Night Bird

Autumn is a time of movement, leaves flutter, conkers thud, spiders speed across the carpet, birds come and go.  So far it’s been kind of slow and mellow and filled with mist and robin's song.  Even some chiff-chaffs have
loitered and I saw a high swarm of swallows the other day, reluctant to leave whilst the weather’s soft and insect clouds linger. 

Outside, a couple of robins are trying to out-sing each other.  One warbles, there’s a second’s silence before another trills - louder. This birdie X Factor is lovely for me, sitting on the step nursing a cup of tea, but it’s a serious business for them, whoever wins will get my garden and a steady supply of worms, berries and the odd bit of cheese.  I watch one in our rowan tree, head thrown back, elderberry eyes glistening, red throat pulsing, spilling song from its needle beak.  He sings at 5 a.m. and is there again at dusk when I close the blinds. Of course, it could be a ‘she’ they both look the same and both sing in winter apparently.

These robins are lucky, it’s peaceful here and there aren’t many street lights, though they may be fooled by the moon into thinking it is daylight every now and again.  I heard a robin singing at 3 a.m. during the September Super Moon. City birds aren’t so lucky.  Streetlights make it seem like daylight, their body clocks get confused and they wake up.  Once awake, they sing and when one sings, the others join in, to defend their territories.  And as if that weren't confusing enough, a study in Sheffield found that birds in noisy areas were more likely to sing at night as their songs could not be heard during the day.  It seems that birds are having to adapt their behaviour to cope with modern life.  They can’t hang black-out blinds and wear wax ear plugs like me. Singing burns calories and such a tiny bird needs to conserve energy, especially during the winter.  Small birds need their sleep, maybe not the 8 hours I need but I’m sure it can’t be healthy for them to stay up singing most of the night. 

Vitamin Sea

Pensarn Beach, Abergele is a fine place to go for a dose of Vitamin Sea.  It’s an SSSI, site of special scientific interest - because of its vegetated shingle bank, which is the best example of this feature in North Wales.  The smooth, rounded pebbles are all shades of grey, green, blue and plum and strewn with blue-green sea kale, silvery sea holly, sun-yellow trefoil, paper-white sea campion and sweet smelling wild roses. 

 

At the tide line, bickering oystercatchers flicker in black and white like the end of old movie reels.

Rafts of black ducks bob in the green water.  The information board confirms them as Common Scoter. They’re not that common really but they get thousands and thousands here over the winter.

I keep an eye out for the splash of porpoises.  A group of sea-skimming cormorants fly across the lenses of my binoculars, followed by two kleeping oystercatchers and a peeping ringed plover.  A small section of beach is roped off to protect the ringed plover nests and I watch a fluffy mottled chick whizzing over the stones like a clockwork toy.

Off shore, windturbines slice through the sky like circus knife throwers.

 

The pebbles are lovely to play with and before I know it, two hours have passed and it’s time for a chip butty on a bench with a view of bright plastic spades, twirling pink windmills and blue beach balls. Beaches are good places to be Slow.
 
 
 
 

 

River of Time - a landscape art project connecting past and present

 

 

Facebook flashed up a message from Discover Flintshire about a special evening event at Loggerheads Country park so rather than fall asleep in front of the telly, I pulled on my wellies and headed into the dusk.

It’s exciting to be out in the woods at night.  Even the house martins were tucked up in their nests above the shop.  After the rain, the air felt heavy and wet and the pungent smell of wild garlic made my nose twitch.The trees dripped and mist hung over the lime stone cliffs transforming the woods into a mystical rainforest.

 

At the candle-lit Mill, we watched Sean Harris’ animation of

ghostly reindeer, inspired by a 12,000 year old carving. 

 

 

 

We were given tiny tea-lights and followed a trickle of people along the rain-swelled River Alyn.  There’s something magical about candles, lots of them had already been placed along the path and the woods twinkled.  A grey wagtail danced on river stones, its tail flickering like the candles and screens, suspended across the River like a magic lantern, showed flickering images of reindeer, elk and aurochs, animals that would have roamed here thousands of years ago.  Their bones have been found in caves only a mile away.

