morning mist and sun

My Walk this Week 247 – Misty Marshes

My walk this week is really my walk last week when I ventured down to the misty marshes early one morning before the day warmed up and enjoyed capturing this beautiful place with stills, video and audio.

Any environment differs according to the weather conditions, but this can be perceived in different ways. Visually (and in a tactile way) the misty marshes are exciting to me. Even though the river is moving ever so slowly, the fog in the air is mysterious and the atmosphere is dank or clammy to the touch.

An excess of moisture is literally hanging in the air and this changes our experience of sound as well as vision. The short video clip above shows the this moisture and also transports the sound of traffic on the motorway very efficiently. The result of course is that on this day, at that time, the marshes were noisier than usual – not only with the busy road but also with the birds shouting over it.

In the soundscape below I have been able to focus more on the birds than on the background traffic and we do this with our ears (or rather our brains) as well – filter out or dim down the sounds we do not want to listen to and focus on the those we enjoy most. That, for me, is not only the birds and in this instance includes those wonderful gates as well.

And then there are the stills, an opportunity to capture a moment in time, a snippet of what is seen and felt, both of the broader landscape and also some of its details, textures, patters, nuances.

I hope you can enjoy the different aspects of this little corner of Wales as much as I did on my walk. Click on the first image and look through the carousel on a larger scale while listening to the soundscape.

spiky foreground

My Walk this Week 130 – It Must Be Mist

Mist or fog – whichever you think it is depends on where you are in relation to the cloud that creates it. Near the start of this walk I was able to look down on the mist/fog in the valley below, but as I climbed up the side of the valley, so it thickened to become more fog like.

mist and crow

But early morning fog is apt to clear or at least move and it is the latter that happened on this occasion – at least until later in the day when the sun finally raised the temperature and dispensed with the dampness. The gloom was very atmospheric and I didn’t mind in the least as I stopped to photograph and listen to my surroundings. The sounds included electricity pylons and cables fizzling in the moisture filled air and temporarily the sound of Continue reading

valley fog

Sunlight, Sheep and Fog

Gaining the top of the hill on my walk this week from fog to sunlight, I was followed by a flock of hopeful sheep looking expectantly at me – I suspect the farmer was due or perhaps the sheep though he was overdue!

Goppa sheep

My route took me past familiar objects both natural and man made. The rhododendrons perhaps have an element of both – they are natural but not native to the UK and can take over a whole hillside as they have in this location.Continue reading

Valley Walk 2 – Reviewing the Walk

hillside lane

Nearing the end of my walk this week, the second of my walks up Cwm Dulais on consecutive days, I am reminded how different this walk was to the one on the previous day (posted last week). I did not do any field recording on this occasion and so the soundscape below does not reflect the misty atmosphere. However, I didn’t want to leave without an aural experience so I have included an edit of another recent walk in the same place but on a much brighter day.

So remember, if you are listening to the sound file at the same time as viewing the images, the two environmental atmospheres are quite different.

Continue reading

September Forest Footsteps

The light in September was fantastic! Its a time of year when its not too difficult to get up and catch the sun rising and a mist lingering in the valley. But it is the sounds I recorded during this month that I really love. Below is a short clip from a soundscape I am reserving for the first day of the New Year. It features my footsteps on the forest floor with leaves underfoot and the passing of early morning traffic in the background.

Forest September light

Continue reading

Forest from January to June – Reviewing the Walks

Having covered the first half of the year of my walks in a local forest month by month and keeping to the format of posts I have been using for a year now (I think that will change next year), today I am looking back over the past week’s posts and selecting two images from each month/post. To head them up I have chosen one from April with the sun peeking through the trees.

Forest April Sunlight

Continue reading

The Sea, The Sea

The sound clip I have included with the images below may be said to sound like wind in trees, but apart from the fact that it is not and the images would also suggest otherwise, I think there is a difference. I don’t deny that the sounds can be very similar but I like at least to imagine that there are subtle elements of each that would allow me to differentiate between the two. However, I’m not sure I would bet on it – every sound in any environment will always be different according to the circumstances at the time of listening or recording but attuning your ear to those individual elements can be a challenge.

Whatever, I love the sound of the sea, the sea in the clip below and feel confident that the waves breaking amidst the general water and wind ambience can be distinguished as such. See what you think!

sea fret

Clearly a Sea Fret

Continue reading