Letting Off Steam

Things are still very mixed and when F picked me up from work, he found a stressed and unhappy me.

As we drove home, I said 'Take me to Godrevy'

'no, I don't want to eat chips'

'nooooo, I need to get out'

So off we went to the headland known as Godrevy. As it so happened he had put Little Dog in the back to come assist with the collecting of me, so she was overjoyed at the diversion.

The very last of the light was still in the sky, along with the tiniest sliver of moon. Just enough light to cast the huge waves in silver and navy. Huge sprays were sent up by the rocks as a glimmer of white in the gloom.

The sky was clear except for a band of cloud on the horizon above St Ives over the other side of the bay. So from silver and navy sea to the darkest mauve of the clouds, lit with the jewel lights of the towns, then above to the last light, nearly gone in a sky turning darker with each minute.

It was lovely. It will be cold later, as it is so clear. But then, with little wind, after the recent gales, it felt relatively mild. Most people didn't want to go out on such a night, so only one or two cars were up there and no other walkers. We were all by ourselves with no need to worry that we couldn't see what Little Dog was up to in the dark.

Nature is always there when I need breathing space. She is always there when things feel too much. When I am sad, or angry. She is also there when I am happy too. She always makes me feel better. I love her for that. So why, on such a wonderful evening, with so much beauty, were we alone?

Being

After four weeks of barely leaving the house, i find I have little to say. I have rediscovered the pleasure of midday naps and this has led to the discovery that I like watching the clouds from my bed. My house has huge sash windows and is perched on the side of a hill so that the opposite house sits a foot or two lower than mine. I can watch the clouds, or the sky change colour, or the seagulls soar. I particularly like the seagulls.

The way they fly is soooo, full of grace. Their huge wings change shape very slightly and they harness the wind. They soar, using the wind with pure instinct. At one ment.

It reminds me of a programme I saw on Leonardo da Vinci once. He made so many incredible drawings of machines that were never made. It was decided to gather a team and try and make some of his inventions. The one I remember particularly was the hang glider, except it wasn't a glider. It flew but was so dangerous, even in the hands of the most experienced pilot.

The machine worked like the wings of the seagulls, subtle changes in shape in reaction to changes in the wind. What made it dangerous was that the pilot could not straight away have those instincts of how to use the winds. In addition, birds can feel the wind under their wings, pilots can not, so there was no feedback. I can only imagine such a machine being successfully piloted by a computer with a battery of sensors and lightning quick reactions.

Each and every animal out there has a precise function, purpose and home. They are at one with their environment. They are part of it. Their complex inter-relationships are vital to the whole system. The salmon in the river need the trees to maintain their habitat but so to do the trees need the salmon for it is the salmon that bring nutrients back up the catchment.

Why did we leave our niche? What did nature design us for? What is it that brings us into at one ment? What was our niche? Until we discovered how to manipulate our environment and make tools, I don't think we were the most successful of creatures. Few others survive on our evolutionary branch with the closest being monkeys, gorillas, chimps et al. So not the most successful design of nature then, not really.

So I know these questions have been asked so many times before... How did we jump from being animals to what we are? and what exaclty are we? Because I refuse to believe that we are a mistake of nature, a virus, planet killer. There is something more to us.

I believe.

Escapism

I still feel icky. Not sure why. Maybe some nasty little virus has snuck into my system and lying it low. Maybe it is psychosomatic. Maybe I just don't want to go back to work. Maybe it is all of these. I have no energy and I feel like a limp lettuce.

It makes me nervous because last time I felt like this, I had Chronic Fatigue. I have been clear for some time, which makes me one of the lucky ones. It scares the bejeesus out of me, the thought of going back where I was. I suspect everytime some bug lays me low, that fear will be there.

I think my dalliance with that nasty bug has always been about my life not being as it should be. I think the further we get from the way we should be living, the more open we are to these nasties. Once in our bodies they make themselves at home.

School didn't make me happy. University (the first time round) didn't make me happy. I am not happy now. So what would make me happy? Is my idea of a perfect life really so perfect? Is it a delusion? What is it I want?

So let's focus on that. That dream. Just for a little while. It sure is a nicer place than my achy head for starters.

*******

I am, when in the best of health, an early riser. So I would get up and leave F and Little Dog happily snoozing for one is not an early riser and the other is not a quick riser. I would go downstairs and brew up a nice cup of herbal tea. I would take it through to another room and leave it to cool.

If it is warm I would go out onto a patio or verandah or deck and practice some tai chi. Say it is Summer and the sun is still low in the sky. I would feel the warmth of the sun on my face as I connect with all that is.

After, I would pause and drink my tea on a chair and watch the birds at the bird table, mostly blue tits. I would hope that a wood pecker would visit. Little Dog hearing that I had finished would appear, all bleary eyed and graciously accept some stroking. Then we would move off for a walk.

I would maybe take a wicker basket with me. Little Dog would lope around sniffing things as we move through the morning with quiet enjoyment. We would go let the chickens out and give them some food and maybe find some eggs for breakfast. Little Dog of course would want to get in and visit.... We would stop and say hello to the pigs and the goats and the cow and sheep and horses and check their water and maybe give them some food although they probably wouldn't need it this time of year so much. If we have some goats or cows producing milk I would have taken a pail and stool with me to milk them.

We would walk down by the river first and pause there before turning back up through the forest garden where I would pause and gather a few berries maybe for breakfast. Then we would go to the veg patch and greenhouse and I would turn on the water and check the plants and maybe pick some herbs for the eggs. Some rosemary maybe.

Finally we would return to the house, I would top up Little dogs food and then hop in the shower before cooking breakfast. The smell would lure F from bed and we would eat together on the verandah. It would still be early

I would then maybe do a couple of hours in the gardens, weeding or hoeing, planting or pruning or maybe some harvesting. Or maybe spend some time in the green house. Whatever needed doing. Maybe the pigs needed moving from one enclosure in the woods to another to give the plants a chance to regrow. F would be pottering to and doing man things probably.

