Maybe not the most hi-tech bit of equipment but if there is a prize for versatility this has to be a contender. My love affair with the humble bandana can be traced back to Saturday afternoon. Not a specific one, anyone, coz that was when they used to run old cowboy movies. A cowboy without a bandana was some sort of effete town dweller who owned a suit. The real deal wore a scruffy bit of cloth around their necks, Clint Eastwood in The Unforgiven is a perfect example. The baddies hid their faces behind them when robbing banks and the good guys protected their faces from sandstorms when they chased the bad guys into the desert.
Morgan Freemans character seems to shun the bandana, bet he wishes he had remembered to wear one. Clint Eastwood wears the biggest by the looks of it and the townies simply have become too “civilised”.
Anything a bit of cloth can do, a bandana can do. It can do a fair job of keeping light weather conditions off your head much favoured by Les Stroud in survivorman.
Pour water on your bandana and it cools you, don’t and it warms you. It can dry things like cloths are famous at, you can use it to pick up hot objects.
In the winter I tend to favour the larger bit of cloth about 2.5foot square as it goes around my neck twice and so is nice and warm. Summer, the smaller version favoured by Les as it is slightly less flamboyant when on your head.
This is one of the very few bits of kit I am never without. Its not very glamorous and while the marketing boys have done their best to create bandanas which are less useful and more expensive generally its not been successful. I have used the remains of favourite shirts to create bandanas over the years.
When the sun is beating down hard I stick it in the back of my baseball cap and it hangs down to protect my neck and ears and depending on how it is arranged as much of my face as necessary. This might look a bit daft, but not as silly as a bright red neck and usually there is nobody about to point and laugh. There is something intrinsically humorous about this arrangement though. As evidenced by the Outdoor Research Sun Runner Cap
The going prepared blogsite has the lowdown on the benefits of these things. You pays your money and you takes your choice.
Woodland strolls are very much in keeping with my tree identification theme for this year. Currently on my reading list is Richard Mabey, Beechcombings which demonstrates with enough knowledge there is a great deal to be discovered in a wood.
I am not going to assimilate a lifetime of learning in a few hundred pages but at least it will improve on my lifetime of ignorance.
There are an alarming number of tree species in Britain, well over 2000. Most are exotic imports, there are 35 native trees and if I can identify those reliably along with a few imports it will be a pretty good start.
For the last few years I have been vaguely following the Ancient Tree Survey work that has been going on in the UK. Thinking about all those great trees of national interest or local importance I could visit. Then going through the backlog of my local MPs blog, Douglas Carswell, he mentions the plight of Old Knobbley (image).
Old Knobbley is the oldest tree in the area, maybe 800 years old, but certainly old. Turns out the chap needs some help as it is being out competed by trees around it and in some distress, possibly dying. The council got to work to prolong the life of the tree by cutting back some of the trees around it.
Well clearly a visit to the oldest tree in the area before it died is a darn good idea. A look at the Ancient Tree website showed this was not the only noteworthy tree in this small wood. Actually the place was littered with them. I'd guess the highest density of them in the area. Cannot be sure though, its a 3 year project in its early stages and rather reliant on public participation I imagine.
I have walked through the wood previously as an early part of the Essex Way and saw some old trees in passing. This always reminds me to measure a churchyard tree that is not on the Ancient Tree register which as I remember it must be a fair contender.
The 1891 OS map shows an oak grove which was still there in the 1940s maps but no longer exists. The area to the south, The Beech Plantation is still there though.
I put the tree co-ordinates and details into my gps. It would be a shame not to visit each one recorded, although this rather smacks of munro bagging to the exclusion of all other hills. Checklists are of dubious value once walking but purpose is useful, the balance is the trick.
The walk-in begins at Bradfield church, a building with a much repaired tower. The views across the fields to the Stour are inspiring on yet another baking hot day.
The walk goes past church remains. It is reputed the churchyard holds the remains of Matthew Hopkins, self-proclaimed witch-finder. A serial-killer and sadist essentially. It seems fitting any church would fall to the ground whose churchyard contained this poisonous character.
The track takes me past a stile that has no purpose, the fence it took you over no longer exits. Maybe it was a fence, but you can bet it was an ancient field boundary of hedgerow once. It does not sweeten my mood.
A torn leaflet is lying on the ground, I make out the fragments. Furze Hill is being thinned out, dogs to be on leads, dangers, stick to footpaths. The saving grace it starts tomorrow, it could go on for a month.
