Tag: leaves

An Andalusian Adventure (2) – reblog

On By Mick CanningIn journeys, Spain, travel, walking12 Comments

It was a long way to Colmenar. I was walking up into the Malaga Mountains, with no map and no directions other than a road sign at the edge of Malaga suggesting that by following this road I would eventually reach my destination.

I suspect I have undertaken other journeys where I have been better prepared.

But the day was perfect for walking, with high drifting clouds and a light breeze to keep me cool, and having done little for several days other than eat, drink and wander around Malaga, I was feeling fit, fresh, and eager to get going.

As the hours went by and I slowly gained height, the clouds began to build up, and the temperature gradually dropped. About an hour from my destination, it finally began to rain. Immediately the temperature plummeted, and I rapidly went from merely chilled to decidedly cold.

Usually, we approach rain all wrong. Buddhists would say unskilfully. If it begins to rain, we hunch ourselves up, both physically and mentally. We fear becoming cold and wet. We need to let go of this fear. It’s a good lesson to learn. Stop. Take several long, slow, deep, breaths, and let go of this feeling. Let go of this need. We act as though hunching ourselves up will keep us dry and make us warmer. It doesn’t. Unless one can find shelter, it is better to accept the rain and finish the journey.

It is a cliché to speak of heightened awareness, yet that is also a by-product of this letting go. We remove our focus from the rain and instead allow it to go elsewhere, where it is really needed. We should throw back our heads and embrace the rain, enjoy the freshness of the rain on our faces. Listen to the sound of the rain on the ground and the leaves around us.

Back then, I hadn’t learned that lesson. I hurried towards the town as fast as I could.

One of the first buildings I came to was an inn. I went into the bar and asked for a room. The room I was given was reached by leaving the bar again and walking around the side of the building. The door to my room had a gap at the bottom of an inch or two, but otherwise fitted the door frame well enough. It was locked and unlocked by the type of huge key frequently described as a jailor’s key. The room was furnished only with a bed, a chair, and a small chest of drawers. There was a mirror above the chest of drawers and a crucifix above the head of the bed, but other than those the whitewashed walls were bare. There was a small window which was shuttered. The floor was of flagstones, with no carpet or mat. To use toilet or bathroom it was necessary to leave the room again and continue still further around the building to reach a very basic room. But again, it was clean. And there was a toilet that worked, and a sink with a cold tap. There was also a shower set into the ceiling I could have braved, but it felt much too cold for that.

Later, I would occupy rooms like this in many other places, in many other countries. Simple, perfectly clean, and usually very cheap. I am not sure whether it is because they appeal to the minimalist in me, but in many ways I prefer them to more comfortable accommodation.

Whenever I have stayed in one, I have always felt I was carrying too much baggage with me. I have been beset with the feeling I should be throwing out some of the items I have in my bag – do I need all those clothes? All those other items? It has been a recurring regret of mine that I have never managed to live a simpler lifestyle than I have. I have never enjoyed the frenetic hurry and clamour of modern urban life, and I hate how easily my life can become complex and filled with what feels like unnecessary fuss.

Here, even the spartan contents of my rucksack seemed too much. Perhaps I had too many books with me…

But now I was here, I changed out of my wet clothes and opened the shutters so I could look out at the low cloud and misty horizon. The rain drummed comfortingly on the roof and I settled down to read a book for an hour or so. I was content, and that’s a good place to be.

I cannot remember what I had for supper that night, but I do remember I drank a bottle of cheap red wine with it. Perhaps that is the reason.

I rather think I slept well, too.

And as in all good stories, the morning dawned bright and clear, the sun shining low in a clear blue sky. Before I left the town, I passed a couple of shops and bought a few items for my lunch: bread, a huge tomato, a hunk of cheese, a couple of apples, a bottle of cheap wine.

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With the improved weather, and the fact I had more downhill stretches that day than uphill ones, I allowed myself the luxury of returning to Malaga slowly, including a stop for lunch of about an hour. Compared to the UK, Spain is a large country and the rural population is comparatively small. Although I was not far from the city, I saw almost no one else on my walk and I meandered along slowly through a mixture of low trees and bushes, many of them in flower – the distinctive Mediterranean maquis vegetation – rocky outcrops and clumps of flowers, and the occasional lone farmhouse. The ground was dry and dusty, as though the rain of the previous day had never happened, and the sun was hot. With my lunch consisting of about half a bottle of wine as well as the food, I was feeling extremely weary and footsore when I reached Malaga again. I found the hotel I’d stayed in before and got a room on the same floor. After showering, I finished the bread and cheese and decided all I wanted to do was read my book for a while and then have an early night.

