IN WHICH I
  • ... Write
  • ... Explain

Go wild camping on a clear spring night

31/3/2015

4 Comments

 
We enjoyed a chilly spring sleep out last week! We'd planned to go microadventuring on the spring equinox, but we both felt a bit ill so we postponed it for a few days. In contrast to my photo-heavy post about exploring the River Cuckmere, I thought I'd try to evoke the feeling of this microadventure through words alone.
Daisy in frosty grass
OK, I'll give you one nice picture to look at: "Easter Daisy" by Olivier Bacquet. We saw a few of these in the morning frost.

First microadventure of spring

We tiptoe past dark houses, creep through an unlit churchyard and slip into the woods. Night has fallen; we walk towards the moon, a hazy crescent hovering between bare tree branches. I clutch a torch in my fist, letting a few speckles of light fall between my fingers. The path leads us to a field and a dim view: lines of dark hills, mist settling in the valleys, lights sparkling in a distant town. Almost there. Back among the trees, we duck under branches and weave around patches of mud. A rhododendron deposits the afternoon’s rain down the back of our necks as we struggle to untangle ourselves from its clutches - quiet! I’m trying! it’s hooked on my bag! eee! shh! Pigeons burst noisily from the trees overhead, startling us as much as we’ve startled them.

Stepping out into a clearing, we see the first stars emerge from the mist. Our destination is a strange old building: a tall archway, open to the night, leading into a shallow three-sided shelter. I shine the torch into the high wooden ceiling to check we won’t be disturbing any birds or bats. All clear. We sweep twigs off the floor with our feet, lay out our foam mat (Dan) and picnic rug (me), inflate our sleeping mats, get out our bivvy bags and sleeping bags and sleeping bag liners and pillows and I joke that we must be the slowest setter-uppers in England. But soon enough, we’ve wiggled our way between all our layers. An owl calls from one direction, then another.

We watch the sky from our snug cocoons. A bright star slides over from the east. Aeroplanes bink overhead and I think of all the people up there: what adventures they’re having or returning from, how they’re getting along with the strangers sitting beside them, what they had for dinner, which movies they’re watching, who will be there to hug them when they land. I silently wish them a good night and a safe journey.

A few hours later, the star has moved like the light of a fishing trawler at sea, dragging a net full of constellations behind.

Later still, I wake up and I'm cold. I crawl out of my nest and stumble out into the bushes for a wee (I’ve heard that holding on makes you colder). Dan and I share a snack bar. Back in my bivvy, I’m glad I decided to use the sleeping bag liner even though I wasn’t sure I’d need it. It takes me a long time to get back to sleep and my dreams are broken and confused.

We’re camping in a shed at the end of someone’s garden, without their permission. It’s summer, so it gets light very early. Chooks are clucking nearby. I’m worried that the owner is going to catch us, but while we’re packing up I realise I’ve taken my trousers off during the night and I can’t find them. I can’t walk out of here without trousers. Someone rides past on a horse and I duck for cover before resuming the trouser hunt. Instead of helping, Dan makes a time-lapse video of me stomping around in my undies saying, “Where are my pants?” over and over again.

Suspended between dreams and consciousness, my brain latches onto a noise: is it the da-dmp, da-dmp of hoofbeats? the chock-chock-chock-chock of a pheasant? When I wake properly, all I hear is birds twittering in the trees around the clearing. We drink a less-than-lukewarm cup of tea from the thermos and regret leaving the stove at home. It’s chilly. Very chilly. The light bleeding into the landscape reveals fields crusted white with frost.

We pack quickly and quietly, then walk into the warm pink glow of the rising sun. There are fresh hoofprints in the frozen turf.

This microadventure cost about £6.60 for two. This includes Dan's new camping pillow, petrol, tea and snacks.

Read about our previous sleep outs: December (beach), January (hilltop) and February (barn verandah).

4 Comments

Explore the River Cuckmere from sea to source

27/3/2015

8 Comments

 
This month’s themed microadventure challenge was to explore a waterway. We spent a day travelling from the sea to (a) source of the River Cuckmere in East Sussex.
Header image
The River Cuckmere rises in the High Weald and tumbles down to the quiet farmland of the Low Weald before meandering through a wide gap in the South Downs and joining the English Channel near the famous Seven Sisters white cliffs.