 

 

We lit our candles and were invited to place them wherever we chose.  I spent some time selecting just the right spot, noticing where other people had put theirs.  Some were tucked in tiny crevices in the limestone, some in tree holes, some on mossy logs, some stood alone and others in family groups.

 

Standing in the peaceful glow of candles, fat rain drops rolling off glistening leaves and bats flitting through the misty tree canopy, I felt connected to the ancient past.  The River bubbled and gurgled, carving its way through the limestone as it must have done for centuries, and if I half closed my eyes, I could definitely imagine an elk lowering its huge head to take a drink.

Thanks to Sean, Ruthin Craft Centre and Denbighshire Countryside Service for a lovely event.

More about Sean Harris www.wildboarpress.com

 

Wild World Cup

I walk to Coed y Felin to avoid the football, but even there there’s no escape.  I see leaping squirrels, more agile than any goal keeper and gangs of sparrows like noisy footy fans, rampage through the hazel hedges. A grey wagtail in its high viz jacket struts and flicks like a crowd marshal. A crow watches from the side lines, hunched and frowning, like Roy Hodgson.  Then a sparrowhawk makes a lunge at its pigeon goal just as a swift swoops in like Suarez, the pigeon escapes and the wren referee sounds its ear-splitting whistle.

So I go to the beach at Gronant where it’s wide and wild and I might see little terns.

I’m welcomed by a choir of skylarks. Their endless song is too sweet to be compared to a footy anthem.   I pass ponds that shelter newts and natter jack toads, swallows swoop over rippling grasses and I feel like Dorothy on the Yellow Brick Road as I follow the boardwalk towards the sea.  Pyramidal orchids glow either side of the boardwalk like the solar lights along my garden path and blue-grey sea holly is about to burst open, providing a sweet feast for red and black burnet moths. 

Then I hear the familiar high-pitched creaky chatter and I look up to see a little tern flapping jerkily above me, luminous and glowing in the white hot sun.  I love these little birds, they’re feisty for their size and with black zorro masks they seem to slice up the sky.  And they need to be feisty, during their short breeding season, they have to contend with crows, gulls, foxes and high tides.  The warden is out doing nest counts, he says they’re doing OK but there’s a kestrel around causing problems.

Today the tide is far out and the birds have a long way to go to find food.  I watch one fly back from the frothy sea with a tiny silver fish in its beak.  But distance is no problem for little terns; they fly 4000 miles from the West Coast of Africa to nest here every year. 

Escorted by creaking little terns, I make an epic journey of my own, all the way down to the sea to paddle. The sun burns my ears and the wind ruffles my hair and when I eventually arrive at the water’s edge, the shenanigans in Brazil seem far, far away....

 

No Place Like Home

Sometimes I need help to appreciate my own backyard.  Like Dorothy, it takes a journey over the rainbow and a few adventures before I remember ‘there’s no place like home’.

It’s good to be still after 4000 miles in the campervan.



I'm not the only one who's come home.Wading through bluebells at Coed y Felin I hear a pied fly-catcher.  I’m always startled at how they find their way from Africa to this small patch of Flintshire woodland.  A dapper male sings, 'tree-tree, once more I come to thee.' 
www.northwaleswildlifetrust.org.uk







While shopping for plants in Mold market, I hear swifts screaming overhead. Young swifts spend their first two or three years in constant flight.  I grin at them charging up and down the high street sky like a gang of teenagers. 
www.swift-conservation.org





I visit Moel Famau where
the call of a cuckoo fills the spaces between the clouds. People stop on the hill,tilt their heads to one side and smile. Skylarks sing high over acid green bilberry shrubs that promise a tongue-staining bounty in late summer. 