After a few hours work, as it starts to get hot, we would return to the house with some food for lunch. Things for a salad maybe. Maybe I would have some things from a full harvest. Things to spend the afternoon pickling or jarring or jam making.

After lunch I would potter a little in my studio or maybe sit with a book for a bit. I love harvesting fruit. I always have done. I used to climb trees for the plums or sit on a stool picking berries.

What I would do would depend on the seasons. The morning routine of tai chi, dog walk and animal care would be pretty consistent but the rest would vary. More arts and crafts in the winter. More garden graft in the spring and early summer. Much harvesting and preserving in the autumn and late summer.

Some days we would escape and go out. Others I would go to a class. Some evenings friends would come over and we would eat and be merry. Sometimes we might go and find some culture, take a picnic to the Minack and see a play.

Maybe one day there would be children. A baby snoozing in a play pen with a sun screen as I pick berries. A toddler asking constant questions and chasing the goats, before they chase him back. A child going off to school (a school without SATs and pressure) and then returning to climb trees and build dams. A teenager maybe fishing in the river or giggling with girl friends over something on the TV.

Maybe F would go out to work. Maybe I would be a world renowned author, writing in the winter and living off the royalties of a train of books. Maybe I would be an artisan with all sorts for sale on etsy, supplementing an income. Maybe I would be rich and have no worries about money at all. It is the living closer to the land I dream of.

Dusk

People are scared of the dark.

No really. They are.

People linger outside their homes, on hill tops, cliffs, anywhere with a view. They watch the sun set. The second it has been sucked below the horizon they vanish. They bustle off home as if the last rays of light leaving the sky will cause them to turn to stone and they must be behind closed doors before that happens....

Dusk is one of my favourite times of day.

The clouds turn charcoal grey, high in the sky. The sea turns the colour of slate. Hills in the middle distance turn inky black, the more distant they are, the less inky the black and the more gently they stand in the gloom. Flowers sprout across them, orange, white, yellow and red. Flowers that outcompete the stars and shine more brightly. They glisten.

It is still light enough to see the path. Walking slowly and steadily with care, rough paths don't pose a threat. The sun shines up from beneath the sea and paints the underside of the clouds. red, crimson, amethyst, dusky pinks. More beautiful than the sunset.

All those people leaving, miss this. They miss this gentle time. Caught in the inbetween. They run from the dark and miss the best of it.

I am not scared of the dark. I am sometimes a bit nervous of the people that hide in it. Tonight there is no moon. The moon won't rise until to late to be seen. And it is a new moon too. But walking under the full moon can be so well lit! Tonight it was always going to get dark but not as dark as people seem to think, nor as quickly.

Time Passes and The Circle Turns

Things still havn't really gotten going. I don't think they are going to either. I think this one will sort of stay as it is before fading away and that will be it for this month. Being fat really does affect your hormones and I know that mine have been affected. Maybe this is my body making progress towards getting back to normal, who knows. Hopefully as I get thinner and thinner my body will become as regular as clockwork with predictablity and stability and fewer hiccups.

My energy is fragile at the moment. I am happy as I wake and go off to work. I have enough energy to see me through the first few hours but then things go downhill. I run out of energy. Suddenly I am sick of everyone, grouchy, tired and fed up. If I had my way, I would not go to work on such days. I would spend them mostly alone, doing soft things at a speed suited to me. I wouldn't become overtaxed.

Last night on the way home I decided to throw the diet out the window. I bought a trashy box, some bath treats, lots of crisps and chocolate and some new brushes. I got in the bath and stayed there for four hours with my purchases (except the brushes). While I am going to stick to a post a day, i am no longer going to insist I boot up the laptop at such times...

The weather is stunning. definitely cool, with the mornings shrouded in thin mists. The skies are pastel and soft, blurred round the edges. By lunch everything feels pleasantly warm but the nights are cold. Perfect Autumn weather. Things are changing but still lovely.

I have decided that I need gloves for work. Not yet but I find that even if I am warm, cool drafts can make my joints ache. I will need to take care of my wrists and hands at work. I can't use full gloves at work because I handle plastics that get staticy and stick to me but I have seen lovely tubes which go up the arm and over the wrist with a hole for the thumb. This leaves all the fingers free to work but keeps a lot covered and warm. I think I might visit etsy...

Maybe I should invest in wooly tubes for my ankles and knees to wear under my jeans to make sure those joints stay nice and toasty as well?

Oh I lost 2 pounds this week. I wasn't so very chuffed with this because it is exactly what I gained the week before and because I was feeling grumpy and rough.

Magpie

I like Magpies

I have for as long as I can remember. I am a little superstitious of them.

I guess it all starts with that rhyme. And there are so many versions....

One is for sorrow
Two is for joy or mirth
Three is for a girl, a funeral or a wedding
Four is for a boy or a birth
Five is for a silver, heaven or a fiddler
Six is for gold, hell or a dance
Seven is for a secret never to be told, the devil his own self, old England or tale never to be told
Eight is for a wish, to live or Old France
Nine is for kiss or to die
Ten is for a bird you won't want to miss, a time of joyous bliss or to eat bogey pie!


I remember hearing that in folk music each new version allows them to estimate the age of the song. so a song with four versions would be twice as old as one with two. By this estimate this makes the magpie rhyme very old. I have no idea where I got that from though....

Some of the things in it make me smile - the heaven, hell and the devil his own self version is just so Christian influenced. The boy and girl bit is much from a time when women were pregnant all the time.

Other things have grown up around magpies, mostly do with getting rid of the bad luck of seeing one. Saying hello Mr Magpie and saluting them were both things my Mum told us. We thought she was joking but they are there on wikipedia.... It also says that if a magpie looks you in the eye they respect you and you don't need to worry about bad luck....

I see magpies.

I have become very sensitive to them. I can recognise their calls. I recognise their peculiar flight. The merest hint of magpie and I am on it. The flash of black, or white or that wonderful irridescent blue green....

