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

The soundscape media player does not show on the WordPress Reader, please visit the website to listen to the soundscape and view the images at the same time.

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

The soundscape media player does not show on the WordPress Reader, please visit the website to listen to the soundscape and look at the images at the same time.

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

View from Goppa hill

My Walk this Week 202 – Goppa Hill, Another view

My walk this week presents another view of my recent Goppa hill walk, but in a slightly different way to usual. It was at the end of March this year and the images are screen shots from the VR 360 video I am developing as a StillWalks® experiment. It takes a while to work on something like this but at this stage I can offer a soundscape and a selection of scenes from the video – selected screen shots. I’ll share the VR video when I have completed it.

So click the play button to listen while viewing the images below.

Goppa Walk Soundscape

The soundscape is quite a windy one in parts, but this changes with the location on the walk, partly dependent on whether it is open ground on top of the hill or when I was surrounded by rhododendrons as I walked down a natural tunnel to the valley floor. Don’t confuse, or perhaps I should say, try and identify, the different sounds of the wind and the river as the recording progresses. There are also the beautiful sounds of various birds.

Goppa Hill Walk-1

Fallen Tree

Open path

en route

hill path

View from Goppa hill

Rhododendron tunnel

Dulais river

old mine track

Cwm Dulais gate

 

slow shutter speed on water

My Walk this Week 201 – Past, Present and Future

My walk this week took me along a route I have often walked in the past, and in this post I am linking back to the time of Storm Doris in April 2017. My walks here, past present and future, start from the image below. This week I have included a selection of images from the walk taken in 2017 and then next week I will to post a version of  my walk in the present time with links to a VR (virtual reality) version for future use.

Goppa footpath

On my walk in the present time I was using a GoPro Fusion 360 to take short VR  video clips along the way.Continue reading