garden focus

My Walk this Week 172 – Wandering Round the Garden

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.

sparrows fluttering

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

lakeside

My Walk this Week 168 – Waterside Wildflowers

My walk this week takes a further look at wildflowers, this time they are around the lake at The Waterside. I admit I do not know either the common names or the Latin of most of the flowers, but that does not spoil my enjoyment of them one tiny little bit.

waterside wildflowers

Their beauty and the ecology associated with them is something I appreciate without knowing the details. I suspect the house martins speed-flying low across the surface of the lake, darting left, right, up and down to catch insects inContinue reading

lake and trees

My Walk this Week 166 – Gnoll Country Park

My walk this week is through a woodland I have not walked in for a few years – Moss Wood in Gnoll Country Park. In truth I am not sure that this woodland is the one I walked in previously, as the StillWalks video I produced here was in a coniferous wood which has since been cut for lumber.

woods and field

The coniferous trees of the lumbered wood were adjacent to these deciduous trees – I think I simply walked a different route to last time. Either way the walk was beautiful and I will be doing it again without any concerns about coming across the multiple  stumps of felled trees.Continue reading

open landscape

My Walk this Week 160 – Changing Forest

upper forest footpath

upper forest footpath

Changing Forest – My walk this week is one I have been putting off for a few months. This is due to the knowledge that the coniferous area of the woodland was being harvested. I always knew that the trees would be felled some day, and the red paint markings on some of them was evidence that it was going to be sooner rather than later – Continue reading

botanical colours galore

My Walk this Week 159 – Botanical Beauty

My walk this week looks and listens to some botanical beauty in Swansea’s Singleton Park. It is late Spring and new arrangements have been made in the formal garden and the colours abound in the less formal areas.

Swansea Botanic Gardens

Swansea Botanic Gardens

The hot-house is exotic with the blooming of enormous bright flowers and the sound of running water accompanies the humidity in one section while fading away in the cactus house. The twisting paths both inside and out give a sense of exploration and discovery as you round a corner or enter a “tunnel” and find another colourful viewpoint or vista.

Swansea Botanic Soundscape

Sitting in the peacefulness of the arranged beds, listening to the birds and the gentle hoeing of the gardeners, Continue reading

pussy willow

My Walk this Week 154 – Golden Grove, Gelli Aur

My walk this week was at Golden Grove or Gelli Aur as we call it in Wales. It was particularly enjoyable because the park has been closed for the last five years or so and it was wonderful to be able to wander round it again.

Golden Grove

Although the arboretum is only accessible if you pay, the rest of the park, even without being able to walk the circuit through the arboretum and the deer enclosure, it is still a beautiful place to visit. The cafe has opened again too and is serving some very nice home made food.Continue reading

Worthing beach

My Walk this Week 148 – Summer in Winter on the South Coast

My walk this week takes place on a Summer day in Winter on the south coast of England. It was mid-February but the temperature reached over 20 degrees celsius!

Man and dog on beach

Staying overnight on the seafront in Worthing, we awoke to a beautiful, bright day and took time for a walk along the stony beach with its ageing, bleached wood groynes. The garish colours of a multi-storey car park on the road side were followed through and improvedContinue reading

churchyard railings

My Walk this Week 144 – One Way To the Marsh Churchyard

My walk this week is a one way walk across our local marsh to the old St Teilo’s churchyard. I have walked this route many times before, and posted about it, but on this occasion the marsh grass is taller than I have seen it for several years – and they are my favourite aspect of the marsh.

dancing marsh grass

Bending as it does in the wind, and curving round to see the sun, it appears to me to be dancing – a busy chorus line of uniform activity responding to the elements and singing in their dry rustley voices as the breeze shuffles them together. Continue reading