That is a stroke of luck. The wood is carefully managed and there is no need for significant alarm that the wood is being thinned. I am just glad I can wander without restriction or noise today.
It was thinned last time by nature and the 1987 Great Storm. The wood was planted in 1948, most likely to provide better cover for the secret govt bunker and buildings built around that time. The wood is much older than this. How old and why it exists is not totally clear. The great old trees could be what is left of a country estate.
The wood is generous, the old trees are just waiting to be touched and climbed if you wish. One oak has been cleaved in two at some date long forgotten. Almost a comedy cleaving, both halves of the tree lean away like a banana skin peel. Hollowed with age both trunks have a healthy canopy. I walk between the two halves just because I can.
There are many twisted and contorted trees, hollowed from fallen limbs, the remaining tree seemingly effortlessly defying gravity. One oak has massive growths on the base of its trunk. These burrs seem to be like a massive pair of hips.
Old Knobbley is the focus of the walk though, the oldest known tree in Tendring hundred. 600, maybe 800 years old. The area around him recently cleared to help this old timer find resources. He is splendid. I knew what to expect, in the modern age endless images and facts can be gleaned but until I stood in front of the tree I had no real sense of it.
I am not a tactile person but I had to touch the bark of that tree, to share part of the history. It was a tree of age when Matthew Hopkins was killing witches just down the road. The War of the Roses was going on when this tree had reached a maturity.
It is a timescale just on the bounds of my imagination for a living object. There are older trees in Britain but the age of these is beyond easy imagination.
The wood has a large pond at one edge, it was vibrant with birdlife when I strolled along one of its banks. Much youthful cheeping was going on among the water lillies. Trees of all ages, variety and slant were all around me. The woodland floor was sparse of plant life though. I look forward to seeing what the thinning process throws up in future years.
It is not a big wood, but there are so many interesting trees and the walking over the undulations of countryside is great fun. With a little extra knowledge, the helpful guide of the ancient tree study and its resultant shift in my focus, my entire outlook on this wood had changed.
Previously whenever I was here, it was something walked through on a point A to B exercise. This time the wood was the walk and it was great to give it the time for it to tell me a bit about itself.
“What would the world be, once bereft of wet and wildness? Let them be left. O let them be left, wildness and wet; Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet” Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889).
“Bloody hell does is it ever going to stop raining” Old Winter August 2010.
Well I am back safe and sound from a thorough thrashing at the hands of Mother Nature. When I have recovered my equilibrium sufficiently to have something vaguely coherent to say on the subject I’ll say it.
If that takes a while I have a few strolls I took before Dartmoor to recount.
In the meanwhile I am going to sleep for a week and hope to wake up capable of enough limb movement to get out of bed.
The bag is packed, it weighs too much as usual. The gadgets are primed, batteries are being charged. I even have a vague notion of where it is I am going, although the details are liable to change.
I be Dartmoor bound, barring national emergency, the North bit. Hopefully I will not be blown up by left over munitions or drowned in a sea of bracken. If I avoid that then just need to avoid the life reducing lymes disease. I am less likely to be dragged away by the Baskerville Hound, be pixie led, or fall victim to the Hairy Hands, but you never know my luck.
Bag a few tors, wonder at the prehistoric motivations for stone building and generally enjoy being on my own out of earshot. How long I am there will depend pretty much on how long I can stand it. That will be a function of how wet cold and downright miserable I get.
Not longer than 8 days or so though and of course the much needed couple of days recovering.
Ticks are one of those things that are hard to love. Actually they are difficult not to dislike. You are wandering along minding your own business and without you knowing it a tiny hitch-hiker has stuck out a thumb and is coming along for the ride. So far so okay.
Once on-board they can wander about a bit, find somewhere nice warm and moist if possible. So this is the first hint the relationship is not healthy, your armpits and crotch are ideal holiday homes for ticks.
This is bad enough if they just hung about being a vague nuisance, but nope, they bury themselves into you head first, little legs wriggling. The wriggling legs give them away more than anything at this point. The size of a pinhead, not exactly easy to see, especially if via a mirror. There is something unsettling about spotting an insect burrowing into you.
If only this was their least unpleasant aspect. It is bad enough, but worse to come. The reason they are buried head first is because they are after your blood. Leave them long enough they can end up the size of a large pea or more, filled with your blood. They look decidedly ugly at this point.
If only this was an end of it, but in exchange for your blood they can give you rather unpleasant diseases. Lyme's disease being primary, it is not something you want. To add to the fun, symptoms can take a considerable timescale to develop and can be difficult to diagnose. Delightful isn't it.