Drinking tea at the welcoming Shepherd's Hut, I watch small children tumble down the heathery hill as a willow warbler tumbles down the scales. 
www.shepherds-hut.com

 

At my Yoga class we do an invigorating sequence that involves firing an arrow and hurling a thunderbolt. It’s about aiming for goals and achieving them.

Right now my goal is to simply ‘BE’ and there’s no better place to be than at home in Flintshire.
Dru Yoga  www.druworldwide.com

A Bit More of Greece (final blog from our slow campervan trip)

Having zig-zagged up and up from Corinth, spent a night with singing frogs, chattering warblers and gliding marsh harriers at Stymfalia Lake (or was it the Ngorongoro crater?)

and another night at snow level, (1400m)

 we helter-skeltered our way down again, 

and our last day in Greece, Good Friday, found us on the coast in Diakopto, overlooking the Gulf of Patras. 

Easter in Greece is magic.  The village church was full and people spilled out into the courtyard. Kids zoomed around like the screaming swifts above them, men flicked worry beads, women linked arms under the darkening sky, the air was heavy with the droning of the priest.  At 9pm the church bells rang, not a joyful peeling but a sad, flat clanging.  A procession filed out of the church and the crowds of people lining the road side tagged on to the back of it.  Four men carried a funeral bier decorated with creamy orchid fronds, a dozen singing girls led the way and the solemn-faced priest followed.  We followed too, around the village, up and down narrow streets. The procession stopped outside a bar,the byre was turned full circle,the priest chanted and then all went slowly back to the church.  We stayed at the bar with two 5 star Metaxa brandies and were presented with nutty chocolates wrapped in silver paper. 

 

Next morning, our last in Greece, I took some orchids I'd found on the pavement to the tiny beach-side chapel.  As I placed them in an alcove, a woman shouted and pointed out into the Gulf, 'Dolphins!'  Five broke the surface, silver and shining, like the chocolate wrapping from last night. A parting gift from Poseidon.

Greece, wonderful Greece.... (more from our slow campervan trip)

Greece is –  

Poppies so vibrant they seem to crackle and buzz like an electricity sub station.

Sea, blue and wavy as the Greek flag outside a sleepy taverna .

Ice cold retsina wine that makes your mouth shrivel and purse like a sea anemone when the tide has gone out.

 

Wild flowers that dip and sway in the breeze like dancers  at a Greek wedding.

 

Finding secret mountain churches with faded blue and gold frescos, and a peace like nothing on earth.

 

Sunsets the colour of the amber honey sold at the roadside.

 

Oranges so fresh and sweet it’s like sucking the juice from the sun.

 

 

Trieste to Greece - eventually (from our slow campervan trip)

Another instalment from our slow trip to Greece.....

We left Venice for Trieste, to catch the ferry to Greece.
 
Trieste is almost in Slovenia, it only became part of Italy in 1918. The elegant neo-classical buildings along the front hark back to the days when it was a great Austro-Hungarian port.

We parked the van in the ferry port and walked along the bustling water front, past gin palaces and sleek yachts to the Piazza dell’Unita d’Italia, a grand square, like a mini St. Mark’s in Venice, with mosaic decorated buildings, a fancy fountain and ornate chiming clock. Making the most of our last day in Italy, we took thick creamy ice creams to the fountain seat and settled in to watch the evening crowd at their ‘passegata.’  Swallows swooped and Grandparents scuttled after kids on pink trikes, young couples cuddled and elderly folk greeted each other with cheek kisses. The golden mosaics gleamed in the amber evening sun. A grandmother sat down next to us, parking the buggy containing her two grandchildren facing us. In silence, with huge brown, unblinking eyes, they proceeded to watch our every lick and slurp.  That was one gelato I didn’t really enjoy.

At midnight, we were allowed to check-in then, we sort-of-slept in the van until 3am.  Boarding a Greek ferry is an experience in itself.  It bears no resemblance to getting the ferry at Dover, there are no lane numbers, hardly even any lanes.  Vehicles will be getting on and off at Ancona, Igoumenitsa and Patras so must somehow be parked in the appropriate place on board. There’s a lot of whistle blowing, a bloke tearing around in the dark on his motorcycle, waving drivers this way and that, and vehicles generally bunched wherever they see a space. 

