I fancied seeing what was over the hill at Halton Park earlier in the week, so that's where I went. Matthew had been saying all day that he wanted to come with me, but then a friend he hasn't seen for months appeared online and they wanted to play Minecraft, so that was fair enough.
You'll recall that there are a couple of cattle grids in Halton Park (which, incidentally, I need to rename because Halton Park just doesn't do it for me at all), to stop the sheep escaping onto the main road. And while I know I'm not going to fall through, I can't help that an intrusive image of a trapped and broken leg flashes through my head every time I cross a cattle grid.
Also, have you noticed how the trees are more bare on the left than they are on the right. Same oak trees on both sides, but one side has felt the autumn sooner than the other. Interesting.
When I'm out for walks in the countryside – not so much when I'm walking near buildings – I almost subconsciously do this thing whereby I look as hard as I can at everything, all of it: the things right in front of me, the view in the middle distance, the fells and such as far as my weak eyes can see. I think I'm trying to imprint images on my mind's eye or something, so that they stay with me when I have to go back inside the house. I think what this tells me is that I need to live somewhere that has its own view. I don't think it matters where it is, just that I need to be able to look out of my window and see something more interesting and pretty than my neighbours' houses. I mean, to be fair, what they see when they look out of their windows is my house, so they've got the worse deal.
Well, it was all about the view today. My eyes, I'm sure, were popping out of my head a little bit as I tried to see as far as I could, in as much detail as possible. Starting with the sheep. They were grazing very close to the road today. They're so funny, aren't they? Hehe. They look up from their grass when you approach, all 'Eh? Are you talking to me?', and they watch you for a full minute without moving. Then when they're satisfied that you have nothing interesting to say, and you're not going to eat them, they go back to their grazing.
The road goes off all twisty turney, and I was determined today to see a little bit more of it. Everything was feeling pretty good, so a mile would not be good enough. I at least wanted to see what was over the hill that we got to the top of last time. I also wanted to beat the sunset – I'd accidentally left it a little late to walk in the wild, and I didn't much fancy a forest in the dark.
I don't know what to say about this view. It's a stunner, isn't it? It's got the lot: the rolling hills, the valley, the river, the sunset-stained clouds. A tiny but perfect bit of the Lune valley.
They were really staring today. They often look as though they're curious enough to come over and ask for a stroke, but as soon as you make a move towards them, they leg it, sharpish. Are the ones with horns rams? Or can the ewes of this breed have horns as well. One of the great mysteries of the universe ... to me, at least.
Half a mile in is the little wood where there be werewolves, though not at this time of day. Obviously, they only come out at night. This was what I told myself, but actually, when I'm alone, a wood always makes me a little nervous. It's because you can't see any distance properly, and I can feel that all my senses involuntarily turn up a few notches and my body prepares to flee if it needs to.
Look, see? There could be anyone or anything hiding in there and I would never know. But at the same time, incredibly beautiful, isn't it? I wondered whether there was a word for the feeling you get when you stare at trees – or the feeling I get, at any rate – so I Googled it. While I didn't find a word, it turns out that there's some science attached to the practice. Of course, that's hardly surprising because science, given enough time, can find an explanation for absolutely everything. But apparently, according to Psychology Today, staring at trees has been studied and found to be physically and mentally beneficial. So let's do more of it, I say.
Once again, I survived the wood. My calves nearly didn't – it's quite a steep climb for about a quarter of a mile, which is no distance at all, of course. I'm not whinging about it; no, I think it's great when I feel a bit of a burn. It adds to the feeling of smugness.
I paused at the top to reward myself with a view of the other side of the valley. I think that's Hare Appletree Fell on the left, the tiny river in the middle, and the bridge that we usually start our Crook o' Lune walk from. It never ceases to give me a little thrill when I spot somewhere we've walked. And that happens all the time now because we've tramped all over this really tiny corner of Lancashire. Well, not all over it – in fact, we've barely scratched the surface. But we've covered a few miles!
There's another one – that's where Matthew and I paddled on that hot day a few weeks ago. Isn't perspective odd? From down there, you're not aware at all of the big hill (another fell, don't know which one), and all you can see are some trees and a really big sky.
Anyway, so, I wanted to see how far I could get before it either started to get dark or I felt like one of my legs might fall off. This was as far as we'd managed to get last time, so I was heading into uncharted territory. Except that it wasn't actually uncharted because I'd seen the road on Google Maps – it just cuts around Halton and comes out on the road to Kirby Lonsdale.
Whatever, dude. This fluffy lady wasn't interested at all in where the road leads. She looked like she wanted to murder me. 'What d'you think you're doing?' she clearly said. 'Who said you could take my photograph? Bugger off!' Alright, calm down, sheep lady.
It turns out that people live in Halton Park. Fancy that, eh? There's a proper farm, as you can see, and a really posh house that has a tennis court and topiary. What a splendid place to live. It looks like Last of the Summer Wine country. Which is Yorkshire; but, you know, Lancashire, Yorkshire, lots of similarities.
So I walked on for a while through this lovely spot, which was made up of twists and turns, so every corner was very exciting. Every few seconds I heard a pheasant making that weird noise that they make, like this:
And then around another bend, this came flying out of the wood with some kind of small rodent-like creature in its talons. I think it was a sparrowhawk, and they sound like this:
I've seen a sparrowhawk before, in my own garden, catching sparrows, funnily enough. This one sat in the middle of the road, ignoring the poor dying thing it had caught, looking me right in the eye. Very obligingly, it watched me take my phone out of my pocket, snap a photo and then put my phone away, before it flew off down the road with its prey. Poser.
Just round the next bend, I decided on my halfway point. I could have gone further, but I spied what looked like the start of another hill, and I was just a little bit too lazy to do another one. This seemed like a nice place to pause for a breather, where there was a little brook running under the road. So nice, in fact, that I took a little video of it.
I thought I'd taken another little video of a pheasant jittering about on my way back, but it turned out that I'd forgotten to press the record button, so I didn't get that.
For a change, I didn't really take any photos on the way back – I'm trying to break the habit of snapping everything, because you don't need to see it all (you just need a little flavour of where I've been), and I don't need a record of every tree and stone and sheep (I also just need a little reminder to look back on when I'm 90).
I did take this one though, just because it was beautiful. That big old oak, looking over the valley, and Clougha Pike over on the left. If I had to be a tree, I think I'd be pretty satisfied if this was my spot.
I didn't rush back, even though it was getting a little dark. I took my time, said hello to a few more sheep, stared at some more trees, kept an eye out for werewolves as I picked up the pace just a little bit through the wood that was now quite gloomy, and took some last deep breaths of wonderful fresh air that had just a slight tang of sheep poo. Glorious.
Until tomorrow, wood nymphs.
WQ
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