I can't remember when all this started but I already felt strongly linked with them by the time I was 18. The Wiccan friend I made was aware of it. She found a dead magpie in her garden and remembering my tendency to use them for omen telling, was very disquietened by this. Later that day she found out a friend had died. I never forgot that.

I don't know that I stick to a rhyme, I just kind of feel my way through it.... It depends not just on how many, but what they are doing.

My watching them has taught me a lot. The juveniles stay and help their parents with the next batch of kids. They live in extended family groups and work together. You can identify their territories and once the chicks are raised they seem to get a little less defensive of their territories and you are more likely to see them socialising in larger groups.

They have become very common because they are generalists. At work we have a carpark surrounded by mowed lawn. The magpies can survive using this lawn where other birds can't. Smaller garden birds live in the hedgerows and scrub just beyond the fence but the magpies are the ones who survive best in the artificial domain we create. Meadow that is mown once or twice a year is so varied and beautiful. Why do we have to have lawn that is mown regularly and consists of one type of grass maintained with chemicals?

The magpies are to me a bird about balance - black and white - good and bad. They are tricksters, magicians and thieves (they like shiny things). There dominance is a sign that things are out of balance. I love them though and am glad that something can survive in these places we have created...

Beautfil Day

Last night finished as it started really... With my stomach giving me trouble... Then I made it worse by letting the dog out in the dark and managing to kick my toe on something. Unfortunately I managed to get the one toe with a bad nail so I added a fresh cut to it.

So F came home this morning to find a tired me. We had a chat and a laugh and then he left me to sleep. I wasn't overly fussed about going out but F made it clear he wanted to so I suggested going to get an aerosol to clean my laptop. I knew something was up when he got his flip flops and the camera.

He wouldn't admit to a plan but we ended up in Mevagissey. This is a lovely tourist town / fishing village with a beautiful harbour which is still in use by fishing boats (we saw one come in laden with fish and sea gulls following it in trying to steal them). We looked in a few touristy gift shops at pictures and crafty things before heading to the harbour.

The first thing we saw of interest was a dogfish lying at the edge of the water being attacked by a seagull. We walked on round. The sea was as flat as a mill pool. The waters in the harbour were clear and allowed you to see the seaweeds turn the harbour into a forest with so many different types... We climbed the outer harbour wall and looked out to sea. We spotted a jellyfish drifting along.

Mevagissey has a lovely view of St Austell Bay including Gribben Head where a day marker stands. This is a huge stripey tower that used to be a lighthouse. The Fowey estuary drains into the bay and ferries run between Fowey and Mevagissey.

As we left Mevagissey I spotted a sign to St Ewe. This rang a bell as I had never been there but Miss*R who lives in Australia recently told me that the earliest of her ancestors on her family tree came from St Ewe. So I got F to make a slight detour...

St Ewe turned out to be a lovely village. The heart of the village is a square with the remains of a celtic cross. We entered the square between the village pub and the lock up and parked there. I dragged F into the churchyard where there was a beautiful and very traditional church which seemd at odds with the palm trees in the graveyard!

We wandered and looked at the intricate grave stones and then I spotted an opening in the wall and some steps down. I followed them and discovered a board walk a board walk through a wooded boggy area. At the far end was a stream choked with plants that obviously only flowed properly some of the time. It felt a special area to me...

It was obviously attached to the church and obviously attention had been paid to it in order tomake it so accessible. Most old churches are built on sites that were already considered sacred. In Cornwall the ancient sites were venerated and became holy themselves. This had the feel of a holy site, an ancient holy site.

The only mention of this I have managed to find online is a reference on this website to a spring rising in the churchyard. But it is there and beautiful.

So Miss*R can be proud to come from an ancient and beautiful village with a holy (probably) spring and an ancient celtic cross. St Ewe herself has been lost in the mists of time pretty much....

So we left and returned home where we grabbed Little Dog and went to the chippie before driving on to Godrevy. We ate and then took her for a walk up onto the top of the headland and watched the sun set and reflect gloriously off the clouds in swirls of fuschia and violet.

We would have stayed longer but a large insect flew towards us closely followed by a bird. The bird narrowly missed catching it because it decided it didn't want to collide with F. The insect flew on and the bird had another go but the bug flew to me and took a liking to my hair. It repeatedly flew at me even when released form my hair. It was the size of a large bumble bee but slightly longer in the body and it buzzed very loud and I didn't want it in my hair... So we left and although it hitched a ride on my back, we eventually managed to leave it behind...

Photos to follow....

Five Frogs

I got home today to find much lovely post... Prince Caspian DVD to watch, some lovely purple art from a young Canadian friend, a Romanian postcard of a Happy Cemetery and two more Keri Smith books!

Little Dog expressed a desire to go walking (she never does if it is raining) and as I had already decided we would go out, off we went... Down by the river.

The pond of tadpoles still has tadpoles but they have slowly been getting fewer. I was beginning to think the tadpole I saw a couple of weeks ago with back legs had been a figment of my imagination. The pond had cleared enough for me to see small black fish and little black beetles, but no frog legs...

We carried on past the pond and as I got to a puddle from yesterdays rain I noticed something squirm. I bent down to look and there was a tiny little frog. I watched it intently. I came across four more... And then I came across them all again as I walked back...

Unusually we bumped into other people and even worse, I knew them! This has always been a getting away from things place for me and discovering people I know also use it for the same reason makes it a little less of an escape for me. Not that it wasn't nice to see them, it was. And Little Dog liked their dog well enough...

We came home and now I have nothing much I wish to do right now....

Home

When I was one my parents finalised there move from London to the country, to a lovely house where they remain to this day, but not for many more years as they plan to move. When they moved, buying old houses and doing them wasn't quite so popular as it is now...

