marsh wild flowers

My Walk this Week 210 – Covid Walk on the Salt Marsh

My walk this week on my local salt marsh, during the Covid lock down, was different to usual. In relative terms, the footpath felt as busy as the M4 motorway which seems to have returned almost to its normal level of traffic.

salt marsh crowds

If you look carefully at the image above you can see the “crowds” in the distance. Without wanting to be too sarcastic, I should mention that there were various other families, couples and individuals using the riverside footpath. As I am used to meeting no more than one other person at most, it felt crowded to me and I veered away from my intended destination of the “church(yard) on the marshes”.

Sound levels may be returning to pre-Covid-19 levels in this area but that includes the birds as well as everything else. Just as the ambient decibels increase, so does the bird song – and there is still the beautiful sound of the wind blowing through the tall marsh grass.

Marshes Covid Walk Soundscape

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Pink rose

My Walk this Week 209 – This Time Last Year

My walk this week is from this time last year when I was visiting Sunbury Walled Garden and gallery because this year I was due to have an exhibition of my audio interactive tapestry weaving. Hopefully the exhibition will happen next year instead. You can see some of my work towards this here.

A glimpse of the garden

The interactive aspect of the work was to have been tactile! While the work will still be textural – both weaving and audio – I am now having to think in a different way about how the interaction may be achieved as multiple people touching the same art works may be a problem. This may not be the result or legacy of the Coronavirus lock down but I have to consider that it may be a likely result of the pandemic and our need to maintain a social distance from each other the the things we interact with.

I may even need to consider the degree of interactivity I can provide through proximity sensors! While this changes some important aspects of my art work, I am gradually beginning to see it as an interesting challenge rather than being frustrated by it. Either way, texture will always be important to me and my work, both visually and aurally, so . . . watch this space (as they say) and in the meantime enjoy Sunbury Walled Garden.

Sunbury Gardens Soundscape

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swamp pond surface

My Walk this Week 208 – Compare and Contrast

My walk this week is green and luscious and through something of a swamp! It is one I have only done once before and that was during an icy winter, so I wanted to compare and contrast the two seasons.

green walk

I don’t think I need to say much about the differences as they can be seen in the galleries below, but one of the most interesting to me is the is the water surface in the swamp/pond. In winter it was covered in thick, dark, opaque ice with a dusting of snow while on this more recent walk it is covered in thousands of catkins and algae.

The soundscapes are different as well, and again, I don’t think I need say much. The strange “groaning” sound in the Spring soundscape may be a distant goods train as there is a railway track nearby, but I cannot be certain.

Gorseinon Walk Soundscape and Images

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Winter Walk Soundscape and Images

estuary vista

My Walk this Week 207 – Cefn Drum Lower Slopes

My walk this week is a warm Springtime walk to the lower slopes of Cefn Drum (pronounced Kevn Drim). I didn’t have time to go further but it was still a most enjoyable and much needed relaxing and therapeutic hour.

country lane

The weather is cooler now (my walk was taken two weeks ago) but the road verges are still looking as beautiful as ever. I have a suspicion that the County Council has delayed much of the cutting and trimming they do each year – either that or the climate over the past year has, for all its ups and downs, produced a bumper crop of wildflowers . . .

. . . or perhaps nature is just taking full advantage of not so many humans being around as a result of the Covid-19 lock down!

The birds were singing, the insects buzzing and true to their name, the mayflies were flying above the river in unbelievable numbers. You’ll have to trust me on that one because, unfortunately, I didn’t get a photograph.

Cefn Drum Soundscape

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Sunset Scotland

My Walk this Week 206 – I should have been here now

My walk this week is a re-post of one I made two years ago in the place we should have been now – SW Scotland. But due to the Covid-19 lock down, all holidays were cancelled and so we can only visit virtually.

The evening light in my selected shots of sunsets in SW Scotland show the changing scene from day to day from different viewpoints. Almost all the photos were taken on different evenings but it is easy to take many, many photographs throughout just one evening as the sun sinks down and the light and shade and colours change above in the sky and below in the bay.

Low tide and lowering sun

Fewer clouds this year might have meant less drama, but I don’t think that is ever the case in this place. The skyscape / landscape / seascape is always mesmerising and holds my attention,
in awe again and again at the yellows and reds, greens and blues, and on one occasion pink and grey. The peacefulness is unparalleled at times like these.

Evening Soundscape

This soundscape is not from the same post but is certainly from the same place.

NB The place we stay with these wonderful views is called High Tide. It has been in my family since my grandfather built it in 1937 and although it is currently closed due to Covid-19, we do accept bookings from people other than family and friends. Watch the website for updates on the situation with regards to booking.

Running into the wind

My Walk this Week 205 – Memories of North Wales

My walk this week is from the archives with memories of North Wales and a windy visit to Colwyn Bay.

Paraglider and rainbow

Some were taking advantage of the wind in a colourful way and the sky just wanted to join in by throwing out a rainbow to accompany the wind surfing paraglider, while other like myself were getting rather more battered by it. Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable walk and thrilling to be entertained by those men and their “flying machines”.

The patterns and colours of sand and wind, rust and fencing, waves and water effects in what appears to have been a changeable day are a good reminder of the experience. The soundscape also serves as an excellent transportation device to take me back there with the images – I can almost feel and smell the sea spray!

Colwyn Bay Soundscape

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oakwood 2

My Walk this Week 204 – A Wander in the Park

My walk this week takes a wander through our local park – Coedbach Park. Along with other parks in the county of Swansea were closed for a few days once the Covid-19 lockdown started, but eh council were good enough to open them again quite quickly. It would have been a great shame not to see it Spring development.

park blossom 1

It was a beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon and I made the time for a stroll through the park – I thought I might see the ducklings my daughter had reported to me. Alas, I was only able to enjoy the spectacular blooming of the trees near the entrance and the woodland wildflowers, garlic, wood anemone and bluebells, the crooked oak trees and the sounds of the birds – poor me 😉Continue reading

garden nook

My Walk this Week 203 – Spring Garden

My walk this week returns to our garden where Spring is in full flow with the birds singing and the colours spreading.

garden pots

But there is a rare anomaly for me in this post! The images and soundscape are from different weeks with the audio being recorded one week earlier than the photos. This is very unusual for me but there is a reason for it. The recording was made while I was digging the first small vegetable patch and as I did so in the breezy sunshine, a blackbird sang his heart out in the trees behind me and it was such a joy to be doing this work to his and other birds accompaniment.Continue reading