By 5am people are tired and fraught waiting to board. Then the ferry men shout at you and wave their arms and insist you park in tiny spaces or right tight against a pillar or other vehicle and well, lets just say, we were glad to get on and went straight to our stuffy, window-less cabin to sleep.

We went on board armed with travel kettle, teabags, egg butties and lots of snacks.  Food on board isn’t great and is quite expensive.  When we finally emerged from our cabin, squinting like moles in the bright light, we sat and soaked up the sun on deck, reading and listening to the different languages all around us.

And then we heard, ‘Hello, fancy meeting you here.’ It was friends from Porto Heli where we lived on a boat for a few years. And before we could say ‘Efcharisto,’ we had been invited to Biff and Amy’s Beer Festival at Poseidon Studios.
www.poseidon-sports.com
 

 

 

...And then, Venice

Continuing our slow campervan trip to Greece

 

Venice dripped.  I saw it through a veil of fog and all its edges were soft and fuzzy.  Then the sun came out and made the black gondolas gleam, washing flapped over narrow green canals, peeling terracotta walls glowed and red geraniums shone under blue shuttered windows.

 

 

We leant on a tiny bridge as a Lawrence Llewellyn-Bowen look-alike sang 'Santa Lucia' to a gondola full of tourists. We splashed out 2 euros on a wobbly gondola ride directly across the Grand Canal, (it's what the locals do when there isn't a bridge nearby), ate huge triangles of pizza sitting on the canal steps and took ages choosing a flavour of creamy gelato. Like the Queen of Sheba on the Nile, I sat right up at the front on waterbus no.1 and travelled the length of the Grand Canal, past churches I knew were crammed full of jaw-dropping paintings by Tintoretto and Canaletto. Then we ducked into an Osteria opposite the yard where they make gondolas and sipped sparkling Prosecco before catching our water bus back to the campsite at Fusina. 





 



 

 



 

The Only Stork in the Village

Here he is, 'Storky White', he made a fantastic clicking-castanet sound with his beak each time he arrived back at his nest.  His Mrs hadn't joined him yet and after the coldest night we'd had in the van so far at minus 3 degrees C, I can't say as I blamed her!  We were parked in a designated campervan stop practically under his nest in the sleepy village of Chevannes sur l'Etang, Alsace, on our way to the Swiss border. Etangs are ponds and there are lots of them around the village with three way-marked routes to choose from. We picked one amongst watery woodlands and heard our first yellow-hammer singing 'a little bit of bread and no cheeeeeese.'  Storky White was hunkered down in his nest at 6.30pm, with only a bit of his tail visible and a blackbird sang his flutey song as we munched on crusty French bread and watched the sun sink behind a stand of willows.

Some Posts from Our Slow Campervan trip to Greece

(On March 12th we pointed our campervan east and began a trip to Greece to welcome the Spring.  Charlie has made me the most wonderful retreat on wheels - photos later - we travel slowly and live simply, by 'wild' camping).

The Night of a Thousand Cranes...

We spent our first night parked on Dover Prom, lulled to sleep by the shushing of waves on shingle.  Night two was spent on the edge of Lac du Der - Chantecoq, the largest lake in France.  We arrived to the sound of bugles and looked up to see thousands of cranes ribboning across the lilac sky towards their island roosting site. That night I dreamt of cranes dancing in stubble fields under the silver moon.

A bugling alarm clock woke us at 6am the following morning. I leapt out of bed, which only the sound of passing geese, and now cranes can make me do. I sleep-walked to the water's edge, a lone witness to the noisy take off of cranes, gliding low past the rising sun and sliding over water the colour of freshly sliced blood oranges. The sound was like a whole orchestra of those long trumpets with banners below being blown to herald the start of a medieval jousting tournament. A flock of curlew joined in the chorus and a chiff-chaff or two added some rhythm.

