My Walk this Week 231 – Going With the Flow

Posted on 06/11/202003/11/2020 by Alastair

My walk this week is necessarily another local one and is going with the flow in more ways than one.

The literal flow is in the Afon Camffrwd, a small local river swollen somewhat by the recent rains. A more existential flow is about me taking the walk in the first place.

Near the end of another day of regular showers the need to get out and calm my mind, exercise my body and enjoy my surroundings was obvious to me. We have to accept and deal with the current pandemic situation as best we can. While I am able to continue my work in tapestry weaving and sound as a result of a stabilisation grant from the Arts Council of Wales National Lottery Good Causes fund, I am still affected, along with everyone else, by the Covid-19 lockdown and the restrictions that go with it. It is a strange and unsettling experience for us all.

Again the soundscape for this walk is in the form of a short video, but there are some more details from my walk in the images below.

local woodland

across the fields

early evening sunlight

early evening sunset

Autumn leaf mosaic

Autumn leaves

arching tree

local lichen

hollow way

Autumn lane

My Walk this Week 230 – Disregarding the Weather

Posted on 30/10/202029/10/2020 by Alastair

My walk this week is through my local Coedbach Park and I was disregarding the weather as I set out. Autumn has typically mixed weather but regardless of this, my head as well as my body needs to get out for a walk as regularly as possible.

So when the sun came out around lunchtime I thought Aha! This is a good opportunity for a walk. Of course by the time I had changed my shoes and got a coat on, the sky was darkening again, but I didn’t let that put me off and carried on out the door.

I reached the park before the first drops fell and fortunately I had brought an umbrella but even so I felt it advisable to stand under a tree and wait.

In the short video above, which also acts as my soundscape for this week, I start out in the oak woods where the magnificent trees, undergrowth and footpaths do the best job of calming any turmoil I may be feeling inside. The stress and mental congestion that is there for any number of reasons, but not least our current Covid-19 lockdown and all that goes with that, is handled admirably by nature and the elements, even the rain.

And after the rain comes the sunlight and as I wandered on down towards the salt marshes, the River Loughor was at just the right level to provide me with a beautiful reflection of the sky as the sun pushed through aa little gap in the clouds.

Autumn oak wood footpath

woodland footpath

moss on stump

stream streaming

Towards the salt marsh

Reflected weather

My Walk this Week 208 – Compare and Contrast

Posted on 22/05/202021/05/2020 by Alastair

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.

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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Afon Llan

green walk

greenery

rhododendrons

wildflowers

last of the bluebells

wildflowers 2

hawthorn

urban woodland footpath

swamp pond surface

catkins on surface

water droplets

swamp surface

cat

lush green

gate

woodland stream

wildflowers 3

woodland exit

gate perspective

gate surface rust

Afon Llan 2

Winter Walk Soundscape and Images

Afon Llan

Afon Dulais ice

solid ice

frozen

frozen woodland bog

Frozen surface

urban footpath

My Walk this Week 207 – Cefn Drum Lower Slopes

Posted on 15/05/202014/05/2020 by Alastair

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.

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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My Walk this Week 202 – Goppa Hill, Another view

Posted on 10/04/202008/04/2020 by Alastair

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.

My Walk this Week 201 – Past, Present and Future

Posted on 03/04/202031/03/2020 by Alastair

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.

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→

My Walk this Week 196 – Woodland Wander

Posted on 28/02/202027/02/2020 by Alastair

My walk this week is a wander through woodland I have not visited for some time and it was good to see that whilst there had been developments and changes made, the character of the place remained as I remembered it.

Penllergaer Valley Woods is wonderful place on the outskirts of Swansea that I have enjoyed immensely at different times of the year. One of my favourite visits was about 4:30 AM for an early morning StillWalks production walk in Spring, but I have made StillWalks videos there from all seasons.

My visit on this occasion was a short one but I still very much enjoyed the patterns, textures, colours and sounds to be found there. I think my favourites below are the various tree stumps and the mass of bare birch branches on either side of the footpath as it descends to to the valley floor.

Woodland Soundscape

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The soundscape is a little shorter than usual this week as I was recording on my phone again but I hope no less enjoyable.

So click the play button to listen while viewing the images below – click the first one and then again to move forward through the carousel.

fence and path

Lake through trees

woodland stream

long shadows

lake in sunshine

tree stump strata

Across the valley

old fallen tree

fallen tree perspective

tree stump patterns

descending the valley

bare birch branches

tree stump arrangement

river

waterfall

water falling

moss

ascending the valley

reaching tree stump

steps

garden arrangement

My Walk this Week 193 – Estuary Atmosphere

Posted on 07/02/202004/02/2020 by Alastair

My walk this week took me down to the Loughor Estuary which has its own unique atmosphere whatever the weather conditions.

On this occasion it was dull and windy but no less enjoyable for that. If you like the wind, as I do, then this open, expansive land and waterscape is a good place to find it at a low elevation. The place can be spectacularly still and beautiful during a quiet sunset but I enjoy almost as much the cloud cover and wind here – a place that feels somewhat mystical in all conditions.

Lonely, harsh, wild, still, contemplative – all of these adjectives and more suit the place at different times.

Estuary Soundscape

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The soundscape follows me down a farm track, past early signs of Spring and a rushing stream to the open, wind blown estuary and salt marshes, under the railway bridge and out through the tall marsh grass by the river where I disturbed a pair of ducks but caught them fleeing on camera.

So click the play button to listen while viewing the images below – click the first one and then again to move forward through the carousel.