Illustrated tree

 

It was good to find the illustrated tree on the edge of Pinnick Wood at Marrowbones Hill still doing well, in fact he looked better that my previous visit a couple of years back.  Ancient and weathered he's really quite the wonder, and quite the spectacle to behold.

Moody morning

A moody scene on Barton undercliff this morning.

 

Barton view

A clear blue sky reflected in a millpond sea; what a beautiful day for a walk on the beach.  A view of isle of the Wight and the Needles from Barton undercliff this morning.

First frost

 The first proper frost of the the season; all hail Jack's return!

Burley Old Fall

Burley Old is my most visited roam, and one of my most beloved; I regularly use it as a litmus test for the wider forest.  Stood amongst it's stands I can see that 'fall' is approaching fast in the forest; soon the remaining canopy, which dwindles daily, will be empty, the boughs naked until the buds burst forth with new life in spring. A rest well deserved; it's been another difficult year out here, failed wild harvests, boughs and trunks slighted by storms and everything feeling off kilter. Still, I have to believe (difficult as that's becoming) that better times will come and the forest community will endure. In the meantime, each season brings it's own unique beauty to the forest and I look forward to and relish them all...Winter nears.

Hail the Holly

One tree that's certainly doing well this year is the Holly (Ilex aquifolium), many are brimming with bight red berries, clearly visible across the landscape as beacons of colour in a fading forest. In a year that's seen failed, or at least feeble, wild harvests, the Holly's berries will be an invaluable source of food for the forest's birds and smaller mammals; whilst it's tenderer leaves are always sought by the deer and pony communities through the lean months. All hail the Holly King.

Bratley Water

 

Up on Ocknell Plain, just beyond the end of the old Stoney Cross airfield, multiple small rivulets flow into Slufters Bottom and Bratley Water is born; eventually Bratley, after a couple of name changes will merge with Highland water to become the Lymington River emptying into the Solent.  A few years back much of Slufters enclosure's conifers were harvested exposing the pre-existing deciduous core through which Bratley Water runs, and returning most of the surrounding landscape to open heath. At that time Bratley Water itself was restored to a more pleasing natural meander, and it's a real transformation...a positive one. Slufters conifers choked the infant stream and it's deciduous environs, as well as obscuring long views across the forest from all directions. I'm still taken by the restored vistas when in this part of the forest, and am enjoying the slow re-naturalizing of Slufters Bottom. 

Woodford Bottom

 

Woodford Bottom

Autumn's peaked

Autumn's peaked. The autumn tints occupy a brief window, these colours wont last long now, some are already going over. Soon the fall will take them all.

Cary Grace @ The Assembly Rooms Glastonbury 28.12.2019

After writing an earlier post on gigs, I realised I hadn't finished, let alone posted my intended post on Cary's Assembly room gig back in 2019. So, still not at all finished (too much time elapsed), though tidied up enough to give an impression, here it is.

Well, what a  absolutely splendid evening of sublime music. I've missed far too many gigs this year, and am so glad that I made it to this one. Tonight was the album launch of Cary Grace's much anticipated fabulous new album 'Lady of Turquoise'. Cary's a mesmerizing performer and purveyor of quality compositions, check her page out, there's some beautifully work there charting Cary's musical evolution. Fantastic as her albums are, and they are, catching a live performance is something else; and tonight in Glastonbury's esteemed Assembly Rooms, a lovely venue, one with history, character and a great atmosphere; lovely staff and a great sound too. Tonight was going to be good!

 

It wasn't just Cary on the bill this evening either, no, tonight we were well and truly spoilt. First up was the wonderful Tim Hawthorn. It doesn't matter how Tim Hawthorn manifests, The Archytypes, The Anarchitypes or simply himself, his bardic magic never fails to engage and enthral; and tonight was no exception, a performer with range and presence. Tim was followed by Kangaroo Moon, those renowned troubadours of joy, whose performances are guaranteed to raise your spirits, and you to your feet...which of course they did. I heard Elliet say her violin is way over 200 years old, imagine that, it's been moving people for that many years, there's magic in that, man. Speaking of magic, one of the band's magical qualities is the alchemy created by transient members, tonight's transient was Hawklords bassist Tom Ashurst. Nice! Talking to Tom's affable friend Kav, they'd driven down from Wigan especially for the evening; I doff my cap to you sirs and salute your commitment. As you'd imagine Kangaroo Moon played a wonderfully set. 