Removing them as quickly as possible is a good plan. A diseased tick has a greater chance of passing on the disease the longer it is attached. Here the tick has one last little joke for you. Evolution has made sure tick mouthparts are ideal for hanging on. Basically they are not coming out, Pull a tick and its body will part from its mouth. The mouthparts remain in you to go septic. If that is not bad idea enough, in shock the tick probably vomited its stomach contents into you. Not great for disease avoidance. Burning them, covering them in meths etc etc have similar drawbacks.
So removing a tick fast and efficiently is a good plan. The best way I have found is with a tick removal tool and daily inspections where at all possible.
Not all removal tools are created equal. After failed experiments with a few (it is useful to have a small dog as a tick collecting device) I found the O'Tom Tick Twister to not only have the most flamboyant name but also the best results.
The device is simple, effective, efficient and small. Seems to have some eco-friendly credentials too boot. The Vetinary Record tested 4 different extraction tools offering different approaches to the same problem and the O'Tom was significantly better than other methods.
This is one bit of wildlife I am keen not to meet on Dartmoor. I fully expect to be pulling them out of the dog at some point though.
Looking “inland” from the backwaters to the sea and the Naze tower. The sea is all around you here.
I continued to scan the horizon, the backwaters is made up of numerous creeks snaking among low lying islands. When the tide he water is all but level with most of these islands. It is not an alien landscape, but it is foreign. It's inaccessibility has meant rare species have been able to remain. One of the larger islands has permanent wardens on it to make sure things remain as they are.
On one of those islands lurks a rare plant. That rare plant is food to the Fisher Estuarine Moth. The island has the only viable colony of them in Britain. The island will flood at some future point, probably sooner rather than later. That flood will probably be the end of the moth.
The area has an inhospitable bleakness about it, even under bright blue skies. I have long left behind the most adventurous of the waddlers, I have the place to myself.
The human activity is confined to the water where people fiddle with their boats. A boat advertising wild life trips goes past, it is full of people. I wonder what they may have seen, but for most being on the water surrounded by the landscape is probably treat enough. There is a lot to sea and hear, although due to the noise of the boat engine, a bit less too see and a lot less to hear.
I am always conscious of walking on the edge of the map when coast walking. Some Canada geese go overhead making plenty of din about it, they join some others in a field, some contented cows continue chewing.
I reach a point where the land runs out and I have to make a right angle turn to follow the coastline. The views are 360. I can see the square church tower of the town, and through the trees with binoculars I can make out two other church towers and various isolated farms and grand houses. Roads do not figure in the landscape, nothing mechanical moves for the miles the eye can see on land.
The one feature is Felixstowe docks, the loading/unloading cranes are impressive, it is difficult not to imagine them as an alien invasion force. The plucky Thunder-Child set sail from Harwich in H.G Wells, War of the Worlds. The Naze being somewhere the aliens had chosen as an invasion point. It was always one of my favourite moments in the book, a daydream takes over me for a while.
(1906 book illustration War of the Worlds)
Wish I had bought a map so I could identify all the features. I did not need a map to follow a coastline, all I have is a sketch and some gps waypoints. I do not even have a compass to take bearings and check later. I could have started getting inventive to determine the bearings but wasn't in the mood. Too hot for problem solving, even the most mundane.
Still no seals. A tern is trying to tell me something. A kestrel is using the offshore wind rising off the embankment to make his hover easier. I briefly hope the things that scurry in the embankment undergrowth keep their heads down. A job not made easier by the fact it seems to have recently been cut back.
The drainage ditch, which has the aspect of a river plays host to a coot and a family of ducks. Freshwater, it must be the source of the earth I am standing on, a tiny bit of deduction I am overly pleased with.
Briefly wild swimming bubbles to the surface of my mind. There is no safe place to get in and out (I tell myself) and this experience is put off for another day without too much loss of face.
Once I take this turn the terrain changes somewhat and seal spotting becomes increasingly unlikely. A noisy oystercatcher sitting on a tuft of grass growing out of the salt marsh gives me a send off.
Walking through dry grass I disturb countless grasshoppers, they leap in profusion just keen to escape me. Seldom have I seen so many. Along with these myriad ladybirds, they are suddenly everywhere, it transports me back to the legendary summer of 76 where we had a plague of the things, sweeping them off doorsteps. I hope they are our native ladybirds, those naughty imports are causing mayhem, lets hope this summer is not so generous to their numbers.
