Moss and Ferns

My Walk this Week – Project Recce Walk, Bishopston Valley

My walk this week follows one of the routes we will be taking on a schools project this Autumn. A recce had to be made and a risk assessment done and in Bishopston Valley on the South Gower coast there are plenty of risks, particularly when it has been wet.

mossy rocky terrain

But nothing ventured, nothing gained and the young 13 and 14 year olds we will be taking along this exciting footpath will hopefully enjoy the challenge. Continue reading

Taste of Gower – Oxwich 2 details

grass seed heads

While the Taste of Gower walkers at Oxwich walk ahead of me I am able to take in some of the details of our surroundings both visually and aurally. Some of these details may be considered incidental or everyday things such as the seed head above, the horizontal shadow patterns of walkers legs or the vertical pattern of fence posts in perspective.

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Cycling Perspective and Reviewing the Walk

My walk this week has been along a very straight footpath that also doubles as a cycle path. I used to cycle a lot but my preference now is for walking – both are excellent forms of exercise and both give you more time and peace to enjoy the sights and sounds of your surroundings so I heartily recommend them to everyone as a means of maintaining health and wellbeing.

End of the footpath

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My Walk this Week 19 – The Waterside

My walk this week is at a place I have visited on a number of occasions now, and in a variety of weather conditions. The Waterside – Felindre is a beautiful space in the South Wales valleys at which I will be presenting the StillWalks package for businesses and organisations on the First Friday of February.

If anyone is interested in coming along to this regular open day at The Waterside, please check out the website above and contact us in advance.

The Waterside - Felindre

Reeds in lake at The Waterside

The Waterside cats

My Walk this Week 8 – Leading to Local Landscape

I have often posted images throughout the week from a single walk but this is the eighth consecutive week that I have done this using photos taken on a recent walk. I like the sequential element of the “story” being told in seven posts or “chapters” and focusing on different aspects of the things I observe and listen to on my walks.

Some of the walks I take are local to me and others further afield, some are rural and others urban. I wonder how long I can continue with this form of posting?

Quite often I will walk the same routes, but as the conditions are always different and I find familiarity allows me to see and hear more rather than less, I hope to be able to bring new images and sounds to you even when the walk is one I have posted about before.

This week’s walk takes us into another area of my local landscape and although I will not be producing a StillWalks video as I did last week, I did do some field recording on the walk. Below is the first of the sound clips recorded along this first section of my route. The full soundscape can be heard at the end of the week.

Cefn Drum 1

Cefn Drum 1

old shed

 

Underfoot and Overhead

Completing the meandering loop of this week’s walk brought me to the oak woods of Coedbach Park.  It looks like there is plenty underfoot to keep the squirrels going through the winter. Overhead the twisting branches of these wonderful crooked trees will provide progressively less shade from the weather as the season moves on. Whatever weather the seasons bring, it is unlikely to stop me enjoying the sights and sounds I encounter on my walks.

acorns

crooked oak trees

Woodland Ways

Having crossed the local park, the salt marshes and farmland by the river Loughor, my walking route took me up the Castell Ddu road alongside a woodland stream. The woodland is private but I still got to enjoy the sights and sounds of the stream and the birds as I followed the stream back up to the main road. You can listen to these below (along with the distant aircraft and motorway!).

Castell Ddu stream and woodland

woodland stream

leaves and road