Cuckmere Haven

White cliffs and rubbish
The Cuckmere is the only major river in Sussex that remains undeveloped at the mouth (the Arun, Adur and Ouse are built up right to the shoreline, and the Rother has Rye Harbour just a little way inland). A few old coastguard cottages perch precariously on the edge of an ever-retreating cliff to the west, WWII military remains are dotted here and there and every now and then a fleet of excavators comes down to dredge the mouth (they were at work last week). Apart from these intrusions, and the faint sounds of the A259 between Eastbourne and Seaford at the head of the valley, quiet sheep graze the fields and Cuckmere Haven is a refuge for wildlife.
Walk between water
Walking along the straight cut towards the sea.
We arrive fairly early and enjoy a lazy wander over the hills, down to the sea, and back along the waterways and paths to the carpark. We poke our noses into an old pillbox/machine gun station, admire views of the cliffs and find some interesting stones on the beach. We also see a lot of rubbish along the tide line and the river banks - washed in by the sea and down along the river. There’s a litter pick arranged by Friends of Cuckmere Haven on the first Sunday of each month, so if you live nearby and are free one month, why not head down to help out? I think you'd fill a bag pretty quickly, unfortunately.
Sheep and meanders
Meanders of the old river at Cuckmere Haven.
Cuckmere Haven is a favourite destination for walkers and school groups. The South Downs Way long distance path climbs the hills to the east, giving a fantastic view of the looping meanders of the old Cuckmere alongside the straight cut, built in 1846, that now takes the river directly to the sea. Near the path is a stone marking the location of the parish church of Exceat (or Excete, apparently pronounced rather like “exit”). This small village had a population of up to a hundred in 1332, but this was probably halved by the arrival of the Black Death. In 1538 the church was closed and the two remaining households were incorporated within the neighbouring parish. Had Exceat not disappeared, perhaps this river mouth would now be surrounded by a town, too.
Exceat marker stone
Cliffs and cottages
Mouth of river
Where the Cuckmere meets the sea.
Stone with holes in it
WWII detritus?
Bent tree and cottages
Gate and water
Mud crackles
Daffodils

South Downs

Cuckmere valley from above
View from High and Over (white in foreground is the chalk carving).
A couple of miles upstream from the mouth, High and Over Lookout gives amazing, almost aerial, views: out towards the sea both at Cuckmere Haven and west towards Brighton; down into the lush green valley and glinting waterways; east across Friston Forest; and north over a number of tiny villages and into the Low Weald. The lookout perches just above the White Horse, a figure carved in the chalk hillside. The horse, first created in 1838, is a younger cousin to the Long Man of Wilmington just around the corner, which was probably carved a couple of centuries before. Some stout, quiet ponies go about their “conservation grazing” work in a field beside the chalk horse. Half a dozen desperate-looking Duke of Edinburgh Award teenagers sit beside the car park, hiding their heads in their arms.
Jobbing smith
I could happily spend days exploring this part of the Cuckmere valley. Swans glide over flooded pools, white egrets and big grey herons stalk their prey, geese honk and flap noisily overhead, groups of ducks cackle at all and sundry and countless little birds flit through the reeds. Hand-painted signs warn drivers to look out for toads, which migrate en masse at this time of year, mainly at night. The woodlands are netted with footpaths and cycle paths, while the pretty historic villages offer more laid back options for exploring. Most of the shops, tea rooms, restaurants, pubs and amenities are squeezed together in the picturesquely cramped high street at Alfriston. Alfriston also boasts the thatched Clergy House beside the church - the first property purchased by the National Trust in 1896. There are other pubs scattered around the valley, the Long Man Brewery (they're thinking about opening for public tours), tea gardens at Litlington (open from April), Drusillas Park (if that’s more your thing) up near the A27 and, next door, the English Wine Centre. 
River at Alfriston
The river at Alfriston.
We jump out of the car at Alfriston to watch the river flow under the white bridge and fantasise about living in all the houses we can't possibly afford. The stream looks significantly smaller than the river at Cuckmere Haven. It must pick up a lot of water draining out of the valley between here and there. Back in the car, we head up to the main road, parking in a layby near Sherman Bridge. There’s not much to see, though the river has once again broadened - it’s odd to find it change sizes so quickly. Later, examining my OS map, I notice the little path that leads off from the northwest corner of the bridge goes to a weir. Next time we’ll have to have a closer look!
Dan at Cuckmere River sign
White Horse
At the lookout
Horses and view
White bridge, Alfriston
The white bridge at Alfriston.
Fantasy house
River Cuckmere at A27
The river at Sherman Bridge.
River Cuckmere, Sherman Bridge