I reach the sea, a point at which the crumbling Naze cliffs sink into the sand, exhausted. I decide to strike out onto the narrow strip of sand which separates backwater from sea. The sand looks dry and the detritus aged, the sea does not wash over these sands often by the looks of it. The wind is weak, and the moon phase promises small tides. All suggests if I have guessed the direction of the tide (I consider it is going out) I am not going to be cut off.
Even if I have got all this wrong, there looks to be sufficient green tussock grass to suggest I could sit out my error till the tide went back out. If all that fails and embarrassed called to the local lifeboat, if that fails then maybe I drown. Its a long set of circumstances before that eventuality, more chance crashing the car on the way home. Still if you don't give these things respect they will teach it too you the hard way.
Onto the soft hot sand I step. There is always flotsam and jetsum in these sorts of places, mostly indestructible plastic water bottles and those useless plastic forks that don't have the strength to lance a chip but will last forever it seems.
I select a bottle to replace my meths bottle. Its got one of those clever cap designs which makes accidental spillage near impossible. Re-use is better than recycle. Some rubber, maybe wetsuit remnant, goes into the bag, near bombproof firelighting material.
Looking back towards the cliff I see small knots of people hunched over double. They are looking for sharks teeth. Some people seem to have spent a lifetime filling matchboxes with them. Others seem intent on filling plastic bags with seashells. Leave the damn seashells where they belong, take home the plastic bottles.
My eyes are scanning the sands for a seashell though. I am looking for a whelk shell that spirals in the opposite direction. Modern ones spiral one way, ones from the fossil record go the opposite way, or at least that is what I learnt as a small child in the land locked midlands. From the vantage point of my wooden lift top desk with generations of graffiti etched into it, the seaside was as exotic as it got. The idea of children learning at ancient Victorian desks now seems exotic.
It gives me something to do, there is a limit to how much the senses can grasp of a flat land a few inches above a flat sea. My hat is pretty much the highest point for some miles.
Eventually without finding anything more than endless ladybirds, one of which I ludicrously saved from a small rock pool (well I could not let it drown) I ran out of land. I had reached the tip of stone point, or at least what the tide had revealed, to go further would be tempting fate for no gain other than taking a risk. Years ago I could have walked further, years from now I will not be able to walk this far, all in living memory. Coastal erosion is something you can chart year on year in this part of England.
Time to turn back. I simply retracted my footsteps, easy to do, they were there in the soft sand along with bird tracks and the tracks of what I presume was the lifeguard 4x4 searching for some unfortunate.
I never did see a grey seal, but I saw a lot more and the place, despite my initial impression, had a natural wildness which was quite unexpected.
Selling Nature by the Pound. (with a nod to Genesis the rock group).
Seems Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs budget is being cut by 40%.
So much for the “green govt” credentials, presumably they meant forcing windfarms into existence.
It looks like they are keen to sell greenery off as fast as possible. This really is not what the people voted for.
Harold Macmillan accused Thatcher of selling of the family silver, that gone it looks like the next phase is to sell off the estate.
Privatisation of parts of the Forestry Commission. Selling off National Nature Reserves and withdrawing grants from British Waterways.
Words sort of fail when faced with this sort of news.
Once again the govt has gone for the soft target.
I finally got around to watching a program I recorded in Feb this year. Robert MacFarlane was sort of doing a TV version of his book, The Wild Places. (youtube link to the program, 6 parts)
Sort of.
He was focusing in on one county to prove the point “wildness” is everywhere (well anywhere there are not a lot of people)
The county in question, Essex. MacFarlane speaks of Roger Deakin opening his eyes to the concept of wild. Or at least to appreciate a weed growing from a crack in the pavement has the elements of wild.
I am not really prepared to visit a toxic landscape by an oil refinery to be impressed by lichen on a grey wall even with MacFarlane egging me on. He does accept it is a wildness which makes you work pretty hard to appreciate it.
Hmmmm, well pupil is not ready to be master, so I am giving it a miss.
But in another segment MacFarlane is waterborne in an old wooden canoe willed to him by Roger Deakin. He is in Walton backwaters where there is a colony of grey seals. This looks to have more traditional elements of wild. Another book about wild places in Britain gives the backwaters high praise putting it in the top 50 or so places harbouring wildness.
I am cutting it fine for a trip to the coast, this is primetime seaside holiday period. Fine if you are a fat drunk conversing with your kids as if they are in another county via subtle variations in the F-word, not so great if you walk upright. Nothing ventured, nothing gained and Mr MacFarlane seemed to be having a very pleasant secluded time communing with seals.