The house was originally two farm labourers cottages which would each of only had two rooms. One up, one down. The house got expanded over the years but this wasn't done unsympathetically. The house is mostly wood framed with red brick. The wood is black and pocked with the holes of long dead wood worms. The roof tiles are also red and covered in moss. Nothing is straight or square or flat. The doors are low. The windows are leaded and only secondary glazing keeps the draughts out. The walls are one brick thick and move with the weather so that sometimes, in certain places you might catch a glimpse of daylight. Draughts also come through the gaps. Each bedroom has a basin and if you let the tap drip in the winter the pipes freeze. The floors downstairs are brick and sometimes if there has been a lot of rain, water oozes up between them.

The house was built over 400 years ago and has no foundations. Many trees were planted in the garden and one in particular is now linked to the house. A giant willow tree lives in the front garden and it's roots stretch under the hosue and support it. In the back garden there are three giant lime trees that are also close to the house. A large part of the garden is flanked by trees, yew, fruit trees and others and there is also an orchard and much hawthorn hedging. I spent much time as a child climbing the trees of the garden.

When my parents moved there they created a vegetable pacth at one end of the garden but this slowly languished. It remained unmoved and has provided a fascinating introduction to the principle of ecological succession... It is now nick named the copse as it is home to trees. My favourite tree lives here - an oak which I have watched grow since it first became noticeable amongst the grasses when I was maybe about ten.

The trees are kept in good shape with the occasional limb being removed. Storm damage and death also result in the loss of trees. All this wood is harvested and set to dry in the wood shed from which it later will journey to the stove. There is also a garden shed and a wood store. There is another tiny decrepit shed which houses the remains of a water pump, rusted and never working in all the time I have seen it...

My parents have no well kept garden, plants live or die as they will and birds bring fresh seed. I remember a particular plant grew amongst the grass that had a lovely orange flower, known as orange hawsbit. My Dad wouldn't mow this bit of grass and the flowers were lovely....

They also put a lot of nuts out for the birds all year round and have been doing this for years. The presence of a pack of greyhounds means that anything small and furry tends not to make a home there. As a consequence birds have flourished and a large variety visit including Greater Spotted Woodpeckers and even the local Green Woodpecker comes to visit. Birds nest all over the pace, under the eaves, in the post box, in the clematis that grew under my window and in through it. Some even nested in the bord boxes...

Bats flourish there too and I think they live under the eaves as well. In Summer you can lie on the grass and watch them fly overhead as dusk falls. My parents leave a lot of the fruit on the fruit trees to attract mice for the Screech Owls that feed there.

I loved growing up with that connection to one piece of land.

I loved walking bare foot in the mud

I loved walking bare foot in the dew soaked grass

Lying in the cool long grass under the apple trees on a hot day.

Watching the single iris my parents planted in a muddy hollow spread until no muddy hollow could be seen and watching them flower yellow.

Kicking copper and gold leaves in Autumn

Picking fruit

Rolling down the slope

The icicles that dangle off the conservatory

I think that house taught me to love the land...

That house though, for all the things that must have happened there, it feels like a happy place, a home. It has always protected and sheltered. I know every creak it makes as it warms and cools. After we have gone it will shelter and protect others to as it has done before. It is rumoured that in the war, the garage was used as a radio room for communicating with the French Resistance. It is just that sort of place... Freedom, hope, beauty.

I remember one time I felt a black presence following me everywhere, when I left to go visit my parents, i felt it couldn't step foot on that piece of land.... One day soon it will only be home in my memory and I shall miss it so very, very much...

Kennal Vale

Kennal Vale is a little tiny nature reserve. Chances are that you would never find it by accident. The entrance to the reserve is on a tiny road that goes nowhere much. It looks as if you are entering the drive to someone's house but the path runs past the house to a gate. And still nothing looks that special or unique. Sure it looks pretty from the gate. A long path stretches along the side of a valley through trees with ferns and a river running somewhere near...

But the site is unique, it is one of my most favouritest places ever in fact. The valley has steep sides and the River Kennal runs through. This river looks like nothing more than a stream but in it's short trip to the sea it powered 39 mills in it's day. It is in fact the most powerful river in the country for no river can boast the ability to power so many mills per mile.

Some of the mills were used for making gunpowder, those in Kennall Vale itself. The mills were powered by water which has been channeled through a complex system of stone lined channels called leats. The valley is full of the river and the ruins of all these buildings. For gunpowder is dangerous stuff and the wet atmosphere of the valley was perfect for preventing explosions. Trees were planted between the different buildings to dampen any explosions and prevent them spreading from building to building. Of course there were accidents, and deaths, some of them gory...

The gunpowder works closed but the site was not dead. A quarry was begun on one side of the valley. The excavated material was placed on top of some of the gunpowder works buildings and new buildings were built on top. So the site has a whole host of industrial history....

There are three main paths, one on each side of the valley and one down the bottom by the river. The path on the mill side of the valley runs along side the leats as they run through the valley. It runs behind the mills and the water from the leats often crosses the path. As the leats descend the side of the valley, the path descends to, down steep steps alongside ruins.

The sound of the river is everywhere as it courses over rocks. It also goes over a weir and there are so many waterfalls, from the leats and the river....

On the other side of the valley is the quarry which is now flooded and backed by a sheer rock wall....

The trees the explosives workers planted have blossomed and the once industrial site is a haven for nature. As well as trees, tere are ferns, everywhere. They grow on the ruins, on the trees, just everywhere. Some of them are very rare as well...
I decided to take Little Dog for a walk there tonight. I also decided to take my brand new copy of Wreck This Journal there to (go see my other blog for some details on that!) It was lovely....

Return of the Sun

Today the gloomy morning matched my mood heading to work. The day however did brighten and so did everything else to. I can't say work is a happy place for me right now, although everyone is trying painfully hard. It all feels a bit shiny and brittle. It wasn't too bad though once we got into it and it all settled down....

This morning I made use of my new paycheck to do some hunting on Amazon. I was after Wreck this Journal and a new Charles de Lint book. However both books were available with offers for two others by the same author... So I have a little bevy of arty books and an enchanted fairy circle on their way to me. Joy! *grin*

Wreck the Journal is the book being followed by The Next Chapter book group starting in a week's time. There are a lot of people taking part and I can't wait to get my books in the post.... Go take a look at what we get up to sometime. I will post more about my progress with this on my creative blog.