Later we found La Ferme aux Grues (Farm of the Cranes) and climbed to the top of a tower hide to watch 50 feeding cranes po-go-ing and bugling whilst a spec of a skylark poured its high brow song over the brash punk rockers.

We watched great crested grebes doing their courtship display, coming together to form their necks into a heart shape, heard green woodpeckers laughing and chiff-chaffs, reed buntings, sparrows, blackbirds, thrushes, curlews, starlings and herons.  

Spring had arrived in France and the air was filled with the glorious sound of it; bugling, trumpeting, yaffling, honking, chirping, tweeting, splashing, flapping, fluttering, buzzing, swishing, drumming, clicking, whistling and barking.

 

 

The Slow Arrival of Spring

I search for signs of Spring from the first of January.  But it can’t be hurried.  And because it arrives slowly, it’s all the more reviving.

 

The light glinting off a crowd of snowdrops under the hawthorn hedge flashes a signal of hope, like kids bouncing sun light off a shard of mirror and on top of the hedge a blue-grey dunnock throws back its head and pours out its sweet scratchy song.  I take my tea and go into the garden, bending low to the soil to look for more signs.  Little spears of crocus flowers thrust up through soggy soil, tiny primrose petals are ready to ping open, celandine leaves are glossy and polished ready for the Spring Show.  

 

As February blows in, my sparrows get fidgety too.   Via the nest box camera, I watch the male spring-cleaning, dragging out beak-fulls of old nesting material.  He struggles with a huge tangle of straw, heaving the lot up to the entrance hole but it won’t go through and he only manages to pull out a few strands.  But he’s determined and finally the box, which the female has roosted in all winter, is empty.  We fixed a camera next to ‘Sparrow Heights,’ the three roomed apartment block on the side of the house.  On the monitor, I watch the birds flitting in and out, choosing their apartments, chirping loudly when they’ve selected the one they want.

Now it’s March and daffodils wave as I tread the earth lightly on my way home from Dru Yoga at Theatre Clwyd.  The rhubarb’s showing tantalizing glimpses of ruby red stalks. I’ve seen skinny lambs, acid yellow primroses,
heard my blackbird sing under the darkening sky and a song thrush in his usual tree belt out his aria as I pass each morning.

I’ve done some great ‘slow’ things whilst waiting for spring.  I spent a Saturday with North East Wales Wildlife in Rhydymwyn, furtling about in mouldy barn owl pellets looking for the remains of harvest mice.  I learned how to recognise a vole's skull from a shrew's and became adept at telling species apart by removing their molars. Soon I was calling out, ‘field vole, bank vole, common shrew,’ like I’d been doing it for years!  No harvest mice but it certainly beat doing the weekly shop. 

At Theatre Clwyd, I watched a spell-binding production of Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood, where I heard ‘the dew falling,’ and ‘the sleep of birds.’

Last week, back at the Theatre, I experienced a ‘Picnic Play.’  In the Clwyd Room we watched the cast of Under Milk Wood read Tom Stoppard’s ‘Inspector Hound,’ whilst we munched sandwiches and slurped tea.  We could’ve sat at the feet of the cast on the cushions and blankets provided.  A few did, but most laid their food out on tables, jars of mustard and sandwiches wrapped in rustling tin foil. It was great fun. Their next picnic play is on March 21^st. 

www.newwildlife.org.uk    www.newwildlife.wordpress.com

www.clwyd-theatr-cymru.co.uk

www.druworldwide.com

www.mammal.org.uk  

 

 

St. Valentine's Storm

In my room in the roof, the thundering wind sends leaves swirling past the skylight and I’m Dorothy spinning up and up through the middle of the tornado.  

I watch a male sparrow deliver a small white feather to the nest box, better than a dozen red roses.  The female seems unimpressed, maybe she dreams of reclining on scented rose petals? 