The backwaters could be found behind a large grey shed of a building, The Columbine centre, built on a flood plain 200 yards behind a sea wall, its the local swimming pool, cinema, indoor bowling club, theatre, car park, eyesore, built in the municipal mundane style.
Behind it, beyond the overflow carpark, is a large earth embankment and once I got to the top of that, I was greeted by a small sewage works, some stinking mud and static caravans.
The stinking mud is what I had come to see it transpires. Given I saw MacFarlane gracefully paddling over limpid waters gazing at basking seals I was glad I did not take the oil refinery option. Gawd alone knows what mouth of Hades that actually is.
Oh well, I am here now. I walk along the top of the sea defence bank. Boats are languishing in the mud, the tide is out. Some boats look as if an incoming tide washes over them rather than float them. Neglect is the impression, this could be a tough sell.
The Twizzle snakes off to do its thing, whatever that might be. In fact the whole low lying area is snaked with water, my walk is taking my along the Walton Channel up towards nowhere much.
Once I am past the caravan site. which was not bad, just unexpected, things pick up. Flat and essentially treeless would be an uncharitable impression Across the farmers field, golden with crop, is a headland and a navigational tower. The tower is a focus of a lot of ineffective hand wringing. Coastal erosion is eating the cliff at quite the rate. Earlier versions of the town have slipped into the sea over the centuries.
It is a landmark tower, ancient and unique, maybe that will be the reason they get the sea defences they need. Probably not is my guess, there are a lot more things to throw money at than a social security hotspot.
The view is impressive, golden crops, green hill, deep blue sea water, a large ferry going into Harwich, a larger container ship going into Felixstowe. Bold colours for bold ventures.
The farmland is protected from the higher tides in the backwaters by an earth embankment which is strengthened on the seaward side by small concrete blocks, much overgrown. The bank is in excess of 12 foot I guess and there is quite a large drainage ditch which runs around the farmland, I guess that is where the soil came from. On top of the embankment is a low wall made of concrete slabs, much weathered and failing in a number of places. Perhaps this was put up after the 1953 flooding of the area. It is either carefully worked out or just something slapped on the top as an after thought. It looks very after thought right now.
Among the flotsam I spot a jam jar, it has paper contents. A message in a bottle, so more akin to jetsum. I go over the knee high wall on the top of the embankment, noticing it had yellow lichen on it. Within the bottle is the block capitals of phone number. Its from the far off shore of Dovercourt, maybe 2 miles away.
Still it might have age on its side if not mileage. I will contact him and he will remember wistfully the far off days when he had teeth and had thrown this jar into the sea.
The lid of the jam jar said, best before 2011.
Oh well, I bunged it into the mud where the next tide would set it on its travels, purposeful litter, sort of. I make penance by picking up the nearest 3 plastic sports drink bottles.
I notice a large blue tarpalin draped over the wall, could not miss it. Also a blue sleeping bag. Looks like someone has been wild camping and left in some haste. Bright blue is not the fugitive colour in this landscape, unless his quick exit was via police escort. Still I gather 7m of paracord and a tin of baccy. I want the tin, I could buy one for no money, but its got no memory, this one is better. My guess, rain stopped play and they headed back to whatever caravan they were meant to be in, suffering the banter of his mates/family, a future Ray Mears returning to mere mortal.
A beautiful Red Admiral sits on the low concrete wall. It is the butterfly all of its species should be judged by. The brightest of colours, it really is striking, but it is a shy beauty and refuses to be photographed. It will grow impossibly perfect in my memory, and why not. The baccy tin, gathers another association instantly.
Bird life is noisy and greedy, all manner of things are wheeling overhead and poking about in the mud. Specialist stuff by the looks of their beaks and all impressively clean. This looks like the sort of mud you dump bodies in. You would have to be daft to go out on it. Needless to say the coastguard cheats Darwin every so often and saves someone from the mud.
Moving along I see a duck boat lying in one of the many folds of the coastline, it is drapped in weed, unloved the tide must flow over it. Long low and built with purpose it seems a shame to be allowed just to rot into nothing. It has resisted the sea for quite some time for that much weed to have accumulated. It is part of a past we don't need now, but one day we will wish we had not been so neglectful of such things.
I look out over the grey mud with some grey sea running between it. No grey seals, but it is early yet and I've not got my eye in.
