My walk this week is a circular one and at this stage I am three quarters round the circle and heading back to Fulford and Chapel Alley. Fulford is on the edge of York City and the main street is busy with traffic going out to the ring road. So I was pleased on my previous walk along this route, to have found Chapel Alley as a short cut that took me away from the noise and fumes.
If you can read the sign in image 4 then you will see where the Chapel Alley used to lead – but really, it’s pretty obvious! I liked the feel of the narrow alley,Continue reading→
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.
My walk this week was longer than I had originally intended and I think that is partly the result of the straight path I was on. Even where the path was not straight, the bend was long and gentle and my memory of it from a number of years ago was not clear enough for me not to want to see round the bend. The result was that the sun was pretty low in the sky on my return.
My walk in this first week of the new year is a childhood memory walk. That does not mean memories of my childhood but instead memories of a walk I used to take when my daughter was at dance class. I would drop her off at the class venue and take an enjoyable hour long walk in the locality. It was not perhaps the sort of place I would normally walk – it is straight (more or less), flat and suburban – but it is also very attractive in its own way. It is quite a long time now since my daughter attended the dance class but taking the walk reminded me strongly of that time.
My walk this week is a local circular walk and anyone living in the area should recognise just from the glimpse of the road sign in the first image, exactly where it is. The walk is a very enjoyable one that provides both exertion on the climb uphill and peace and tranquility in the valley return.
As with my StillWalks videos I have not identified where the walk is to anyone who doesn’t already know it because the location is not relevant. It is the sights and sounds and the signs of the season that I enjoy on my walks and in that respect this first post for my walk this week are the walls alongside the footpath that were of particular interest to me.
My walk this week features two different suburban woodlands which are very close to each other and through which I have not walked for a number of years. They have developed in the meantime.
The woods are in Stainton, on the outskirts of Middlesbrough in the north east of England. As with any conurbation there was the constant background sound of traffic but as the woods edge farm fields, there was also the thrum of a tractor engine throughout my walk. Neither of these things detracted from the sound of the birds oe my footsteps on the varying surfaces of the woodland. You may gather from this that my walk this week does have some sound clips to accompany the images and a short soundscape at the the end of the week.
All photographs and sound clips throughout my walk this week were made using my iPhone 6s.
Stainton Woods
A note on the appearance of the blog posts if you are viewing them in an email – WordPress has been doing some odd things regarding the formatting of the posts in emails. The best way to read the post, view the images and listen to the sounds is to click the title of the post at the top of the email and you will be taken to the post itself on the StillWalks website. You will also then be able to click the “Like” button. Thank you.
While my walk this week has not appeared very wintry, the photos were taken and the sound recorded in January and though there is no ice or snow to be seen, it seems that mild winters are now a feature of the seasons in many parts of Britain.
I hope you have enjoyed the first of my walks in 2016 and I look forward to posting many more this year.
Try listening to the soundscape of the walk while viewing the images in sequence – click the play button and then the first thumbnail below.
Suburban Lakeside Soundscape Sample
If viewing this in an email, to see the sound player you will need to visit the blog – please click the post title to view the full post.
My walk this week is another from my archive of StillWalks® videos. I have chosen it because (writing in advance) this is where I will be during the transition to 2016 and I will certainly be taking at least one walk around this lake at that time.
Blue sky and crisp coldness – if there is no snow or ice to denote the season, the bare trees at least should prove the time of year. These photos are clearly from a less damp winter than we have experienced in Britain this year, even allowing for the fact that the north east is drier than the south west.
