The park in question on my walk this week is Stratford Park in Stroud, England. I’d driven up there to see a friend’s exhibition of knotted tapestries – Anne Jackson in the Museum in the Park. It was well worth the drive and having spent an hour enjoying the exhibition in detail, I still had time to take a walk in the park.
All the classic features of a British urban/suburban park were thereContinue reading
This walk for the “Our Gower” project extends beyond Bishopston Valley to the beach at Pwll Du, but I thought I would present some of the details of the valley which, with the dry weather of the second project day in the valley, allowed us to explore and photograph more easily.
We also recorded some of the sounds of the thickly wooded valley and made notes about the atmosphere of the place – how it made us feel, what its colours and textures were like and something of the history and geography of the environment. For instance, Guzzle HoleContinue reading
The second of the schools I walked with on the Our Gower project had no more luck with the weather than when we walked out on the marshes (see last weeks posts) – if anything, it was worse!
Bishopston Valley on South Gower is home to some wonderful ancient woodland . . . and when it is wet, it is also home to a great deal of mud. Despite the wet conditions (or perhaps because of them) everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. As well as Wellington boots, everyone had been givenContinue reading
One amongst many refers both to the one black leaf of the family on the forest footpath and also to this, the fourth of my walks this week and a return to a local woodland.
This is one of my most frequent local walks . . . and every time it is different! Whether it be the time of year or the current weather conditions, and even if the same objects are there each time, I still get a fresh look at them, perhaps enjoy them from a different angle, under different light conditions, or whatever.Continue reading
I am lucky enough to have a long garden down which to walk each morning and enjoy the changing colours, patterns and textures it presents along the way. I don’t know what I would do without this resource for my wellbeing. Being outside my door, it is the closest that nature could be to me and much as I enjoy my walks to local marshes, woods, hills and further afield, I don’t know how I would manage without our garden as well.
The reds are really coming through now, but there is more to come as Autumn proceeds. For now we have the berries, rosehips, fuchsia and dogwood.
I’m not one for controlling nature but if we didn’t do some maintenance jobs, it wouldn’t be long before we couldn’t move in the place. And so the garden heap is still waiting for a convenient dry evening to be burnt before the cuttings from the pruning of our cherry tree can be moved into place to await their turn for a bonfire.
So on my saunter down the garden for “my walk this week”, this is what our flowering cherry tree looks like – after the pruning it was given a few weeks ago. Our friend Joe did a fantastic job of untangling branches from telegraph wires and opening the tree out to allow more light amongst its foliage. You can see the before and after photos is in the image set below.
The tree is still green but in other places the greens are changing to yellows with the brightness of a lone Welsh poppy still standing out against the backdrop.Continue reading
My walk this week is not so much a walk as a saunter down our garden. Having completed a very hectic few weeks of work, I allowed myself a short mid-week lie in and so didn’t set off down the garden to our studio until mid morning. The day was fairly bright, although it had been raining through the night – the result was one of bright colour and it lifted my heart and brought a smile to my face.
I wouldn’t ever claim our garden is worthy of being placed next to many others “fancier” ones I know of, but I love it just as it is. It seems to be in a permanent state of being in the middle of things being done – but perhaps that is how a garden should be!?Continue reading