In part two, will I see a seal or will it just be a blubber stomached tourist floundering in the mud.
How things change over the years. This trip to Dartmoor is dominated by digital preparations. Partly because the other elements run on well practiced lines.
The digital march has no new tech, but it does have much more extensive use of that tech. My Psion 5 carries a dozen or so Dartmoor related texts and a great many notes to improve my understanding and interpret what is being seen. It actually has ludicrous quantities of information including decades of Victorian moor archaeology.
With the best will in the world it is impossible to remember it all and it is a relief not to have too. It is all stored away digitally and at no extra weight.
The Psion also is capable of a game of backgammon or chess if need be.
I have been updating my Dartmoor gpx files and sorting out the 500 most relevant waypoints for this trip. My old Garmin Etrex, a discontinued model is showing its age now but it performs its essential task well.
Always annoying to have missed a curious stone by a few hundred yards, which happens more often than I would like. The waypoints reduce the possibility of that.
There is so much to see and seeing something in the landscape with your own eyes beats all.
Waypoints give a different perspective to a map and I confess a lot simpler to check quickly than unfurling the map. Effectively it is my map with the things that are relevant to me on it. Bogs being one of the things which are easier to spot on as a waypoint than on the map.
New SIM for the phone so I have a choice of networks, hopefully this will reduce the chance of being in a deadspot. This might not be an issue, or it might be a matter of some importance.
The phone trebles up as camera, it is quite good enough to capture my memories of Dartmoor, and mpeg4 player. The Hound of the Baskervilles travels with me in written word, spoken word, radio play and two film versions. Again overkill, but it is there if I want it and the phone weighs no more for the extra contents.
Without tech most of this would not be possible at all. The books would be possible, if I did not mind walking about with a couple of dozen.
Tech has revolutionised the way I conduct walks generally and it is an enhancer. Rather than cut me off from what I see it allows me to see and understand more of it.
Was reading about the big butterfly count for this year and was reminded I had a bit of butterfly hunting left over from last year.
The White Admiral is found in very few sites in Essex, until the mid-90s it was reputedly only to be found in one. This was where I was heading, Stour Wood. It is near the River Stour of couse, but not as close as Copperas Wood, which is close by.
Copperas Wood is worth a mention as the treeline goes right down to saltmarsh. I believe this is the only such instance in Essex. This is prime bird watching territory, which I guess will be on my list of things to know more about. (image of the destruction)
Back to the butterfly.
I have left it a bit late for seeing the white admiral, mid-June into July is primetime. Given the alternative was waiting till next year it seemed worth the effort.
The White Admiral is not a rare butterfly but numbers are declining and its a high priority for butterfly conservation. Spotting one in a rare location is more fun than spotting them where they comparatively abound.
Also breaking in a new pair of boots, so tree gazing and butterfly spotting seem suitable activities. Modern boots don't need the sort of breaking in period of old but it is still a good idea to not destroy your feet as they get used to boots.
Driving down I spotted a cherry tree with a lot of fruit laying underneath it. I made a mental note to visit my favourite cherry picking haunts.
Before I actually got to the wood, I stumbled on a small meadow which seemed to be filled with Holly Blue butterflies. So many one hung around obligingly to be photographed. Maybe they had just hatched out into the sunshine and getting their bearings. I marked it as a good omen.
The walk begins at Ramsey. There is a carpark at Stour Wood but the walking in is part of the deal.
Ramsey windmill blades loom from behind a bush which would never have existed when it was working. The mill has not ground flour for a long time, but it still looks out over the fields whose crops it must have once milled.
The windmill was moved from its original location in Woodbridge to its new location in 1842. A working mill till World War Two, it fell into dis-use and was saved by volunteers in 1974 at which point it was a collapsing derelict.
The signpost pointing out the long distance footpath, The Essex Way sported a new style of flash for the walk. Good to see if it represents an overall maintenance program of the walk but I cannot help thinking replacing everlasting plastic flashes is a regular waste.
Going off The Essex Way, heading west, the impressive chimneys of Roydon Hall come into view. It is marked in gothic script on the OS, non-roman. What stands there now is a late 16th century building but the site goes further back than that. It stands in isolation.
Onwards to Stour Wood which covers over 130 acres and is actively managed, it was coppiced until the 1970's and is being done so again. It enters the written record as being coppiced in the mid-1600s. As with all things there are people willing to say the Sweet Chestnuts date all the way back to their introduction by the Romans.