Low Weald

Catkins
I confess, I don’t really know where the Low Weald begins or ends. I don't even know it exists until I see it marked on the map. We park in Arlington, between the church and the pub. Feeling peckish, we grab our picnic blanket and trusty camp stove from the boot and head out on a footpath to the riverside. We set up near an arched footbridge and spend a few quiet minutes watching the greeny-brown water go by. Overhead, willow catkins mark the start of spring. We rub them between our fingers and they feel soft, like warm summer air. The sun almost comes out. Perfect. After our tea and biscuits, we walk over to Arlington Reservoir, which was built in a former meander of the Cuckmere and is now classified a Site of Special Scientific Interest. We’ve walked around it before, so this time we’re content to gaze at it for a while and head back.
Arlington Reservoir
Arlington Reservoir, built in an old bend of the Cuckmere.
Going on a driving tour is a pretty rare experience for us. It’s nice to be on a relaxed schedule, too. We turn down interesting-looking lanes without weighing up how long each detour will take, how annoyed we’ll be if we don’t find anything at the bottom of the hill, or how hard it will be to climb back up. We pull into Michelham Priory and take a peek at the watermill, which they’ve restored and now use to grind flour. We go on a quick hike around Bede’s playing fields and through a horse paddock to find the Cuckmere just before it flows into the Michelham Priory moat. We look at the river from the bridge at Horsebridge, spotting (and failing to photograph) the ruins of the old  flour mill. We go on a meandering cruise through Hellingly and find a probably-now-ornamental water wheel and mill race beside a house close to the Cuckoo Trail.
Mill race
A mill race near Hellingly.
We decide to get chips for lunch, to complement our homemade salad, but the chip shop in Horsebridge is closed - as, apparently, are all the proper chip shops in Hailsham. This travesty turns out to have a silver lining, though, because we discover Bebble's Langos. We eat two ridiculously tasty fried breads, toppings scattered over them like a pizza, finished with lashings of garlic sauce. It is a bit of an oil extravaganza, but so good. I’m a bit overwhelmed and I have to have a quick nap in the car. I think we will return to Hailsham for more langos (but maybe not for a few weeks, I need to recover)!
How tall?
Camp stove cooking
Making tea
Making a cup of tea beside the river at Arlington.
Primroses
Near Michelham
The river near Michelham Priory.
Horsebridge pedestrian bridge
Arches at Horsebridge
Horsebridge.
54 and bells
River Cuckmere
The Cuckmere near Hellingly.
Langos

High Weald

River at Sheepwash Bridge
At Sheepwash Bridge.
It's time to choose which tributary to follow up into the High Weald. There’s a lake to the north west near Cross in Hand, feeding a stream that flows down to the Bull River, which in turn passes through Chiddingly before joining the Cuckmere proper; there’s Vines Cross stream, which rises in Heathfield Park, almost directly north of here, and flows past Warbleton, joined by other gills and streams on the way… But we decide to head north east - partly because that takes us closer to home, partly because this is the arm labelled “Cuckmere River” on our map and partly because the names are so beguiling: Flitterbrook, Rushlake Green, Three Cups Corner. We enter hillier country, making a short detour to Sheepwash Bridge to be underwhelmed by a little watercourse in a ditch much overgrown by brambles.
Flitterbrook
The Flitterbrook - one of the tributaries of the River Cuckmere.
At Rushlake Green, we head down the steep hillside from the end of the enormous, eponymous green to find one of the Cuckmere's tributaries: the Flitterbrook. At the bottom of the valley, we’re greeted by a bright rust-orange stream. The first time I saw this phenomenon, a couple of months after moving to East Sussex, I thought there was some horrible pollutant in the water. I now know better: it’s iron. There was an iron industry in the High Weald from pre-Roman times and its history can still be read on maps. Look for words like Pond Bay, and Bloomery, or names like Forge Cottages and Furnace Lane. There’s an “Ironworks (site of)” marked here, so we pretend to be knowledgeable archeologists and look for lumps and bumps. Unfortunately, there are no BBC graphics in sight, so history remains hidden. Further along the field, someone has attached a rope to a few trees, leading down towards the stream. “Well,” says Dan, “If someone’s gone to all that effort, it would be rude not to follow it.” To our delight, the rope leads us to a tiny, iron-rich spring, bubbling straight out of the earth. I lick a few drops from my fingers and find it tastes, unsurprisingly, like an iron railing or blood. We’re pretty stoked about this unexpected discovery - it’s everything we could want from a source of the River Cuckmere!
The spring
An iron-rich spring - one of the sources of the River Cuckmere.
Finally, it’s up Flitterbrook Lane to Punnett's Town and east to Three Cups Corner and The Three Cups Inn. I’d always assumed this settlement  (or crossroads) was named after the pub or vice versa. I’d never wondered where the name "Three Cups" came from in the first place. Mystery solved: tributaries of three rivers rise at this point - the Cuckmere, the Dudwell (which joins the River Rother and runs out to Camber Sands, near Rye) and Christians River (which joins the Ashburn and runs out across the levels to Normans Bay near the Star Inn). It seems only right to mark the end of our journey here, so we stop at the packed pub and share our favourite bits of the day over a quiet half pint.
First weeping willow leaves of spring
Empty tanks
Memorial at Rushlake Green
Crepuscular rays
Flitterbrook
Flitterbrook
At the spring
Flitterbrook in someone's garden
The Flitterbrook near Punnett's Town, running through someone's garden.
Three Cups Inn sign

This microadventure cost about £21.40 for the two of us, including petrol, langos, drinks and snacks.

I hope I've inspired you to get out this weekend and spend some time beside, in or on a waterway! I'd love to see your photos, videos or artwork, or read your stories or poems about your local creek, lake, river, beach, pond, waterfall or reservoir.