There was a knock at the door and when I opened it Matthias was standing there grinning.

‘I saw you arrive earlier. We go for beer, now!’

Blue Monday

On By Mick CanningIn Blue Monday, winter34 Comments

The third Monday in January – Blue Monday – is supposedly the worst day of the year for those who suffer from depression. So here we are on the 20th, Blue Monday. But there is no scientific reason for this date to be singled out, it is just a modern myth invented, apparently, by a UK travel company who presumably intended it to prompt people to take foreign holidays to cheer themselves up. However, I can see some justification for the claim, while also seeing a certain hope. Justification, because I tend to feel depressed and miserable at this time of the year. Tired. Lacking in energy or, indeed, motivation.

But also a certain hope; by now the daylight hours are lengthening, which becomes apparent when we are fortunate enough to have clear skies around sunrise or sunset. New growth is apparent, with new shoots finding their way up through the earth and leaf or blossom buds swelling on trees and bushes.

I feel so tired at this time of the year. I just feel I need to survive this winter, just get through it. I shall light a fire, wrap up warm, pour a beer and read a pile of books. I am in touch with my inner dormouse and intend to essentially hibernate until Spring.

It’s That Time of Year

On By Mick CanningIn Art, autumn, Painting24 Comments

Chestnuts. Watercolour on paper. Size: 8ins x 10ins. 21 years ago.

Photographs

On By Mick CanningIn photographs41 Comments

I’ve become very bad at taking photographs. Not exactly lazy, it’s more that my focus is on the world around me. More and more now I find that when I’m out for a walk all my senses are tuned into the world around me – sounds, sights, smells – and I feel I just want to take them all in, rather than try to record them. I just want to be in the moment.

And, incidentally, a photograph is a poor substitute. It can never capture a complete experience – the colour is frequently leached out by bright sunshine, I cannot hear the wind in the trees, or smell the scents of autumn. I cannot feel the nip of the sharp early morning air. The sounds surrounding me would all be lost. The leaves suddenly whirling all around me in the breeze. I would lose the deceptive simplicity and is-ness of all this.

And yet, I enjoy photographs. I use them a lot in my writing. How to square the circle? Must I only take photographs on days I set out to focus on photography? They are good memory joggers. You may not get the sounds or scents (or sharp nips), but a photo may well remind you of them. And they can be things of beauty on their own, of course.

I think I need to find a way of taking photographs without disturbing whatever is my current train of thought at the time. A sort of Zen-like process.

Wednesday December 27th

On By Mick CanningIn environment, natural world, seasons, walking, wildlife43 Comments

It is windy this morning and the forecast is for rain and high winds later in the day. Consequently, I go out for a walk straight after breakfast, heading for the woods beside the common where I know I will be sheltered from the worst of it, should the winds get up soon. Above, the clouds are thick and dark and what light does make it through the mirk is thin and silvery, glittering coldly on leaves and puddles, the latter wrinkled with tiny wavelets scurrying in bursts across their surfaces.

A couple of rooks are calling irritably overhead, buffeted by the breeze, as I reach the edge of the wood. A few paces in, I pass along the edge of a shallow, long-disused sandstone quarry, its banks perforated with badger holes, and with other entrances deeper into the woods. The whole of the sett appears to occupy upwards of a fifth of an acre, although there may well be entrances I have not yet found.

Moving on, I find I am walking to the rhythm of a tune in my head, something that happens to me frequently. This time, it is a track from an album by Stick in the Wheel, a kind of punk-folk group, the track being the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance. Stick in the Wheel are a group I have only recently discovered, and the only album I have of theirs (so far!) gets played rather a lot. This particular tune has a very pronounced beat and I wonder, as I often do, whether the tune has come into my head as the beat matches my pace, or whether I have unconsciously altered my pace to fit the tune.

I also decide it doesn’t matter which it is.

It is still early enough in the day for there to be very few other people about. In about an hour’s time the air will be filled with barking and shouting as the regular dog walkers invade, but for now I have the place almost to myself.