The fact the wood is named after the river rather than a landowner suggests age and sweet woodruff along with other plant indicators underline this. There do not seem to be trees of any massive age within it that I am aware of though, although coppice is not giving away its age easily..
There are a good many well defined footpaths through the wood along with many rather more ad-hoc looking affairs. The northern edge of the wood is bounded by the railway line which runs on an embankment at near canopy height. Very odd to hear a train go past high above your head. The river is a little beyond that.
On my walk I was pleased to see one of the few surviving small leaf limes which remain in the wood. Squirrels were having a field day among the Hazel trees. I eye the hazelnuts hoping a few will be left for me when they are ready.
One tree on the edge of the wood was bursting with activity and remained so when I went back to it a couple of hours later. The birdsong gave the hint and then i saw them silhouetted, tiny little birds smaller than the leaves with the distinctive long tail, the long tailed tit.
Good too see them, not rare, but I rarely see them because they are so damn small. These birds made it into the top 10 garden birds in 2009 but chilly winters can kill 90%, it was a cold winter, they did not make the top 10 in 2010.
Many trees lay where they had fallen in the great storm of 1987, shooting up new growth from their horizontal rest. In nearby Copperas Wood 25 of the 34 acres were flattened that night. It was a shocking destruction I remember well. Trees are not easily destroyed though as evidenced from the coppiced hornbeam sprouting from stumps cut to within a few inches from the ground. Apparently regularly coppicing gives a tree an almost limitless lifespan. This is not a wood tidied to within an inch of sterility, dead trees exist, lots gets to live in it.
Humanity was present in the wood but huddled around the car park for the most part, noisy. Within the wood it was easy enough to forget the world outside.
Butterflies were not exactly in abundance, I saw very few and was giving up hope of spotting the White Admiral when sitting in splendid isolation I saw exactly what I sort. Sure it was a bit ragged and somewhat dull but it was The White Admiral and I was very pleased to see it. I wondered if I might see another having seen one but I did not.
I explored happily for a few more hours and took a circular route back following The Essex Way back out to my start point, it leads me out of Stour Wood along the banks of the river itself and into Copperas Wood. The bushes along the riverbank had many sloes in them, testament to how vile they are to it. Some blackberries looked edible but barely were.
Copperas Wood had a last little surprise for me with a litter of small crab apples just as I was leaving it. They looked the very definition of bitter.
On walking back to the car at Ramsey unaccompanied singing was coming from the spartan Weslyn chapel by the footpath. Quite a congregation, it sounded tuneless and heartfelt and put a smile on my face, it was good to hear. The end of a pleasant five or six hours.
Work clouds that is. An multiday trip to Dartmoor had to be put off earlier in the year because of work commitments. This worked out okay as the weather was positively dreadful at the point in the year things should have been getting better. I don’t mind poor weather, but there is no reason to actively seek it out when there are alternatives. I promised myself I’d get to the moor the moment there was a suitable gap in the work schedule.
The problem with not going on a break is you don’t get the time back and if I was too busy in spring, chances are I was going to be too busy through to the autumn months. All well and good having time on my hands in Feb but I can always think of better alternatives to being half frozen out on the hills miles from nowhere. Usually half frozen closer to home is the option taken.
But it looks like a break in the schedule is coming up. Uncomfortably close to the August bank holiday but take the chances when they come, there might not be another.
I am at the kit evaluation stage. Most of it is good to go. New boots, but they are pretty much what I had before, they work, I will let others guinea pig the latest space age nano boot tech.
My trangia is being retired for this trip. It has done me good service, the military version, it is pretty well bombproof, but the weight is testament to the indestructibility. The replacement is the whitebox stove. Don’t ask me why its taken so long to make an obvious decision put it down to the devil you know. Other considerations might have been, “I’ll let others guinea pig this space age nano cooking tech”. Or, “its a bloody crushed can”. Still it looks to be a well reviewed robust bit of kit, its a field tested and proven bit of kit.
New cooking pot is needed, nothing space age, its a camping saucepan with lid, folding handle and a base broad enough to handle the flames coming out of the white box stove. Nice and light, you don’t need much to boil water and cook beans lets face it.
After the trangia, it all seems a bit like a child’s tea set. My main concern is stability issues but I am a reasonably competent adult so I suppose I will get along. The website says it does not need a pot stand, but that might be like saying I don’t technically need two legs as I could hop. Nobody seems to be making a big fuss of stability issues other than saying “stability issues”. Reasonable care seems to be the thing to apply.
