Nature washing over you

Here are three recent walks that I didn’t want to go on because of the weather – and the time of year – and the global pandemic - but which turned out to be full of fun and interest. As Kate of ‘I live, I love, I craft, I am me’ says, ‘Sometimes it is hard to get past that initial ‘grump’ then suddenly you feel nature washing over you and you feel so much better.’ Thank goodness for dogs who drag us out.

Ten days ago

Two noisy collies used to race over this stream and nip your ankles. It was a little unnerving and one friend wouldn’t even walk this way because of them, so one day I wrote a letter to the farmer explaining what was happening and saying that I didn’t want his dogs to cause severe injury and get into trouble. I had a very nice letter back, the farmer promising to fence his side of the stream and put a gate on the bridge, which is exactly what he did. Peace now reigns - for which I'm grateful (in spite of my opinions on fences).

The stream, the bridge and the gate

Oh dear, here’s one of those signs that make me see red. It’s children I worry about. Do they ever get the chance to be out in the countryside by themselves, to explore and play and use their imaginations?

The unwelcoming sign

There are lovely views, however, a little further on. I’ve seen red deer here twice and there’s a heronry in the trees below. In spring, you can watch the birds coming and going from their tangled-twig nests in the treetops. There’s not much life in evidence today though, in the depths of winter on such a cold day.

Lovely views

And there’s plenty of woodland here accessible from the path.

Accessible woodland

Oh dear. Here’s a new fence.

A new fence

 And what about this? I call this sort of footpath a ‘gulag’. (The bridge is for the animals.)

The gulag

We come to a fork and I say to Frog, ‘We can either take the easy but boring top path or we can take the interesting lower one which goes through the watermeadows. They’re much prettier but they’re wet at the best of times.’ 

The watermeadows

He surprises me by choosing the second option.

We hang on to each other and try to negotiate the mud without falling flat on our faces.

 

Negotiating the mud

As we reach dry land, I say to Frog, ‘I’m so glad you chose the lower path. That was the best bit of the walk. It was an adventure.’

He surprises me again by agreeing.

Two days ago

It’s Sunday and lockdown and people stream round the lanes and paths which I’ve had to myself for four decades. I don’t know where they all come from but I suspect Exeter, whose new housing estates are spreading our way, and from a new town which has sprung up a few miles to the east of us.

Nevertheless I’m charmed by a clump of gorse in flower as ever, some bedraggled left-over red campion and some toadstools projecting horizontally from the hedgebank. What on earth are they? They look like felted drumsticks.

Red campion

 

What are these toadstools?

Yesterday
 
We’re in what I call ‘Deliverance country’, Devon’s interior. As a neighbour says, herself a farmer, ‘You wonder if some of the people who live there have ever seen another human being before.’ The countryside is what I imagine most of Devon once was: rushing streams, tangled woods and small steep fields.

 We descend to one such stream and find a brave primrose shivering in the leaf litter.

Now we have to cross the stream, well churned by cattle. Ellie charges through, splashing mud up our trousers. Frog treads warily. He’s wearing walking boots which reach only to his ankles. I’m wearing wellies so I wade over, trying each foot before putting my weight on it, remembering a time when I sank into quick-mud and had to abandon a wellie, throw myself forwards and crawl out (then walk home filthy and one-booted).

 
Next we have a muddy slope to negotiate. Frog chooses this route, the long less-steep one. Just to be different, I choose the short precipitous one, the other side of the bramble clump, thinking that I see well-worn footprints that I can use as steps. I can’t. The whole area is treacherous and, with only brambles to hold on to, I imagine myself hurtling down backwards, head over heels. I have a few nasty moments.

 
At the top, we decide it’s time for lunch and get out our egg sandwiches, tangerines and coffee. Ellie whimpers under her breath, hoping we’ll take pity on her and share our food. We don’t. We’re wise to her by now (after ten and a half years).
We wonder about the green pimples all over the grass.
‘Perhaps they’re fairy houses,’ I say whimsically.
‘Maybe,’ says Frog. ‘I did think I saw a door in one.’
I suddenly feel terribly excited. ‘Where?’
It turns out to be a leaf.

We have a choice of routes, but there’s not much in it. Each is as muddy as the other.

The unmetalled road

The bridleway (right)

A blue waterpipe dangles through the trees, reminding us of Greece where utilities are hit and miss, especially on the islands.
 
We descend to a hamlet, so damp and deep that the lichen on the trimmed hedge looks like a forest of miniature Christmas trees.

My back’s beginning to ache so we rest at the gateway to a farm. Two muscular collies charge out barking, look us over, and then wander off, having decided that we’re OK. I feel honoured.
 
A man on a tractor raises his hand to us in greeting. He's the only person we've seen all day.
 
A speckled grey collie who I remember as snarly from a previous visit, potters out to see us in silence and then hangs about shyly as if she remembers us.
 
I love it here. It’s my sort of place.