I have just begun to re-read Robert MacFarlane’s The Old Ways, and in this he tells us that at the time of writing (2012) he reckoned he had walked perhaps 7,000 or 8,000 miles along footpaths in his lifetime. Does this mean each mile is a unique mile, in that he means he has walked this distance all along different routes, or does it include the day to day walks along local routes, routes such as the one I repeat day after day? He doesn’t make that clear, and I would guess it includes all repetitions. He then goes on to quote De Quincy saying that Wordsworth walked a total of 175,000 – 180,000 miles in his lifetime (although how did he know?), which would clearly include his repeated local walks, if true. I wonder how many I have done and make a vague stab at guessing a figure. At various times I have worked out I tend to walk an average of 20 miles a week, allowing for good and bad periods of walking, of which probably one half would be on footpaths. There were times when I did much less, and times when I did much more, but it seems a reasonable estimate. That would give me a figure of between 25,000 and 27,000 miles in my adult life so far, which is probably wildly out but is quite similar to Robert Macfarlane’s.

I’ve no idea what to conclude from that.

But I know I would probably walk quite a bit further if I didn’t tend to stop so frequently just to stand and stare at my surroundings. I do it often enough to sometimes irritate those I walk with, although they’re usually kind enough to say nothing about it. But there are also those who just get their heads down and walk, walk, walk, seemingly on some mission to cover as many miles as possible in the shortest possible time, barely able to glance around them as they go. What is that about, unless it’s some sort of charity event and they’re raising money by the mile? Where is the pleasure?

The Welsh poet W H Davies wrote ‘What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare?’

What indeed?

I’ve been doing it quite a lot again this morning. It seems so important. Surely everyone must do it to a degree?

Peak Autumn

On By Mick CanningIn autumn, oaks, trees23 Comments

The leaves are turning, but in some cases, such as these oaks, still very slowly.

On Sunday, I was wandering around under the oak trees in the woods for a while. It was a gloriously sunny morning and I found myself stuffing my pockets with acorns and oak leaves. For no particular reason – they just looked interesting.

Maybe I was channelling my inner squirrel. Back indoors, I thought I might try to arrange them a little bit artistically, but I’m not sure it has really worked. Never mind. I love the way that both the leaves and the acorns turn from green to brown, passing through many different pastel colours on the way, many of them ochres – the earth colours.

‘From tiny acorns mighty oaks do grow’ as the saying goes. This one has a little way to go yet, but as long as it doesn’t get broken or knocked down, its chances are good. There is a lot of light where it is growing, and currently little competition for light or space.

I felt a little menaced by a fallen branch, but all was well.

And despite it being mid-October, as I said at the beginning, there are still plenty of summery green leaves to be found.

Autumn Equinox

On By Mick CanningIn autumn, Equinox, seasons26 Comments

Often, it still feels like summer at this time of year, but I feel autumn has truly arrived now. This morning I walked a path I haven’t walked for a week or more to find the sun was that much lower than it had been and I was constantly having to shade my eyes. It’s all about colours, now. Colours and the cooling of the world. Russet. Browns. Fading drab greens. Yellows and orange. Autumn can be beautiful, although it can also be dull and dreary and occasionally fierce. But mornings often arrive with an added sparkle, with heavy dews on cobwebs and leaves glinting in the low sun, hedgerows of thistledown, rosehips, and hawthorn. There is usually a freshness in the air, especially in the mornings, which has been absent for most of the summer, that invariably lifts my spirits.

I like summer, of course I do, but the arrival of autumn reminds me in some ways of the arrival of spring. In spring we have the stirring of life after a long period of hibernation, whereas the beginning of autumn always feels to me like the start of a new, second, outburst of life. Many plants have a sudden growth spurt, fruits and nuts and berries swell and glow and are plundered by birds and beasts. It is still warm, warm enough to bask in the sun and to feel hot walking up even quite gentle hills.

The Equinox occurs on Friday (at 2.03am in the UK, to be precise) and after this the hours of darkness outnumber the hours of daylight until the end of next March (counting dusk and pre-dawn as night time). After this, the year always feels to me quite different, even if the weather from the one day to the next is much the same. I can already feel myself slipping into a different place; the logs for the burner have arrived and have been stacked ready for use. The apples have been picked, shortly to be wrapped and stored away. Much in the garden is in the process of being cut back for winter. When the days are short and the nights are long, there will be many books to read, lots of music to listen to, a few beers to drink, and many long conversations to be had.

But also many long walks as well, I hope. I love winter too.