 

Soon the rain beats hard on my roof window and I can hardly hear ‘O Mio Babbino Caro,’ or as I now sing, ‘O Mio Babbino Sparrow.’  Now there are no birds to be seen anywhere.  Where have they all gone?  I hope they’re tucked up safe in the thorn-thick hedge. 

Hidden Kingdoms - in Rhydymwyn

It was like a scene from one of those dark crime dramas on telly.  We lined up, a meter apart and began systematically combing through the rough grass, parting the soggy tussocks with wet gloves, searching for clues, like a police forensic team.  Falling sleet and a raven's hollow 'kronk' added to the crime thriller atmosphere.

A scene from Silent Witness?

 

But we weren't looking for anything gruesome, just the golf-ball sized nests of the harvest mouse, Europe's smallest mammal.  The mouse is no bigger than a wine cork,weighs the same as a 20 pence piece and is the only mouse with a prehensile tail for clinging on to the stems of wheat and tall grasses.

Non-breeding harvest mouse nest, custard cream for scale

They are seriously under-recorded and the Mammal Society need volunteers to survey for nests during the winter of 2014. We were gathered on this finger-numbing day to learn how to look and what to look for. Winter is the best time to search so as not to disturb their breeding and because they are easier to find. 
Needless to say, we didn't find any, though someone did find a golf ball in the long grass. Never mind, we found lots of vole nest, tunnels and latrines and it was wonderful to get a vole's eye view of the world and glimpse a tiny bit of their lives. Thankfully there were no kestrels hovering nearby
If you've enjoyed watching Hidden Kingdoms on BBC1, get involved in a harvest mouse survey and catch a glimpse of the hidden world in a field near you.

www.mammal.org.uk/harvestmouse_survey (The Mammal Society)
www.miseproject.ie   (Mammals in a Sustainable Environment)
  

A Tweet a day keeps the blues away

Music is returning to my garden. Birds are tuning up for spring.  I stick my head out of the back door into rain and wind and sky the colour of an oil-spill and hear the sweet, sharp sound of a dunnock, like two pieces of polystyrene being rubbed together, though the dunnocks’ song doesn’t make me wince, it makes me grin.  Great-tits are teacher-teacher-ing, robins softly trill, their sound as watery as the winter sun and great spotted woodpeckers pik- pik like squeaky toys.  My shoulders relax, my heart beat slows, my face muscles soften as I tilt my head in different directions to catch each song.

Blackbirds are back in numbers from wherever they’ve been hiding, though silent still.  They’re playing  three-a-side, dribbling apple pieces up and down the lawn. Starlings peck at past-their-sell-by-date mince pies, clicking and whistling like old men adjusting their hearing-aids . 

During a winter bird survey yesterday,we shocked two woodcocks into a zig-zag, wing-whirring, brown-blur flight and chuckled at the site of a moorhen in a tree.  There were also bullfinches, not the usual two or three but – what’s the collective noun for a group of bullfinches?  A ‘plump’ of bullfinches perhaps, or, if you own an apple orchard, a ‘pest’ of bullfinches?  Their soft, sad whistles gave them away.

Birds or, more particularly their songs, may be good for your health.  There’s an interesting article on the internet - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22298779 called Surprising Uses for Birdsong. Recordings of birdsong have been installed in the corridors of Alder Hey Children’s hospital in Liverpool.  Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport uses birdsong in a quiet lounge where people can relax before their flight.  The National Trust suggests people listen to birdsong for a few minutes a day to combat low moods.  Radio Four’s Tweet of the Day is very popular.  If you don’t hear it at 05.58 each morning, you can download the podcast.  Or if like me, you can hardly wait for chiff-chaffs and willow warblers to arrive from Africa, go to the website and listen now!  http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/totd

 

Have a Happy and Slow New Year

January can be a difficult month.  The Christmas decorations are back in their box and rooms are no longer filled with twinkling lights and glistening glitter.  The sky’s the colour of under-the-bed-fluff and the ground squelches beneath my yellow wellies.  Spring seems a long way off.