 

Then the main event of the evening...The Cary Grace Band. It seems like an age since we last saw the Band perform, a collective of musicians of the highest calibre, who consistently deliver memorable performances and tonight was to be something special, the première of Cary's new album 'Lady of Turquoise'. Wow, Cary's surpassed herself with this one, what an album, and what a performance too! Cary's voice was on top form, as was her synthe, both magnificent instruments working wonders together. The bar was set for the rest of the band and as you'd expect, they rose to it. Victoria Reyes on keys contributed some lovely harmonies as well as Sax; her playing giving no indication that she'd only picked the instrument up a fortnight ago! Whilst John Garden looked so laid back delivering his masterful guitar, so much so that on several occasions he was reclined as if in repose on a chaise lounge. Underpinning it all a solid foundation brought by the formidable talents of David Payne (drums) and Andy Budge (bass) ensuring flawless rhythm; the two maestros really came into their own through the heavier segments. Talented folk all, whose talents shone throughout tonight's splendid performance; a magnificent job, this evening was the band's first time playing the new material live too. They all looked like they were having a good time (always lovely to see), there were plenty of smiles and looks between them as it all came together. I can say with authority that the audience absolutely loved it! Lady of Turquoise is a modern progressive psyche rock masterpiece, beautifully written and arranged, and tonight magnificently performed with a theatrical delivery perfectly pitched for the material.

What a lovely evening; what a splendid show, fabulous music, in a beautiful place, spent in the company of wonderful people...that pretty much ticks all the boxes of top evening. It was always fated to be a fabulous evening...which of course it was. You must check the album out Lady of Turquoise.

Timeless synergy

Timeless synergy. Close to Palmers Slough ford, two kings locked in symbolic embrace. The Oak King and Holly King forever trading occupancy of natures throne, each symbolizing the tenure of their reign, and each reliant on the other. I don't see their story as one of eternal battle, as often told, rather a story of partners engaged in a joint undertaking, each caretakers of their part of the ongoing project, and grateful for the respite offered by the other.

Dockens Water

 

Autumn colours reflected in Dockens Water.

Dead Man Oak

'Dead Man Oak' reads the shallow carved graffiti on a towering veteran leviathan in Mark Ash Wood. Thing is, it's a veteran beech rather than an oak.

Our seasonal shroom

I've seen quite a few nibbled or trodden examples, though this is the first complete small capped Fly Agaric I've seen this season. The iconic mushroom of midwinter and Christmas, from whence much of our seasonal folklore and imagery originates.

Knight Wood

The forest is full of magical hidden places, places that are a little off the beaten track, the places in-between, overlooked and rarely trodden. Places where you seldom, if ever, see others, and connection to woods and nature is easy. These are some of my favourite places, as they retain a certain something only felt, impossible to articulate. Above, a restored Warwickslade cutting meanders through the misty stands of Knight Wood; the restoration has resulted in the woodland slowly becoming waterlogged... it's welly country, and will only get wetter as the effects of restoration bed in. Knight Wood is unenclosed deciduous old forest, the oldest tracts being those of majestic veteran beech on the, slightly, higher ground, more recent the mature oaks through which Warwickslade cutting flows (they date somewhere in the 1800's, and drainage). Some of these oaks are not liking the wetter aspects of the restored landscape one bit, their broken limbs litter the woodland floor and several of the trees are looking rather peaky. Full restoration to bog woodland will be a long journey mind, it'll take decades for these oaks to be replaced by returning carr species. You know, I don't remember ever seeing another soul amongst these oaks, I'm sure there must be other visitors, and maybe they're thinking that they've never seen anybody here either.

Burley Old

I never tire of the natural beauty Burley Old manifests.

 

Aw nuts!

 

As I was saying regards pannage, the Sweet Chestnuts (Castanea sativa) this year have been rubbish. Traditionally, for me anyway, the fringes of Backley Enclosure have always been prime chestnut collecting woodland, and I don't remember it ever being so poor there. Yeah, there were  a handful of gooduns here and there, but no real corkers, and for the most part they've been little more than empty leathery sacks. Same everywhere we've roamed too. I hope it's an anomaly and not a sign of things to come... you do get good and bad years after all.

Pannage 2021

F*ck off! That's what Mrs Pig was saying, and what we did shortly after taking the photo as Mrs Pig took a dislike to Geoff and I. Not wishing to cast aspersions on Geoff, but I think it was him who Mrs Pig wanted gone rather than I. There were piglets in the group, and she was obviously taking no chances. It'll be a thin year's feasting this pannage for the forest's pigs, none of the forest's nuts have come to much.

Beefsteak

As a large Beefsteak fungi decays on the woodland floor, it's easy to see how it got it's name. Although, I think 'porksteak' may be more appropriate, as I think the fungi's flesh looks akin to pulled pork.

Vinny Ridge

 Vinney Ridge is home to some wonderfully gnarly veteran trees, tenacious buggers every one.

Boss...da plane, da plane!

This morning the sky above Duck Hole Bottom had me wondering if I'd inadvertently stepped through a time portal into late summer 1940. No matter in which direction you looked the sky was criss crossed by vapour trails. It's not the Battle Britain though, it's a sign of our collective cognitive dissonance in a far more wide ranging battle for humanity's very survival. 