8 Comments

Report: The challenge starts here

24/3/2015

2 Comments

 
Have you ever stood on West Hill on a bright morning with the sun glinting on the silver sea, looked out over the ruins of Hastings Castle and thought about extending your weekend walk… maybe all the way to Scotland?
Silhouetted lighthouse and sunset
Destination: Cape Wrath Lighthouse (Photo by Bruce McAdam)

North by Northwest 800 Challenge

A new adventure challenge takes Hastings Castle as its starting point and ends at Cape Wrath Lighthouse on the northwest tip of Scotland. It’s a distance of over 700 miles as the crow flies, or around 800 miles by the most direct road route.

But the North by Northwest 800 Challenge (NNW800) is not a race and there is no prescribed route. Nor is it focused on endurance, strength or Bear Grylls-style wilderness survival - in fact, it is open to walkers, motorcyclists, vintage car enthusiasts, mountain or road bikers, horse riders, skaters and anyone in between.

Instead, the challenge encourages participants to use the experience to document their journey in a short film or photo essay and create a unique, cross-section portrait of England and Scotland.
Boat on a pebbly beach
The Hastings boats are eager to get going... are you? (Photo by Elvin)

Learn something new and share your discoveries

Iain Harper, the brains behind NNW800, has a good reason to include artistic creation as part of the challenge. “People undertaking adventurous trips often become very focused on the physical challenge of getting from point A to point B,” he says. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it potentially misses the opportunity to get under the skin of the communities and landscapes being travelled through, to learn something about them and then to share those discoveries with a wider audience.”

Iain hopes that participants will choose to focus on a theme or topic close to their hearts. “How about looking at attitudes towards issues like climate change, sustainability, green energy, population growth or community?” he writes on the NNW800 website. “Alternatively, you could think of a sweepingly-open philosophical question to ask everyone you meet to answer in a single sentence.”

Based in Hertfordshire, Iain originally conceived the Hastings-Cape Wrath challenge as a personal cycling expedition in 2013. He planned to explore attitudes towards climate change across the country. “I arranged to visit all sorts of wind farms, exploratory fracking sites, nuclear and conventional power stations,” he says. “Then my appendix burst while on a training ride, life got in the way for a while and the trip didn’t happen.”

But the concept stayed with him. “It seemed like an idea with proverbial ‘legs’ and I was keen not to let it go to waste,” Iain explains. So, he added a page to his adventure news website and launched the challenge quietly in January this year. “Feedback from the adventure travel community has been very positive so far,” he says. “I’ve had a few people get in touch already to say they’re thinking about doing it.”
NNW800 graphic
I would walk 800 miles... (Image courtesy of Endeavour 360)

The way is straight, but not narrow

Apart from the added element of creative production, there’s only one other guideline for completing NNW800: travel on or close to the straight line between Hastings and Cape Wrath.

Having said that, Iain acknowledges that there will be a few notable detours on the way from the English Channel to the northwestern tip of mainland Britain, where the Atlantic Ocean meets the North Sea. Most participants won’t fancy swimming 22 kilometres (17 miles) across the Firth of Forth, nor diving into the River Thames or the other rivers, inlets and lochs that intersect the route. He also imagines that most people will do the challenge in April-May or August-October, “to avoid any high summer temperatures and the worst of the Highland midges.”

So, next time you stand up by Hastings Castle on a fresh morning, why not turn your face north by northwest and, with the sun on your back, take the first step towards Scotland?

Are you up for it? For more information, visit the NNW800 website or follow the NNW800 Twitter account. This article first appeared in Hastings Independent, Issue 24, 20 February 2015, p4.

2 Comments

Walk around Bodiam Castle

17/3/2015

6 Comments

 
A pretty circular walk starting from Bodiam Castle, taking in the views from Sandhurst Cross and returning along the Sussex Border Path.
Farm track and Bodiam Castle
It’s hard to imagine what the locals must have thought of Bodiam Castle when it appeared on the scene in 1385. Even now, through modern eyes accustomed to epic feats of architectural engineering, it’s a wonderful sight: the round towers rise sheer from the surrounding moat and the stone walls glow pale gold in the sun. And it’s still a surprise to come across it, nestled amid vineyards, hops farms and white-tipped oast houses, looking out across the lush pasture of the Rother valley.

The winter sun sparkles on the frost as we head east from the castle along a farm track, crunching ice beneath our boots. It’s a glorious day under a big, blue sky, and we’re not the only ones outside enjoying it.

To the north, the square tower of St Nicholas church at Sandhurst Cross hoves into view. As the river twists away to our right, we cross Kent Ditch and head uphill, leaving East Sussex behind.

We pick our way across a muddy field and through an even muddier wood. A frantic volley of gunshots erupts close by and, realising it’s a party of duck shooters, I briefly consider turning saboteur. Instead, we push on, appreciating the open views towards Sandhurst with its clock tower and windmill.