Somehow while I was at work today my kitchen changed from magnolia to yellow. Although I miss F on the evenings and nights and weekends when he has to work, there are some benefits. I have decided that this still counts towards my 101 things, it is just an example of delegation *grin*.

Little Dog found herself being wiped out the door as soon as I got home. We went down by the river. The path faces towards the sun and it was baking hot despite the strong winds that made the trees rustle so much the leaves sounded like an ocean.

Butterflies basked on the path. The stagnant pool with millions of tadpoles had changed since last time, there was still tadpoles but they were fewer and fatter. I even saw one where little legs had just started to grow. The hedgerows are full of the white flowers of the Umbellifer family, probably cow parsley, and ferns were unfurling.

I had hoped to let Little Dog swim in the pool we discovered under the trees but it had dried up too much. It was an expanse of mud with a stagnant puddle or two. I think Little Dog was disappointed....

She didn't mind too much though. She trotted around happily sniffing things. She reminds me of a horse, quite a classy horse, or maybe a pony. She has quite a collected little trot and it is so precise and upright.

And now it is the weekend and the sun is set to shine all through it....

Baker's Pit

I gave F warning that when he got home this morning, he could expect to be dragged off somewhere with Little Dog and I. And we did...

We went to Baker's Pit, a Cornwall Wildlife Trust site that lies between St Michael's Mount and St Ives on the old pilgrim's way. The back bone of Cornwall is made of granite and these hills are home to heathland and acid peat bogs. In between the hills lie heavily wooded valleys often with willow carr (a habitat featuring water and willow trees mixed together) and little rivers.

In some places water got into the granite and weathered it. In these places the clay has been weathered into clay deposits. St Austell is famous for it's clay pits and clay tips with the Eden project built in an old pit. I didn't know that other parts of Cornwall had been mined for clay, until today.

Baker's Pit is an old clay pit that sits between granite hills. The water has that orange colour that tells of water draining off from peat. trees grew round the edge of the lake. We sat on a concrete jetty and ate our sandwiches. Little Dog galivanted happily, in and out of the water.


It was a beautiful spot our camera couldn't do justice. The pit would be lovely to explore in a canoe but apart from this small area by the jetty it was inaccessible without causing damage and disruption and possible injury.


We made our way back to the main path and followed a fork that lead through some small fields around the top of the pit. Gates and stiles lead between fields and then into boggier land. The path came here, where it lead through a tiny ruin (on the left). Little Dog was turning into a Bog Dog with black paws and ran through the bog in the picture and back through the ruin several times.

The trees began to clear and we found ourselves on open heath as we neared the top of the hill. Behind us we could see the sea around St Ives. As we reached the top we could see the sea at Mount's Bay. The photo below actually shows Mounts Bay and Penzance....Paths zig zagged all over the area and once we reached the top we started to circle round. We passed fields of cows, mine ruins and a lone chimney. Our sense of direction was good enough that we ended up back at the car. Looking at the map I still can't see exactly where we went. I don't think all the paths and tracks are marked. Looking at the reserve map however we appear to have done the full circuit of the reserve....

It was lovely and Little Dog and F seem rather tired now...

The pits were started, in the main, in the early 1800s but one pit in the area was working in 1758. In 1868 the pits changed owners and pumping began. Sand was separated first and taken away and slurry was placed in settling tanks to separate the clay. The best quality mica rich clay was dried in a kiln. Some of the waste was sent to be made into bricks.

Work stopped for the Great War and never really got going again. It passed into the hands of English China Clays which later became Imerys. Work stopped in 1942. Imerys gifted the site to Cornwall Wildlife Trust in 2000.

Within the reserve there are also Early Bronze Age Barrows, low stony banks from a prehistoric field system and an iron age banjo enclosure (the only one in Cornwall). Banjo enclosures were funnel shaped and probably used for livestock but theories include farming settlements or seasonal ritual centres where feasting occured. I think this counts as an ancient site where people lived....

Fear

As I may have mentioned I have a lovely glorious week off. F doesn't however as he has just started his new job. He is now working shifts and I have to get used to him working evenings and nights as well as days. Some weeks I will see very little of him... This week I would only have seen him one evening after work and the weekend.... Except I took the week off.

Yesterday he left me at midday and returned home this morning. This change has made me realise how dependent I am on him. Not to do things for me, but as company and a rock. In my late teens a few things happened to me and I became a little agoraphobic. I don't think I am agoraphobic really now but I think I will always have this tendency.

In the old job he would have two late finishes a week and he would work every other Sunday. These Sundays would always be days when I would have trouble getting myself going. Getting out of the house can take a fair bit of will power. Getting out when I am by myself takes either purpose or determination. Work or existing arrangements get me out no problem but if I don't HAVE to go out then, I tend not to. I can slowly turn into a hermit. Sometimes I have when I haven't been working.

I have so many things I want to do this week though, I don't want to waste it. Last night it was getting towards 7 and I started to get cross with myself. So I grabbed Little Dog and we went and walked round a local reservoir for an hour. She had a whale of a time and I enjoyed myself to, although i didn't bound around like she did....

If I enjoy going out so much, why is it still so hard to get out by myself?

Roseland Roadtrip

Today F and I went out on a little trip to the Roseland. The Roseland is a peninsula that is separated from mainland Cornwall by the Fal. The Fal runs south past Truro to Falmouth and is a flooded river valley. To reach the peninsula by road requires a large detour around the river valley. Unless of course you take to the river. The King Harry Ferry crosses the river. The river is tidal as far as Truro and is broad and heavily wooded along it's banks.

The view from the ferry up river to where some old ships await their fate.

From there we drove to a small village called Philleigh where we stopped at an Inn for a sandwich outside in the sun. We also explored the church behind the Inn and were lucky to be able to do this as the organist practiced. The graveyard is one that is managed by wildlife and as we entered through the gate we were greeted by a robin.

