the worst hotspots.
With the weather being so good I joined several of my local field paths together and ended up doing about 6 miles without noticing the time. There is no end to lockdown, as far as I’m concerned, so I’ll probably write up the same walk next week and wonder where the time has gone. But nature marches on and there will be changes underfoot to remind me of the passing year, a year I’ve all but written off for getting away.
*****
A very similar pattern for me. I am happy enough but very conscious of the value of time considering my advanced years so I walk every day to retain some fitness hoping I that will be enough to enable me to do some multi day stuff as and when the opportunity arrives.
I’m sure you have plenty of plans. Maybe make them winter walks!
That straight line is still there.
I’ve not even had my watch on. Gives a new meaning to time,
Interestingly, as hinted in my post, I never wear a watch so have developed a normally acute feeling for the time of day. That’s slipping away at the moment – better get up!
I’ve noticed the quieter roads have definitely given rise to some very dangerous driving, as if it was only the sheer weight of traffic that was holding some idiots back. I’m losing track of time as well, and I suppose there’s a risk of seeing this as a lost year, but I suspect us walking types look will back and realize it was the year we really connected with our local environment.
I’m happy to stay local, I certainly don’t want to catch the virus so I won’t be going to Blackpool this weekend.
I keep trying to find different slants to my walks, the changing face of nature over the weeks has been absorbing. As you say connecting to the environment.
Best wishes in these times.
You’re certainly right about time passing by and the changes in nature. On Wednesday, less than three weeks since the Jumbles walk I featured on this Monday’s blog post, I went that way again and found the reservoir water level much lower than previously. The quarry, which still had quite a lot of water in it before, is now so dry that I was able to walk along the bottom of it and the stream feeding it is now visible. The hawthorn is now blossoming everywhere – I really love its scent – though there are still plenty of bluebells around, carpets of them in one of the meadows I walked through 🙂
Yes, the hawthorn blossom scent fills the lanes, maybe there is less traffic pollution.
Were there any secret relics exposed in the bottom of the dried-up pond? My mind goes back to America black and white ‘B’ movies where a body or a safe is discovered after so many years.
I tried to locate exactly on the map where that little quarry next Jumbles was.
Nothing in the bottom of the quarry itself only tree branches and big lumps of stone. In the bottom of the actual reservoir not far from the sailing club are the remains of the old bleaching mills, little more than foundations really but still visible on rare occasions if much of the reservoir dries up. It did one year, back in the late 1990s, we walked along the bottom and I took some snaps of the mills’ remains but strangely I’ve never been able to find any reference to the Jumbles drying up to such an extent.