 

I don't know about you, but after being politically and environmentally conscious, and to a degree active, since my teens I find myself despairing of the empty narratives of both.  I have to agree with Thunburg's 'blah, blah, blah' comment at COP26, and I don't see it confined to government and corporate green-wash either. As far as I can see it's most everyone and everything. The whole carbon neutral narrative, plant based everything, growing 'green' economies, sustainability through technological innervations, all smoke and mirrors, comforting bullshit, a deception we're happy to be complicit in. Evangelical believers if truth were known, after all, it's our lifestyles on the line, and no matter our words our actions betray the truth. We wag our fingers at corporations and government demanding change, and then happily accept their green-washed platitudes as just enough to sooth our consciences and allow us continue our destructive habits. If Covid has taught us anything, it's that society lacks commonality and is reluctant to change it's hedonistic self serving habits, even as death stalks the streets people raged that a hiatus in their consuming had been foist upon them, and, as soon as was possible returned to the free market trough...imagine when the climate mitigation penny drops...#shitstorm! In my opinion consumption, or rather the excesses there of,  is the enormous elephant in the room, rarely acknowledged for fear of the backlash the truth of the scale of reduction required to save us will inevitably provoke.

 

Yeah, corporations and governments deserve the wagging fingers, though really this shit's on us. For many of us the only genuine power we have is how we spend our money, a power we rarely use to positive effect...and yeah, I'm guilty too...few aren't. Millions in the moneyed classes wring their hands and pontificate, although are unwilling to give up their luxury, the happiest cohort to embrace the fallacy of green tech salvation, happy to pay a little extra to show their virtue and assuage their guilt whilst continuing their consumption unabated. Even the Millennials and GenZs who champion the environmental cause so passionately and vociferously are voracious consumers of tainted goods, who'll be loathed, if honest, to relinquish their destructive 24/7 lifestyles; limited ethical/sustainable consumption is at odds with 24/7 unlimited labelled consumption. And of course, then there's the lived experience of millions of poor Britain's which renders proposed climate mitigations and associated costs at best inaccessible and at worst disenfranchising, the ethics of consumption merely another luxury they can't afford. I'll be honest I couldn't support any climate measures which exacerbate widening inequality, we can either move forward together or we can 'all' go down together. Is that wrong? Meh.

 

What I'm trying ham-fistedly to say is that there's no fucking honesty in any of our political or environmental dialogues, and without honesty around the genuine scale and scope of the radical societal change required, and the social consequences involved to halt the climate catastrophe (and societal collapse), partnered with a compelling and unifying combination of authentic messaging and policy......it's all just 'blah, blah, blah'.

Gigless

After spending time with family and friends, what I've missed most over the last 18 months of covid weirdness is going out to gigs. I love live music, always have from my first gig at Bournemouth's Stateside, the Two Tone Tour in 1979 (The Specials, The Selecter, Madness). There's something about being in those communal spaces, being moved by the performances, experiencing the event in a very personal individual way, yet being connected to the others in the room and making it a shared experience too. I love that energy, it feeds something in me...maybe I'm a Colin Robinson? I think though like walking the wild places or sitting around a fire, a good gig resonates with something deep within us, triggering ancestral memory maybe...communal events with music go as far back as we do. I was watching a Cary Grace Band gig from 2018 at the King Arthur, it reminded me of the joy afforded by quality live music. What a top gig. That's what I miss bands like the Cary Grace Band giving stellar performances in intimate venues like the King Arthur. You can't beat that shit. On the 'Arthur'; discovering the King Arthur was like finding a rare treasure, a warm and welcoming establishment with a constant stream of quality performers plying their art, we've enjoyed so many fine evening there. I can't wait to attend to live performances again. As it happens it was a Cary gig that was my last gig before covid, also in Glastonbury, though this time at the larger Assembly rooms...another stellar gig (where's that post?).

Spy Holms

Wow! A sight I don't remember seeing before, well, at least, nowhere, nowhere near to this extent. All the open grass areas of Spy Holms were completely swathed in a glistening, gently rippling sea of gossamer this afternoon. Quite the magical sight. Why? How? For that matter, how many bloody spiders did it take?

Amethyst deceiver

The floor of Burley Old is carpeted in Amethyst Deceivers (Laccaria amethystina), an interesting little edible, not particularly flavoursome though a fun addition to a soup or such if you want to cause a raised eyebrow in those not in the know...little purple mushrooms, not what you expect in your dinner. A word of caution though, although edible and non toxic in themselves, some sources suggest that if there's arsenic in the soil, Deceivers can build up high concentrations of it. So, maybe best avoided...unless you've a soil testing kit to hand.