On from there we drove to Pendower Beach. The view from here was stunning as the beach sits in a large bay. Porthscatho sat glistening in the sun around the bay. The beach sits at the mouth of a valley and is sandy with small pebbles. As you walk along the beach it becomes backed by a cliff before the cliff drops away and it turns into Carne Beach. F skimmed stones into the sea and we admired the beach rocks. We spent quite a bit of time there....

Pendower Beach in the foreground with Carne Beach opening up beyond.

We drove on to Porthscatho, a lovely little fishing village / town which is joined to Gerrans. I was amused to see a poster advertising a frog race!

Porthscatho, across it's harbour.

From there we drove on to the very end of the peninsula, St Anthony's Head. This headland is the southern most point of the peninsula and sits at the entrance of Carrick Roads. The Carrick Roads is the expanse of water where several flooded river valleys come together. The largest of these creeks is the Fal, to the west is the port of Falmouth which sits between Falmouth, Flushing and Penryn and the third is the smaller creek which flows past St Mawes and into the Roseland Peninsula. Carrick Roads is such a deep and wide channel that huge ships regularly pass through it to avail themselves of the docks services at Falmouth.

From St Anthony's Head across Carrick Roads to Pendennis in Falmouth. You can just see the castle as the highest point on the headland. The docks are to the right of the headland.

To one side of the mouth sits St Anthony's Head and across the other side is the mound on which Pendennis Castle sits in Falmouth. A twin castle to Pendennis sits on the Roseland at St Mawes. Further military facilities sat on St Anthony's Head. A battery was sited on the head with an observation room for positioning ships. They were defended by the addition of walls. There was still ammunition and guns up there until 1959.

View from St Anthony's Head looking towards St Mawes with the Fal passing St Mawes on the left.

Walking between the battery walls.

At the bottom of the head there sits a lighthouse, St Anthony's Lighthouse. This lighthouse guides ships into Carrick Roads and warns them of the Black Rocks and the Manacles Reef. This lighthouse was the one used in the classic children's programme, Fraggle Rock. A little further along the coast is the old parafin store for the lighthouse.

St Anthony's Lighthouse

The Black Rocks from the Lighthouse.

From there we drove back up the peninsula, round the creek, to St Mawes. We walked along the sea front a ways and then drove up to St Mawes Castle.

View past St Mawes Castle to St Anthony's Head, you can just see the lighthouse.

I have seen so many beautiful views today and I have seen the Carrick Roads from so many angles.One last view of Carrick Roads from St Mawes Castle.

On the map below, the Roseland is the landmass to the right, with St Anthony's at the very bottom.

View map of Falmouth, Cornwall, England, TR11 3 on Multimap.com
Get directions to or from Falmouth, Cornwall, England, TR11 3

Virus (Word Wednesday)

In honour of the bug that has swooped down on Mel and her family today's word is virus.

A virus is a microscopic organism which can live outside of a host cell. Not all viruses hurt the cell in which they live, many just live their lives and pass on. Others cause a variety of effects and hepatitis, the common cold, flu and AIDS are all viruses. Our immune system has developed to try and fight viruses within our bodies. So some people may carry viruses, with no idea that they are doing so as their immune response manages to win the battle but not fully eradicate the virus.

There are other types of things that behave like viruses but have different mediums. Computer viruses are pieces of virulent code which can infect computers and self replicate. Some have disasterous results for your computer while others are harmless, such as chain emails. Memes are a form of virus that infect blogs.

In the film 'The Matrix', Agent Smith likens humanity to a virus and I have to agree. We have well and truly infected this planet we call home. I guess we have a choice, to be a nice happy smily virus, a virus that doesn't affect anything very much or a nasty destructive virus. I suspect that the Earth's immune system would be enough to take out this little virus, a few mega volcanoes and some nice dust clouds high in the atmosphere or perhaps a fresh little ice age. But then again maybe this little virus will kill it's host before the hosts immune system has a chance to fight back.

I would love to see us all just stop what we are doing. Becoming a nothing-y virus that doesn't affect much would be a helluva achievement. I would love to see us actively work with nature for the benefit of the planet. Nature aims for complexity and we are destroying this...

One thing I saw on TV very recently was a programme about a Devon farmer's desire to make her family farm sustainable. All farming is reliant on fossil fuels - even organic farms. There are however things called forest gardens where trees are planted with wide spacings and plants and bushes are grown inbetween, according to their requirements so that they fit the environment. In this way the complexity of a piece of land is harnessed in order to produce a fertile and largely self sustaining garden that produces food.

These gardens aren't suited to mass production or the use of oil guzzling tools. They encourage the use of old species grown unfashionable such as nut trees, medlars, quinces, damsons etc. There isn't room in these gardens for cereals or foreign imports that can not survive happily without being propped up with polythene or chemicals.

Imagine if we truly tried to work with the earth instead of against it?

She spoke of memories of flocks of seagulls coming to feed when they ploughed their land in her childhood. Now the birds no longer come when it is ploughed as ploughing has killed the rich ecosystem of the soil.... Are allotments similar somehow, with their neatly weeded rows, regularly composted.

Is there really another way?

I would love to think that the beautiful, wild looking gardens I saw could reallys support us....

Word Wednesday: Leaf

I need a new one.

So I can turn it over and hide under it.

Or maybe float on some lovely green pool while sat on it.

It needs to be a large one...

I find myself with a few negative emotions zooming around right now, I suspect it is the old hormones giving their little rumble before they spring fully in to action. The newest leaf on my tree ain't helping though...

This leaf is all young and fresh and conscious of her luscious green-ness. She doesn't want to do the same hard work as the other older leaves. She wants to hide in the shade while the others do all the hard work of changing the sun into lovely glucose. Maybe she doesn't quite get it.

Maybe she isn't really a leaf but a flower in disguise. Designed to attract the honey bees but somehow very self conscious of doing so. I want to look nice but I don't actually want anyone to look at me, but you can tell me how nice I look!