At St Nicholas, the congregation is leaving after the Sunday morning service. We sit in the churchyard for a while, drinking in both the view and a thermos of tea, trying to keep warm in the wind.

Inside the church I read about the bells, including the John Bell, which was cast in the late 15th Century, cracked in 1961, then repaired with new technology and re-hung in 2009. We also admire a window constructed of salvaged fragments of old glass and prayer cushions decorated with everything from hovercraft and Boeing jets to badgers and biblical quotes.

From Sandhurst Cross, walkers can take the road straight back to Bodiam, but we venture on to join the Sussex Border Path.

If the first half of the walk was characterised by big things - castles, skies, views, churches - then the joy of the last section lies in the details. The first crocuses are blooming, joining snowdrops and daffodils at the side of the road. We pass a well-used badger sett. Multicoloured lichen adorns a fallen tree and a bright orange jelly-like fungus emerges from a fallen branch.

After weaving our way over the hills, we slip down a narrow path beside a vineyard to emerge back at Bodiam Castle, just in time for lunch at the the National Trust tea rooms.

A version of this article first appeared as "Crossing borders across a rich landscape" in the Battle Observer, Friday 20 February 2015, p46. 

GPX route map - Bodiam and Sandurst Cross
File Size: 9 kb
File Type: gpx
Download File


Bodiam Castle
Bodiam Castle under a clear winter sky.
Daffodils
The first daffodils of the season.
Panorama of fields and church
View towards the church at Sandhurst Cross.
Silence while bells are ringing please
Instructions in the bell tower at St Nicholas.
Lichen
Lichen on a fallen tree.
Orange jelly fungus
Bright orange fungus on a fallen branch.
6 Comments

Make saag pa-nearly

12/3/2015

4 Comments

 
A simple but delicious spinach dish that can be eaten plain with rice or with added paneer, tofu or cream.
The first time I made saag paneer, I tried to do it from scratch. The home-made paneer (cheese) was a bit of a disaster because it melted into goo when I fried it, but I was still hooked. The following dish forms a great base for saag paneer or saag tofu, but it’s also delicious served by itself - we call it “saag pa-nearly”. It’s one of my favourite comfort foods: tasty, nutritious and easy to make.

Ingredients

  • 500g frozen spinach
  • 1 large onion, sliced
  • 5 cloves garlic, crushed
  • Knob of ginger (4cm), grated
  • 1 fresh chilli, finely chopped or 1 tsp chilli flakes
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  • 1 tsp coriander seeds
  • 1 tsp garam masala
  • ½ tsp turmeric
  • Salt to taste
  • Oil for frying
  • Optional: 200g paneer (cubed and shallow fried) or 200g firm tofu (pressed, cubed, coated in cornflour and shallow fried) or 200mL cream
Saag paneer
Saag pa-nearly... you can add paneer, tofu or cream if you like.

Method

  1. If you’re making rice, put it on to cook (and don’t forget to turn it off when it’s done!). If you’re using paneer or tofu, make sure it's fried and ready to go.
  2. Pop the spinach in a microwaveable container and microwave on medium-high, checking every minute or two to make sure each puck is thawing, but not cooking. This usually takes about 6-8 minutes. When the spinach has mostly defrosted, drain off the water that’s accumulated in the container and set it aside.
  3. Meanwhile, pop a good splash of oil in a large saucepan over medium heat, pop in the cumin and coriander seeds, then fry the onion until it’s soft but not brown.
  4. When the onion has softened, add the fresh ginger, garlic and chilli, stir thoroughly and cook for 1 minute.
  5. Add the garam masala and turmeric and mix until the onion is coated and you can smell the spices wafting enticingly out of the pot.
  6. Add the spinach, mix well and cook until it’s piping hot.
  7. If using paneer, tofu or cream, add it at this point and stir it through.
  8. Taste your dish and add a pinch or three of salt if desired.
  9. Serve over rice (I hope you remembered to turn it off!) with a spoon of achar (spicy pickle). It’s saag good’un.

This recipe first appeared in Hastings Independent, Issue 23, 6 February 2015, p8.

4 Comments

Do the February microadventure round-up polka

8/3/2015

0 Comments

 
Thanks to everyone who joined in with the February wildlife spotting challenge.

I know lots of you kept an eye out but found it difficult to get good photos or footage of the creatures you spotted. I can sympathise with that: this challenge certainly gave me a greater appreciation of the skills of wildlife camera operators!

I spy . . .

Mags spotted foxes, squirrels and birds around her home in the English countryside, and even managed to get a couple of clear shots. Read her post here.

Emily threw herself into this challenge - she recorded a huge variety of wildlife (native Australian and introduced species) in Melbourne. She spotted 3 species of mammal, 1 species of reptile, 7 species of fish/aquatic life and a whopping 29 different species of bird! Read her post here.

Dan and I had fun tracking our sightings and spying on the birds and other visitors to the seed and nut feeders in our courtyard. We didn’t get any good shots: I used photos by far superior photographers (licensed through Creative Commons) in my post.