The day has settled into the familiar weather pattern, the sun beats down. It has been a wonderful summer. It cannot compete with past summers because nothing can compete with things gone. In memory though it will be very special.
"They" say August will be hot, the first six months have been as dry as anything since the 20s.
The track curves away from Bottengoms and towards a pond. Our progress was hidden by trees and startled a young duck. He went for the safety of home at comical speed, everything flapping as he ran across the water. A gust of wind nearly sent my hat skidding across the pond after the fleeing duckling, that would not have done at all.
A bit of road walking was coming up. A country lane really. that happened to have been surfaced some time ago. I guessed quite some time ago by the amount of plant life that had forced itself up through the tarmac. It reminded me of the life after people TV series and how time limited so much of what we create is without continual vigilance.
These sleepy country lanes, sunken with poor visibility, make me nervous. My ears strain to hear approaching motors, they can be on you fast, too fast. Getting yourself to safety against the steep earth banks can be tricky, an added complexity when you have small dogs on leads. A stress which doesn't allow me to really enjoy these little sections of walk which are very nice to remember once the danger is behind you. Empty roads are a pleasure but they always hold the memory of swift travel unless they are very decayed.
Soon back to billowing countryside and a sign warning us there is a bull in the field. Marvellous, and limited views through undulating fields cannot disprove it. No fresh cowpats can be seen though. I venture on. 600 odd years ago something more than a bull was worrying the locals around these parts.
I am surprised by the sight of a glider, it is quite low to the ground, appearing above treetops. It is coming into land, there is a landing strip nearby which I had forgotten about. It was a quick reminder of the day I saw them from a greater distance when walking a section of The Essex Way, south of here.
I am close to The Grange, and entering dragon territory. The views across The Stour Valley are very special, devoid of almost everything but agricultural enterprise.
The tale has a few tellings but lets go with the account written down by a local monk, John de Trokelowe, which was written at the time. 1405. This has the dragon emerging from The Stour at Bures. The dragon did considerable mischief to local sheep and scared a good many village folks. Richard de Waldegraves bowmen made a concerted effort to rid their lordships land of the miscreant. However they found arrows bounced off the back of the great beast and they had to make a retreat.
A local posse was formed and legend has it the dragon on seeing this went into the local mere never to be seen again.
Wormingford is of course, ford of the worm. Worm being another version of dragon. The mere is now in the grounds of Wormingford Hall. There are plenty of versions of the tale with one identifying the dragon as a crocodile which had escaped from The Tower of London. The monk describes a vast body with tufted head, saw-like teeth and a tail immeasurably long. Combine this with a back that deflected arrows and perhaps this is what it was.
Whatever the truth the area has thankfully not drummed this up into a theme park or tourist trap. Wormingford church has a 500 word plaque recounting a version of the story and elsewhere there is a stain glass windows depicting events.
This version suggests the legend of St George and the Dragon may have had its roots here. The passage of time has lost the absolute truth of what happened here, but something odd did.
We arrive at Wormingford church itself, Norman tower built partially from recycled Roman materials. A north isle of 14th Century construction is the modern extension.
Opposite the small road by the church a house proudly proclaims its construction date of 1750 with a large plaque contemporary to construction by the looks of it.
The church wall has a treat, a set of stone steps which go up and over the wall, which is maybe 4 foot high. It saves opening the iron gate next to it. The dogs like this and make repeated use of it. I wonder if it was used as a mounting block.
The churchyard holds the mortal remains of John Constables relatives who worked locally, as well as the artist John Nash and his wife.
The Norman church is the epicentre of the walk, John Nash lies there, Ronald Blythe preaches there. I can imagine the villagers praying for salvation from the dragon. To the NW near the mere significant prehistoric remains have been found when in 1836 a barrow was opened where 'hundreds of urns in rows' were found.
On the old flood plain at a bend of the River Stour can still be found the flint tools of our ancestors, a walk for another day.
Walking on a skylark hung 15 foot or so above my head and sung his liquid song. It had been the soundtrack of the walk My late start had caught up with me and Bures was not going to be my end destination. Rather than a circular walk back along the St Edmunds way it was back along the Stour Valley walk.
Almost at the very end of my walk was an old deeply weather-worn kissing gate, thick wooden beams were curved as a barrel. The whole structure speaks of more effort than needed, built stronger with more craft but clearly rustic. I cannot recall the last time I had seen a gate quite like this. Hopefully it will be many years before it needed a replacement even if in keeping like the one at the start of the walk.
A beginning and an end. Time to turn around and see things from another angle.