Not a Water Buffalo Day Today

On By Mick CanningIn trees, walking, winter13 Comments

A rather nicer day today, although very cold. A day for double socks, a duvet jacket and hands thrust deep into pockets. The birds are into their winter silence, flitting low down between bushes and clumps of trees, although a blackbird does set up an aggrieved alarm call as I approach.

This holly tree keeled over some years ago, but life finds a way to hang in there. Now it throws out lateral branches that act like new trunks.

This holly nearby is laden with berries, which folklore claims is a sign of a harsh winter to come. It’s not, of course, it’s merely the result of the weather patterns we have had earlier this year. It may still be a harsh winter, but the berries are not a portent.

But it’s a very Novembery day, almost a Decembery day. The leaves have fallen and the sun is very low.

But where the sun strikes the trees the light is still glorious.

The Thick Month

On By Mick CanningIn environment, June, natural world, trees, wildlife26 Comments

June is the Thick Month. Trees and bushes and stands of wildflowers have acquired a lush density by now, branches and stems encased in full-sized leaves, rich and vividly green. Leaves massed and packed in swaying light-blocking swathes. Nothing has yet faded, although there is a gradual falling away of birdsong now mating is over and broods are being raised, although this is compensated for by what seems to be an increase in insect noise, especially bee hum – certainly in our garden. The flowers are beset by mason, carder and bumblebees, and large numbers of solitary bees which provide a delightful oxymoron for this recorder, at least.

Going out and about through the woods a mile from my home, I feel I could almost be walking indoors, such is the density of the tree canopy above me, and when it begins to rain I do indeed remain dry, other than from the occasional drip finding its way through. But it is muddy underfoot in places, the sheltering swathes also keeping the sun from drying out the ground. The thick wet dark humus-rich soil smells sweet and clean, reminding me of a ‘plum-pudding smell,’ as Kenneth Grahame described the river-bank in The Wind in the Willows.

The fields, too, are thick with wildflowers and grass, as are roadside borders where councils have refrained from scalping them. As much as I rejoice to find the occasional rarer species amongst them, I think my greatest pleasure is just to see masses of the commoner species; buttercups or ox eye daisies, vetches or speedwells.

I generally see nothing rare when I am walking my patch, but I could never think of any of this as ‘ordinary’.

Winter – 2

On By Mick CanningIn environment, Pre-History, weather, winter18 Comments

Nature dies down in winter. Certainly, at those latitudes where the days become much shorter and the temperatures plummet. Both wind and rain seem to become more frequent. Snow. It is a period of rest and renewal after autumn has put on a final glorious display of colour. Animals adapt to this in one of three ways: some will eat and eat of the autumn bounty of, especially, fruit, putting on large fat reserves and surviving the winter in a state of hibernation, their heart-rates dropping to a scarcely believable one or two beats a minute, their bodies slowly using these fat reserves for the little energy required to maintain a flickering life through those months. Some migrate, seeking a warmer climate until spring returns. These animals are, due to the obvious logistics required to travel hundreds of miles to reach those more hospitable climes, the larger animals and many of the birds. Travel over those kinds of distances would be out of the question for the smaller ones. Others stay put and, in the case of the plant eaters, scratch out a meagre living on whatever leaves and grasses survive through the winter. The carnivores, of course, stay and try to catch them.

Our Neolithic ancestors’ life cycles would be attuned to this pattern too. Autumn must have been lived fast and furiously. In the same way our medieval ancestors worked long hours to bring in the harvests, Neolithic man and woman must have used all the dwindling daylight to bring in as much food and fuel and dry bedding as possible before the winter period. Then by the end of autumn gathering would have largely ceased and they would have moved into a winter rhythm of life.

But how did they get through winter? What of the food they had gathered? Presumably, they had no way of storing fruit – could any of it be dried? Was it fermented for drink? Or was it all eaten as soon as it was gathered, as though they were all so many dormice seeking to build up their reserves? And could this, in fact, have been a part of their strategy to get through those months? To eat and eat until the perishable foods were all gone, and then to stop all but the most essential activities. To expend as little energy as possible and stay as warm as they could. Spending as much time as possible asleep.

And yet, they would still need to eat, and so with dwindling food reserves they would slaughter any beasts kept for that purpose, possibly smoking the meat to enable it to keep for as long as possible. Hunting would continue and might, in some ways, become a little easier. With less vegetation around, there would be less cover for their prey, and in snow there would be clear tracks to follow. But presumably this prey would still need to be pursued, and this would use precious energy, unless they relied more upon pits and snares.