Abby and Kieran are the lovely friends who invited us to Wildwood in Kent. Kieran's uploaded a G+ album of the visit here.

Your mission for March

The microadventure challenge for March is . . . explore a waterway.

This might mean walking or cycling along a creek, going pond-dipping, finding a new swimming spot, revisiting a favourite beach, taking photos of plant and insect life alongside a stream, going boating on a river, making a film about a lake, or even touring your city's sewers.

Anyone can get involved, just leave me a comment here or on Twitter so I can add your adventure to the next round-up. I hope you can find ten minutes, or an afternoon, or a weekend to get involved. And remember: if it feels adventurous to you, then it’s an adventure!

Last month, the microadventure challenge was to spend time on top of a hill. Read about it!

Fox
Sly fox, spotted by Mags.
Gecko
Marbled gecko, found by Emily.
Otter
Snoozy otter, photo by Kieran.
Waterfall
"Rocky Mountain Stream" (CC) Keith
0 Comments

Take a friend on their first microadventure

4/3/2015

2 Comments

 
One of Alastair Humphreys' suggestions for making your year of microadventure even more fun is to take a friend on their first microadventure. It wasn't too hard to convince Mags to meet up for a sleep out.
February galloped by and we procrastinated about our overnighter. It was too cold. We had visitors. It was rainy. Our friends weren’t up for it. We were sick. We didn’t want to do it on a work night. It was going to snow. All in all, we were being a bit feeble.

What we needed to do was set a date and stick to it. Mags had acquired an Alpkit bivvy bag for Christmas and was yet to use it. With a bit of encouragement from us and some prodding from her colleagues, she agreed to join us after work one night for her first bivvying adventure.

We met up on the country property where she works and slept out (with permission) on the verandah of a beautiful wooden barn. It felt quite luxurious to have a nice dry platform to sleep, cook and eat on - and to have a roof over us when it started raining during the night. It wasn’t exactly a wilderness experience, but we all enjoyed it and it was a good way for our friend to join the world of bivvying microadventures.

The sky was lovely and clear at the start of the night, with a bright moon and stars. We saw a satellite go over and listened to owls calling. We didn't see the owls (sad!) but we did find some pellets on the verandah of the barn.

I’d bought a £10 fleece sleeping bag liner to beef up my summertime sleeping bag. Although it took a few minutes to get in and adjust myself properly (not a problem when you’re on a dry verandah, probably more annoying if you’re in a field during a rain storm) I’m happy to report that it made a big difference. I was mostly toasty warm. My feet were still cool but not cold enough to stop me sleeping, and my thighs (the other strange problem area I’ve noticed) were fine.

We also took our beer can stove for its first outing. It worked . . . at least, it worked when we balanced the pot of water properly! Our friend had a lightweight travel kettle with a removable infuser for loose leaf tea, which was pretty impressive: it’s the tea equivalent of a moka pot.

It was a fun night. I think Mags will soon be out in her bivvy bag again!

This microadventure cost approximately £3.25 for two of us (petrol, food, fuel and tea). Now that's my idea of budget accommodation.

I've been inspired by all the people undertaking the challenge to sleep out at least once every month in 2015. Follow the #microadventure hashtag on Twitter if you're keen to see more!

Selfie!
Happy campers.
Person in bivvy bag
Rugged up and toasty warm.
Owl pellets
Owl pellets.
Person in bivvy bag
Wakey, wakey!
Person in bivvy bag
Someone is keen to stay in bed.
Kettle and gas stove
Mags has a kettle with a tea infuser - fancy.
2 Comments

Go wildlife spotting

1/3/2015

8 Comments

 
February's microadventure challenge was set by Emily. She chose wildlife spotting. Inspired by Emily’s species-tracking updates, Dan and I thought we’d keep a log of what we’d seen in our courtyard and beyond. As the month progressed, I also started thinking about why we hadn’t seen more wildlife.

