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Carpet

That’s a proper carpet.

This is one of our favourite walks, just so very peaceful. It’s a great place to find that stillness we all need sometimes.

Mostly peaceful.

A family meet-up here a few years back. A beautiful family get together, all apart from a wasp sting, one twisted ankle and my only case of fleas….. A friendly squirrel interested in being hand fed some carrots and grapes. We shared our food, he shared his fleas…..

Most Hallowe’ens we have a night trip here, it’s a great place to tell slightly lame scary tales. Completely pitch black, silence punctuated by the occasional owl hooting and unseen creatures moving in the undergrowth, probably covered in fleas. Torch Beams crossing paths with the ornate wood sculptures definitely give seriously good jump scares.

At night these sculptures genuinely do seem alive, almost like they move, expressions change.

Would you come for a torch lit walk here…..

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Magical trees

The local Arboretum has over 7000 trees from around the world spread over 120 acres. That’s a lot of wonderful trees….

But we love one part of the wood fest in particular. The trees here have real character. They look like characters from Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Almost magical.

And if you look really closely, they also have hats…. Bird House Hats.

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Stones

We are so blessed to live on the edge of The Moors. Close enough that just 30 minutes after Hawklad’s last lesson of the afternoon we can be here…

The Bridestones…..

The name is likely to come from the Norse Brinkstones, stones on the edge.

Natural sandstone sculptures formed through an Ice Age and shed loads of Yorkshire Weather….

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Not at all

For days this part of Yorkshire has been weather stuck. Stuck under mist, grey clouds and no sign of the sun. Apart from a few dog walks, the kind of weather that keeps you not too far from the fire. Trying to keep warm, I was sat going through some old photos and came across similar greyness in Switzerland. Rather than sat by a fire, here we were sat inside a warm lake boat, with hot drinks and breakfast, watching the world go reassuringly slowly by. Not belting anywhere at 100mph, just leisurely making our way across lake water. Savouring the journey rather than just impatiently trying to get somewhere fast.

Too often I find life goes by way too quickly, way too much stress, feeling out of control with no time to contemplate life. Even when the weather was grey, I treasured those moments of stillness on that lake. A chance to quietly think and breathe.

Those boat trips are years back, definitely well beyond my rear view mirror now. They haven’t really been replaced with anything similar. Life happened, a new reality dawned. A reality which often seemed like constantly moving from one activity to the next. Constantly busy, constantly occupied, rushing, maybe not achieving anything, maybe not feeling like making progress, just always doing stuff. Feeling like I hardly had any time to stop and breathe.

I love nature, I find so much peace there. When was the last time I spent real time gazing at a real mountain, a lake, out to sea. Not just a a fleeting glance then off again, actually stopping and taking the time to take in the wonder and the beauty. I’m tempted to say I don’t do this enough, but sadly the real answer is NOT AT ALL….

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Irony

A small nature reserve on the edge of the nearest city.

Been coming here for over 20 years and I’ve never seen it this wet.

The small pond has suddenly decided to grow, there is supposed to be a wooden viewing platform there. In fact the now super pond has completely submerged the path on the far side. No circular nature walk now.

Flooded pond

Impromptu streams forming all over the site.

The irony, just a few months back Yorkshire was officially under drought restrictions…..

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Woods

Blustery breeze, a few bickering birds. The only sounds here. PERFECT in this mad mad world.

Several power cuts over the last few days. Helpful test updates informing us that the power is out. Helpful text updates saying that due to the complexity of the supply problem it was impossible to provide fix times. Helpful text updates then saying the power is back on. Then helpful text updates saying it’s broken again.

But in the great scheme of things, it’s all ok.

Especially OK when it encourages trips out into the WOODS.

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Light Show

My phone camera really doesn’t like the dark…. It tries its best…..Sorry no glossy, professional photos here 😂😂😂😂 Being in focus is much overrated, that’s what I tell myself each day when I unfortunately see Shrek looking back at me in the mirror.

Unexpected bonfire night sky show, just when you think it’s been a quiet fireworks night. Especially as the public shows near us we’re cancelled due to flooding.

But if you give it a chance, if you look up ……. life, nature, all around us can be truly breathtaking.

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Worst

Biodiversity captured in one photo. Just moments later Captain Chaos decided it was a great place to cock his leg. The flying creatures didn’t hang around after that….

Maybe I should send The Captain to 10 Downing Street. Maybe that’s the only way of getting The Serial Liar to finally quit, end this nightmare and we can get our country back again.

Look at the mess here in the UK. That is what happens when you give power to the worst amongst us. When will we learn.