An afternoon out, and another County Top bagged; it was a decidedly urban one, that of the city of Nottingham. I thought this shot had a notable 1970s feel to it, so toned down the saturation to fit the mood. The blue plastic bag adds to the desolation. I no longer just walk in the glamorous places…
Top of Flintshire, summit of the Clwydian Hills, Moel Famau appealed enough to the royalists of the early 19th century for them to begin building on it a tower to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of King George III. But this fervour clearly faded, and the construction was never finished. Nowadays it is just a place to rest after hauling oneself up to the 1,814 feet (554m) summit. But it looks good, and the view is magnificent. (For pictures of that, see my other blog.)
A weekend away with the family. Corse Hill sits in the middle of a gigantic wind farm and although not a dramatic spot, was a nice place to break the journey north to Scotland and did become my 32nd county top — and Clare and Joe have picked up a few as well. C. looks suitably satisfied, Joe’s checking his phone, but that’s what he does.
The first non-English shot since 18th September 2020, which was day 3,312; thus, a run of 259 English-only shots comes to an end.
This walker knew just what she was doing when she saw me pull out my camera. She called over afterwards, saying ‘don’t mind me…’ — but I assured her that I had got the shot.
For more pictures of today, being my latest attempt to stay sane and healthy, see the page on my County Tups blog. Also, as this technically counts as being in Bolton, I now have to award that place the title of ‘location to have the longest gap between appearances on the blog’. It’s 2,539 days since its first, and only other, appearance on the blog thanks to Bolton Wanderers’ stadium featuring on day 933 (15/3/2014). At over 1,000 feet in height — not to mention that its base is itself 1,440 feet above sea level — the TV mast seen here is one of the tallest structures in the UK.
January 2021 hasn’t featured a football match, a visit to a pub or a night away from home — and I sincerely doubt February 2021 is going to differ in any of these ways. But I have done my damnedest to have it feature some healthy exercise. This gets no less healthy if one travels more than five miles from home — in fact, for those who live in urban areas, the opposite may be true. This fact seems to elude those who find it blithely OK that the government has removed freedom of movement within our own country.
For more pictures from today’s bout of exercise along with the usual accompanying self-reflection, see my County Tops blog.
What ho, it’s Christmas. I try to get out on a walk on this day if possible: seems somehow more respectful (to myself, as much as anything) to do more than just consume. There’s even a Christianity reference here thanks to the well-sited church. Though what the giant cotton bud is doing out in the North Sea I do not know. For more pictures from today see my County Tops blog. And a happy Christmas to you all, whatever you were doing, however you celebrated it, in this particular time.
This little chap becomes the latest robin to prove that members of his species really don’t see the humans as things to be worried about. He kept a close eye on us as we (Clare, Joe and I) had our sandwiches, while undertaking another County Top walk. This took place nowhere near Hebden Bridge, nor do we intend to be there for a while. Draw your own conclusions.
This is also the latest in a notable run of pictures taken at 1:nn pm: six of the last seven. Times of pictures are never chosen, they just happen; it’s a kind of random number generator, though admittedly some times (daylight, namely) are more likely to appear than others. But a run of this consistency is unusual.
The reason I came to Bath was to bag another of my County Top walks (see my other blog), the morbidly-named Hanging Hill. That was duly collected a few miles after taking this shot, from the ascent of Penn Hill, a slope of mud with a decent view of the city. During this climb I passed this dog walker, and his companion who seemed for some time to have decided that he was ditching his owner in favour of this new and more interesting person. You can’t just tell them you prefer cats, can you?
The weather forecast today was such that it made one think — ‘Hmmm, better get out into the open air, before some pencil-pushing parasite with a job to make seem relevant decides I can no longer be trusted to do so.’ So I went out. To Scotland, in fact: making this only the second non-English shot since the beginning of February. It was worth the drive. This is Loch Skeen, near Moffat.
This would be a nicer photo without the bushes in front, but I took it from a car, stopped in the middle of a road, in order to capture the sight of this hill wreathed in mist. This is the Wrekin, a well-known protuberance in Shropshire, and one that Clare and I had just hauled ourselves up in weather much like this — on occasion there was mist and cloud, in other parts, clear skies. Another County Top done, anyway.
Being 42 