In our courtyard

We live on the outskirts of a small rural town. We tend not to get woodland and farmland animals in our courtyard, probably because the nearby woods and farms are much nicer than our little concrete square. We’d had a peanut feeder up for a while, which seemed to attract a few birds, but we used this month’s challenge as an excuse to get a seed feeder to pop on our kitchen window. We saw the following birds and mammals in our courtyard during February:
  • Blue tits. Our most common and numerous visitor, these are cute little things.
  • Great tits. Handsome, bolder markings than blue tits and larger, there’s usually only one at a time.
  • Long-tailed tits. We first noticed these adorable birds visiting our garden when we did the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch in January. They come rarely and visit in little flocks.
  • Coal tits. We hadn’t seen many of these before, but they seem to like the seed feeder more than the nuts. They’re quite hard to spot because they flit in and out very quickly. They’re a bit smaller than blue tits and they have greyer markings, so sometimes if it’s overcast or at the end of the day I’m not sure if I’m seeing a blue tit or a coal tit.
  • Robins. I saw two at the same time, which was interesting (they can be pretty territorial). They have trouble holding onto the nut feeder, but they’ll often peck crumbs from beneath it. I noticed them coming to the seed feeder, especially when the ground was frozen and they couldn’t peck away in the planters and pots.
  • A dunnock. These are sweet little birds: delicate, warm grey/brown and quite shy. They’re similar to sparrows and are sometimes called hedge sparrows. There’s something in their colour and manner that reminds me of grey shrike thrushes in Australia (which are much bigger).
  • Blackbirds. We saw male and female blackbirds. I hadn’t seen many in our courtyard before this month, though Dan had. Maybe they came for the seeds and nuts because the ground was frozen.
  • Eurasian magpie. Perching on the wall.
  • Grey squirrels. This was new. In the past we’d had brown rats climbing on the nut feeder and so I just assumed it was still rats to blame for the occasional mass disappearance of nuts. But this month we discovered it was not one, but two bold little squirrels. We don’t see many squirrels around here, so it is kind of nice to have it visit, even though we don’t really want it eating all our bird feed!
  • Mouse or mice. Again, this makes me think maybe the rats have gone, because I’m not sure if mice like hanging out with rats (with the exception of Mrs Frisby)? One of the mice was definitely a wood mouse. It was running along our windowsill under the new seed feeder and I noticed it was a much browner/creamier colour than a house mouse and had really big ears. It was super cute.
One of our neighbouring houses has a long garden that encloses our courtyard on two sides and stretches right down into some trees, towards a big, ungrazed field. The house was recently sold, and our new neighbours only visit occasionally. I wonder if the lack of activity in their garden is encouraging more wildlife up towards our courtyard?
All photos are licensed through Creative Commons. Please click pictures to view original source.
Two blue tits
Two blue tits on a branch (David Reynolds)
Great tit
Great tit (Kev Chapman)
Long-tailed tit and robin
Long-tailed tit and robin (Tony Sutton)
A dunnock
Dunnock (Åsa Berndtsson)
Magpie
Magpie in flight (Irene Mei)
Wood mouse in snow
Wood mouse (Erik Jørgensen)

Beyond our courtyard

We tried to keep an extra keen eye out for animals and birds this month. Around East Sussex and Kent we saw (in addition to the species in our courtyard): wood pigeons, collared doves, jackdaws, crows, rooks, herons, herring gulls, black headed gulls (they look like they’ve face-planted in black ink), a buzzard, a kestrel, geese flying over, wrens (or other Little Brown Jobs), chaffinches, rabbits, foxes and deer (though these were in a deer farm). We also heard woodpeckers and found owl pellets, though we didn’t see the woodpeckers or the owls.

At the end of the month, we were in London and Norfolk. In London we saw (in addition to species mentioned above) a scruffy mouse at a tube station, then in the outer suburbs we saw nuthatches, parakeets and woodpeckers. On the way to Norfolk, we drove past two camels at a funfair, saw many rooks in rookeries, spotted a number of kestrels and a couple of buzzards. 

During our stay, we spied oystercatchers, a little egret, a skylark (or something equally noisy in flight), moorhens, ducks, house sparrows, several hares (on the last day of February, so they weren’t mad March hares yet), a bar-tailed godwit and a smaller wading bird that might have been a redshank.
Kestrel
Hovering kestrel (Mark Kilner)
Rooks
Rooks in flight (timku)
Hares
Hares in a stubble field (Ian)

Wildwood

A couple of friends who have joined the microadventure challenge invited us on the spur of the moment to visit Wildwood in Kent. Since I hadn’t managed to spot a (live) badger, I thought this was likely to be my best chance of seeing one.

We had an interesting but cold afternoon wandering around the park. We saw a sleeping otter, then later on we were lucky enough to watch one up close being fed. They have amazingly powerful little teeth and jaws that can bite clean through a person’s fingers. There were a number of deer species and a couple of elk (they have bizarre looking faces). I enjoyed watching the big, hairy bison - they looked like pleasant creatures (though I wouldn’t like to have one charge at me - they’re massive). Dan was quite taken by the lynx, I was in a flap over the little owl. We saw lots of other animals, including storks, Bennett's wallabies (did you know there are colonies of wallabies living wild in the UK?), Scottish wildcats, harvest mouse, beavers, eagle owls, barn owls, wild boar, wild horses, egrets, ravens (they are so much bigger than crows!) and wolves. We all spent a long time looking at the edible dormice (which are much bigger than I expected and look almost like sugar glider possums), but that’s possibly because they were inside, where it was warmer. Oh, and we saw some snoozing badgers, too: success!

I’m always a bit uncomfortable in places like this. The animals aren’t cooped up in concrete boxes for display like in old-fashioned zoos, but they still don’t have a lot of room to move around in. I know that many of them are rescue animals and are better off here (e.g. Wildwood has just raised enough money to rescue two Bulgarian bears), but I didn’t like seeing the wolves pacing around the fence line of their enclosure, or the raven flying from end to end of its little aviary.