If she is a flower then maybe that's why she doesn't mind the leaves around her but going and doing some work with other leaves a little further afield is just too much! Or even thinking about doing some other things apart from the work that she always does. Taking responsibility for said work is just too much but she will happily plug away without getting stressed or taking any of it seriously... I am not saying she doesn't work just that when there is so much to be done and she is given some different jobs to do, coming and giving them to me shouldn't be her first reaction.

I know this is a poorly disguised rant and it is not that I am jealous of her being pretty or young. I just have so much more to do now, trying to take responsibility for managing her, when she should be managing herself is too much. When I have a stack of other jobs, that take me away from the task we share can't she see that she needs to take responsibility for it now? Why do I have to think about picking up new work and dropping off completed work? She needs to step up, not work harder exactly as she does already work hard but just step up, take the strain and be a nice little team player... And except that men are going to look at her and just hold her head high and get on with it.... or go work somewhere that isn't male dominated....

*sigh* not much about leaves at all....

I saw some today... leaves that is... they were all green and curled... Fresh and clean looking, like they had just woken up. I bet THEY don't have problems with each other and like working together... Why can't I be more like a nice little leaf? Maybe that's the leaf I need to turn over...

Padstein

Today we celebrated F's birthday. It wasn't actually his birthday - that's in a couple of weeks time. Tomorrow is the last day of a special offer for a lunch time set menu at Rick Stein's Seafood Restaurant in Padstow. And today it was our turn.

The restaurant was lovely with a calm but sophisticated air. The service was flawless as our waitress seemed to read minds and was always there without being intrusive. But the food... the food was beautiful.

The main course that F chose was normally the same price as the entire price of this menu for one person. It still wasn't cheap but how often do you get to eat at a celebrity chefs restaurant? Cornwall, being a tourist place has more restaurants than local population can support in the winter months and there are all sorts of lovely offers. Even the best of our restaurants need us poorer locals over the winter to fill their tables.

So the menu focused around Rick Stein's newest book and consisted of seafood. I had lobster and fennel rissotto to start while F had a gratin of turbot cheeks. For main I had sushi and F had Sea Bass. For desert I had pana cotta with rhubarb and he had a thing... (oops, slipped my memory). We finished with a latte and a peppermint tea )made with actual fresh peppermint leaves.

My sushi was perhaps a little more adventurous than I expected. There was a fair bit of raw fish. I don't think F would have liked it! It was beautiful and something I wouldn't normally have gotten to eat.

Part way through the meal, a young couple was placed at the table next to us. They were very attractive and were dressed expensively. They sat there and talked about money, about people they knew losing thousands, about shopping in New York, about not using the nursery slopes on skiing holidays and on and on. F and I don't have to talk. Their presence reduced us to silence but we were still communciating. And trying not to laugh. For them it was just a meal, while for us it was a special, special thing.
Afterwards we walked around the harbour and admired the views. Padstow sites near the coast, in a flooded river valley (caused by the change in sea levels after the last ice age). As such the harbour is very sheltered. Opposite the river from Padstow is Rock and the two are linked by a ferry. Rock is known for being the playground of the children of the rich.

Rick Stein knew what he was doing opening a top restaurant where he has access to both the rich and holidaying. The harbour continues to be home to a working fishing fleet, which is becoming less and less common in Cornwall. These fishermen, I hope, receive more for their catch because they are linked to the gastronomie that Rick has created. He has a restaurant, a bistro, a chippie and a cafe. Then there is the bakery, deli, gift shop and wine shop...

After our walk we returned to our car park and decided to visit the Lobster Hatchery. Most aquariums in our area tend to be small and overpriced. This one was small, reasonably priced and utterly charming.

Lobsters are under threat from fishing and pollution but it has been discovered that if females who are carrying eggs when they are caught are placed in a hatchery and the larvae raised until they are large enough, a much, much higher percentage survive to be adults. Lobsters are generally a mix of blue, cream and orange but occasionally genetics creates a rarecolouring or two. These variations occur in one lobster in several million (can't remember the number I think it was ten million for one and four for the other). They had lobsters of both these colourings, one was bright orange and the other was a vivid royal blue.

As well as full grown lobsters there were vats of larval lobster. There was a strong current in these jars and you could see little tiny lobster shaped individuals being thrown around. As soon as they leave the larval stage, they are separated into individual cells, as they have a tendency to fight and eat each other. The little lobsters in theit cells were so tiny! Once big enough to survive they are released into the seas of Cornwall.

We then drove through the sunshine along the coast back to home....

An Evening Walk

The last four days have been beautiful with clear blue skies and a hike in the temperature. Today dawned foggy and the day remained hazy even after it became sunny and warm. The earth seems to have warmed enough to give up it's water and it shrouds the land gently. And it was even warmer, it was lovely.

I got out of work a little early after a hectic day and I had to go walk. I walked in the door, picked up a lead and walked out again with Little Dog in tow. I knew everyone would be going for a walk this evening and I didn't want to go somewhere where they would all be. I needed to go inland, where people tend to neglect, and I wanted to walk in the sun and open air, not somewhere shaded under the trees.

I decided to go to the Red River at Menaderva, just outside a small village called Kehelland. We didn't see a soul. We walked to the music of the river and were serenaded by birds with every step. The long path beside the river had the sun traveling along it's length and hordes of insects were living their short lives in the heat rising from the baked path. As we walked back along the path, the sun cast long shadows in the orange light. The air had that glorious warm, sweet, alive quality and it was so clear and fresh that I just wanted to take huge gulps. I could almost taste it.

The Red River drains from the heavy mining areas of Camborne and Redruth and was named the Red River as the mines which it drained caused it to be full of metals which would settle out and coat the river with iron. I could give you a science lesson on this and I probably will one day but i can't remember all the details and I don't have time to look them up right now and chemistry isn't what I want to talk about right now!