There must be something good about January... 

Well, it’s an ideal time to be ‘slow’. 

 

Snuggle up and read, read, read. Try a bit of poetry, I love Billy Collins.

Empty your veggie draw,open those tins of butter beans and chick peas you’ve had at the back of your cupboard for ages and make vats of nourishing soup to freeze - whilst listening to warming and passionate opera arias,(try Anna Netrebko and Rolando  Villazon singing ‘O Soave Fanciulla’ – bliss, you’ll find them on YouTube).

Keep some strings of fairy lights up throughout January and February.

Light lots of candles and sit and enjoy the sound of the rain beating hard against your windows.

Get cosy in your Christmas pyjamas and listen to a talking book.  I can download them for free from my library via One Click Digital and the Flintshire.gov web page.  For some extra warmth, choose a story set in a warm climate.

Visit a spa.  My nearest one at Deeside Leisure Centre offers two people, two hours in the spa for £15. Laying on my towel in the muscle warming sauna, I could be anywhere I choose.

Write letters to friends you haven’t seen for ages, send silly things, stickers, leaves, doodles on post-it notes in the envelope.  It’s great to receive a hand written letter through the post.

Plan an adventure.  I love to unfold my maps and spread them on the living room floor. I lay down beside them and trace routes with my finger.  This year I'm looking at cycling along The Loire, walking the Welsh Coastal Path - and then there's Rannoch Moor. Have you seen the O.S.map for that area? It's well worth lying on with your magnifying glass, wow!

Watch the birds.  This morning we had 6 black birds in the garden, eating chopped apples and having minor skirmishes.  I spied a plump, pink bullfinch pecking at buds in the tree opposite my window. A circus troupe of blue-tits came swinging and leaping from feeder to fat balls and a squabble of sparrows bullied for seed space.  January 25-26 is the time to join in the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch.

 

Join an exercise class.  I love my local spinning class where we all perch on fixed bikes and pedal like the wind to disco music.  Clare's Dru Yoga class at Theatre Clwyd is wonderful on a dark and soggy January afternoon.  And there’s coffee and cake to be enjoyed afterwards in the cafe and lovely art to gaze at along the corridor galleries.

How will you make the most of this SLOW month?

The Slow Days of Christmas....

In December, there’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday, (and thankfully,Small Business Saturday).  It can be dark, dreary, depressing and dear.....but it doesn't have to be. It’s still possible to take a step back and enjoy some ‘slow’ days.

A group of us decided to leave the Christmas shoppers to it and spend a Saturday on our bikes.  We cycled to a fab cafe in a converted barn (Meadow Lea Farm, Mickle Trafford). At a table between the glowing stove and the twinkling Christmas tree, we ate hearty soup and thick bread and planned a New Year's Day ride.....

 

 

On Sunday we were back on our bikes to join a few hundred cycling Santas delivering presents from the Pier Head in Liverpool to Alder Hey Children’s hospital.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After another morning otter survey with North East Wales Wildlife (with poo and paw prints to prove otters play in our river), we got creative and made a herd of silly reindeer with bits of tree and twigs.

 

 

On a dark and chilly day, my friend and me made a lovely mess (in her house) making home made Christmas cards, glue and glitter everywhere, mince pies and Christmas songs and mugs of hot choc.

This is the month when we love to take walks during that magic 'just before it goes dark’ time. Sometimes the sky is purple, pink, lilac, orange. When we get home we drink mulled wine in the dark, except for coloured Christmas lights.

I made an alternative ‘tree’ out of birch twigs and glittery pine cones. When I was collecting the twigs in the woods, I heard a tawny owl and later a crowd of 'cawing' crows came to roost.

I watch birds. They make me laugh on dark days.  These sparrows are outside my dining room window and one morning the sun came up like a big orange ball of fire and made the fluffy brown birds glow.