Where is the wildlife?

This was a fun challenge. It reminded us to pay special attention to animals and spend a few extra moments trying to identify them. We were pretty happy with our species total, too - not bad for people who get most of their wildlife knowledge from Springwatch.

But during the course of the month, I started to realise just how few animals we were seeing. For example, it seems normal to us to be excited by a skylark, but this was an extremely common bird within living memory. Likewise, it would have been inconceivable to someone doing this challenge in a rural area in the 1980s to not see a hedgehog - not even a squished one on the road. So many of the animals we spotted have experienced alarming declines in population over the last ten, twenty, fifty years. Even house sparrows and starlings are now red listed in the UK .

There have been some recent success stories: buzzards and red kites have made a comeback, some birds that live well alongside humans (blue tits, robins, blackbirds) are flourishing and although we didn’t see any wild otters they are also scrabbling back from “the brink of extinction”.  But overall, there are huge declines in UK bird populations (especially farmland birds), invertebrate populations worldwide and UK wildlife in general.

Something I read this month, which made me stop and think about this issue, was a fascinating piece of community research by a local primary school and conservation volunteers. They'd published a little pamphlet outlining the history of a village water meadow. As part of the research, they’d collected oral histories from local residents, who were first-hand witnesses to the decline of wildlife in the area. One account was from a person who described how as a child they could go to the meadow and see hundreds and hundreds of frogs: now the school children were lucky if they managed to spot a handful.

This reminded me of a chapter in Collapse, where Jared Diamond talks about the deforestation of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and its disastrous effect on the human population there. Reading that story, our inclination may be to wonder why an islander chose to cut down the last tree, what went through their mind when they did so, how they could have destroyed that final specimen of what was once a forest. But Diamond reminds us that this deforestation took generations to complete: the person who felled the last tree had never seen a forest.

Such is the case with declining wildlife populations. I think it’s one reason that going out wildlife spotting - with children, with great-grandparents, with migrants, with people from multiple generations, with city people and country people - is so important. It’s one thing to say: “Species X has declined 70% in the last 35 years.” It’s another thing to engage a child in a story: “When I was your age, I would see dozens of Species X on this walk. Why do you think we’ve only seen one pair?”

It's not just children who need this. I’ve been in the UK for over three years and I have never seen a (live) wild badger, wild otter or wild hedgehog. I've seen one slow worm and two snakes. I don’t know what else I’m missing. It’s relatively easy to notice what’s there. It’s much harder to notice the absence of something you’ve never seen.

So, go wildlife spotting! Talk about what you see. Talk about what you don't see. Talk about why that might be. Talk about what you might be able to do to help wildlife survive and, hopefully, prosper.
Skylark silhouette
Skylark (Mark Robinson)
Hedgehog
Hedgehog (Johnson Cameraface)
Starlings
Starling murmuration (Laura Thorne)
Badgers
Badgers (Tim Brookes)
Buzzard
Buzzard (Mark Robinson)
Slow worm
Slow worm (Wilfbuck)
Puffins
Puffins (James West)

If declining wildlife, birdlife and biodiversity is something that concerns you, you might also want to get involved with a local conservation group. In the UK you could try: RSPB, The Wildlife Trusts, Woodland Trust, Bat Conservation Trust, BTO, Butterfly Conservation Trust, CPRE, High Weald Landscape Trust, Hawk and Owl Trust, Bumblebee Conservation Trust or Buglife.

8 Comments

    In which I

    In which I do things and write about them

    RSS Feed

    In which I tag

    All
    #30DaysWild
    Art And Architecture
    Audio And Music
    Australia
    Battle Observer
    Birmingham
    Books And Stories
    Bristol
    Buckinghamshire
    Cambridgeshire
    Cooking
    Cycling
    Devon
    East Sussex
    Eating And Drinking
    Film And Video
    Foraging
    Gardening
    Gippsland GunaiKurnai Country
    Grand Union Canal
    Hastings Independent
    Hertfordshire
    Heysen Trail Prep
    Housekeeping
    Imagining
    Interviewing
    Kent
    Lake Field
    London
    Manchester
    Marketing
    Melbourne Wurundjeri Country
    Microadventure
    National Trust
    Netherlands
    Norfolk
    Northumberland
    Paddling
    Q&A
    Reporting
    Review
    Share The Love
    Sheffield
    Snowy River
    Somerset
    South Gippsland Bunurong Country
    Suffolk
    Swimming
    Tea
    Victorian High Country Jaitmathang Country
    Victorian High Country Taungurung Country
    Wadawurrung Country
    Wales
    Walking
    West Sussex
    Wiltshire
    Year Of Sleeping Variously
    Yorkshire

    In which I archive

    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    October 2021
    September 2021
    March 2021
    December 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.