The metallic particles the river carried were worth a little effort to reclaim though and in it's lower reaches the river was used for tin streaming. The tin ores from further upstream had caused the river to make the riverbed of the lower reaches of the river an easy source of tin ore. The river was manipulated through different ponds and canals as the base of the valley was scoured for ore. The water was used to seperate the heavier metallic ore and other material.

The river itself currently runs between two walls along this stretch and has a steady flow. A path was built along one of the riverbanks and this is high enough to remain dry. Both banks of the river have been left to nature and only for a little way is there fields adjoining the river. Woods and heath and willow carr sit on both sides. The old ponds and canals have been reclaimed and willows grow in and around them, draped in lichens and moss and reminiscent of some primeval swamp. The higher land is wooded or where the soil is poor, as a result of high metal content probably, gorse and heather has taken over.

The path itself is wide and bright and you could drive a land rover down it. To either side there is no sign of humans really doing anything very much at all any more. The gorse was covered in yellow flowers and yellow daffs and primroses were all over the place. Yellow celandines sat in some hedges. Everywhere was yellow and green and brown with the sun casting and orange glow. Just before I got back to the car I spotted some violets.

I couldn't see what most birds were as the sun was low in the sky so that birds flying were a whirr of feathers and light. Stationary birds glowed orange. Two Canadian Geese flew overhead telling me their names, with their loud honks. I think i saw some wood doves to and maybe a robin but it was hard to tell. The bird song rivalled the dawn chorus of many places and I wish I could identify birds from the songs.

It was a beautiful magical walk that left me happy, with a deep sense of contentment. I came home and bathed in lavender, chamomile and hops with a cup of tea and some chocolate... Bliss...

Life Through a Lens

I had promised myself that I wouldn't talk about the changes in my life until I could give them some perspective and I set myself a date for a week and that takes me to tomorrow. I have lots I want to say and show and share. But what shall I talk of tonight? I have managed to find other things all week but tonight...

One thing that has been on my mind recently is the old Smirnoff adverts from my teenage years. I have been trying to find them online with very little luck although i found the TV ad. There was a whole series of still pictures to but i can't find them. The premise of the campaign was that if you looked through a bottle os Smirnoff vodka, you would see the world rather differently. Wasps becoming helicopters was one I particularly remember but there were so many and they were very, very cool.

I love the idea of magic glasses or some other way of seeing the magic in the world or of just seeing it differently. They crop up all over the place from the old story of using smeared juice of four leaf clovers on the eyes to see faerie to the holed stone of the more recent Spiderwick Chronicles. I guess they appealed to me because I would have loved some way to see the fantastic, some way to see magic.

Problem is that the fantastic and the magical become the common place and the ordinary as soon as everyone can see them all of the time and they become the accepted. Maybe in some other reality all they have are wild helicopter gun ships and they would love an ordinary wasp or two. Maybe in some other reality they would love to have crocodiles instead of magical dragons. Maybe magical and fantastic is just about perspective.

Children seem to see the world with such innocence and joy, the magical and fantastic are with them all the time. I think as we take the world for granted we lose the ability to see them. In many of the Smirnoff ads the viewpoint changes as the camera moves so that by moving so the bottle is between you and the object, you can then see it different. Maybe we can shift our perspective in the same way so we can see the fantastic.

Actively manipulating magic is a different thing entirely of course. Science evolves and it is entirely possible that science and magic may become linked in my view. Everything is made of energy. When you look at things in such detail that you can see the energy of solid matter, magnified many, many times, the very act of observing changes its. Maybe magic is all about using your mind to become such a focused observer that you can alter things on a fundamental level. If you don't believe me look up Quantum Physics and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle and I wish you the best of luck!

For me there is so much that is fantastic in the natural world, but then I live somewhere so beautiful it would be hard not to see the beauty. I have a book on Cornwall published in 1923 as a tour guide for the well healed. The attitudes to many things are very, very different!

"inland, the scenery, dear as it may be to those who have known it from childhood, is apt to affect the unfamiliar eye as dreary in its monotonous expanse of rough brown moors, swelling up into low ridges, scarred by mines and topped by smokeless engine-shafts to take the place of trees."

I think time is a magic lens as well...

Common Roots

I have been struggling a little, trying to get hold of this concept of deity. I can't seem to relate to a particular God or Goddess. I like the idea of neolithic Mother figures having no details on their faces. The figure I made has no details on her face and I am comfortable with that. Many people with similar beliefs to me choose a God or Goddess which they are drawn to. I find this idea difficult...

I have come to realise that this isn't a problem, it is all to do with how I believe things to be. My real, core belief. The one I had perhaps mislaid a little...

I believe that everything contains a spark of spirit. I believe these sparks together mount up to an incredible spirit, that is the spirit of our planet, that some might call Gaia amongst other names. I believe that this spirit is nature and you can see it most strongly when looking out on the world. To look on the beauty of the world is to worship for me.

This spirit is both good and bad, male and female. It is everything all in one and may have contradictions inherent in it. I believe that all the Gods and Goddesses ever worshipped are aspects of this spirit. My truth is not the truth of others but for me, to look for a personal deity feels wrong at this time, it is not at the root of my faith.

I was talking to F in a car park yesterday before we went into a shop. I asked him how he felt about the changes I have made to my life recently, my return to my spirituality in particular. F is a doer rather than a thinker but he has the almighty power to surprise me. F was of the opinion that my change in attitude and picking up of my life had taken me closer to his outlook on life. I guess I have to agree with him there.

He continued by explaining how when we visited the tate, he really meant it when he said the view from the window was the real art. That nature is the most beautiful thing and the best and how he was glad that I had started us going out for more walks and how much he was enjoying that and how it had made him feel happier.

It seems that my beloved was able to just see that we were the same, but sometimes we happen to use different words for things. That I have turned my belief and feelings into a faith I try and use to better myself while he has no need of faith, he just is. It seems that within the heart of my non-spiritual fiance, there actually beats a spiritual nature loving heart. For all my academic ability, I think he is the clever one.