My walk this week took me wandering round the garden on a bright August day. I was sitting watching the birds flutter and fight over the feeder outside my studio where I was weaving and thinking about the similar aural textures of my activity and that of the birds.
If you listen to the soundscape below you may understand what I mean, but it could just be my imagination. Being able to get out, or at least look at, the natural environments around me is essential to my wellbeing.Continue reading
The wonders of the woodland, the lakes, the colours and the soundscape . . . and the textures and the bird life and the patterns and the fact that the rain held off for me on my walk this week around Gnoll Estate Country Park in Neath, South Wales – these are some of the things that I enjoyed about this walk.
One thing I did not remember from previous visits (going back a few years) was the oak tree with a huge hole through its trunk. Clearly the park authorities felt it was a wonder worth preserving and have reinforced the natural structure with metal rods.Continue reading
Iron standings, rusty rings and other objects – these are from a short stretch of the Scottish shoreline which I was walking along last month and which includes two old, small harbour jetties.
The colours and textures of rust are always attractive to me and in this location they also reflect the colours and textures of the surrounding rocks and lichens.
So far as I can tell these small ports are not used any more, althoughContinue reading
The rusty old engines I found as I turned a corner at the end of my walk this week around the old industrial buildings of Copperopolis in Swansea, brought a big smile to my face. The colours, textures and patterns of the old wheels and screws, cables and rails are wonderful.
The boat trips up the River Tawe pass by this old historic area of Swansea but I had a much better view of abandoned machinery than those on the Copper Jack. If you look back atContinue reading
The light was diminishing on my walk this week at the NBGW but the late afternoon still revealed some good views and wonderful details. One of my particular favourites in this respect was the Witch Hazel. The Botanic Garden of Wales has many of these and at this time of year they are blossoming with their beautifully coloured and wacky flowers – the colours make me think of the cocktail, Tequila Sunrise!
There was also a crooked oak tree that looked as though it was using one of its own fallen branches as a crooked walking stick to hold itself up. It reminded me of this old rhyme:Continue reading
My walk this week is from the National Botanic Garden of Wales (NBGW), though it turned out not to be the walk we had expected as the Pont Felin Gat woodland was closed off to the public for clearance / restoration work. The images show one of the existing lakes in the gardens as well as the site of another lake from the past. This is being restored but in the meantime the landscape of tree stumps creates some fascinating patterns, textures and colours.
So we followed the “blue” walk instead and climbed past old farm buildings which also look in need of restoration. Again, the colours, patterns and textures revealedContinue reading
My walk this week is on Aberystwyth seafront and from the overcast weather depicted you would not believe that half an hour earlier the sun had been shining and the sky blue. Neither was it raining at the time these photos were taken – but I still got soaked as I walked along the beach!
Today I am again looking at the textures, patterns and colours I found on my walk this week in Carmarthenshire. They are different to those I enjoyed in the woodland yesterday but the remnants of Autumn seen in the spiky thorns of a bramble and the soggy brown mass of drooping vegetation at the trackside are just as attractive as the woodland.
When I take a closer look at the intricacies within in the forms of these natural objects, I always get excited about the complexity of the world around me and how every aspect of it, including ourselves, is all connected in such a variety of ways.
You can see from the “river” running down the track how fast the snow is melting. I can imagine that the moss that inevitable grows thick in places like this, still enjoys a degree of dampness even in the height of Summer.
