Tag: 365daysofbiking

#365daysofbiking Family values

May 7th – It may be just me spending more time by the canal this year, but we seem to have a larger number than usual of waterfowl chicks about. It’s lovely and heart warming to see – and let’s face it, we all need a bit of cute and heartwarming at the moment.

The Canada geese have been particularly prolific, and everywhere I go on local canals I see gorgeous balls of fluff bobbing along between proud, defensive parents, or I meet hissing, protective aggression that requires careful negotiation.

A beautiful and very positive reminder that life goes on.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2MD2Olo
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Monumental

May 5th – Looping back into town, I caught sight of Morris, the Brownhills Miner, a statue and work of art I hold dear.

Morris is not particularly accurate, or even a true representation of our history, as such, with Brownhills actually maturing as a town long after the immediately local mining had all but ceased. But he captures the spirit of our town, and our collective history, reflecting that many Brownhillian lads were miners, but working in pits in adjacent towns and villages.

Morris is also uncomfortably Soviet, to anyone who’s any experience of Eastern Bloc public art; he’s exactly the sort of thing many soviet states would have willingly erected.

But this lad, pick and lamp aloft, is ours. And it’s always good to see him silhouetted in the dusk.

It’s how I know I’m home.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2Ychg9l
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Cut both ways

May 5th – The art of the daily exercise ride is quite weird. Used to normally commuting for my daily bike fix, the ride for the sake of it is, I’m ashamed to say, usually short and local.

It has, however, enabled me to get a grip back on what’s wonderful about the place I love and call home.

Here at Ogley Junction, standing on the cast iron footbridge as I have many, many times, on this warm evening it was hard not to be filled with pleasure at the sight of the peaceful canal, the only movement being languid waterfowl and birds swooping for bugs.

Such rides are measured by weight, not distance.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/3f0XDry
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking A new generation


May 4th – Nice to see a new year’s worth of youngsters on the canal: Goslings and ducklings compete to out-cute each other, guarded closely by their attentive parents.

There are cygnets, too, apparently although I’ve yet to see any of the local families, which is a bit remiss of me.

A beautiful, cheering thing.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/3fY9lEC
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking How do you like those apples?

May 3rd – An interesting surprise to note one tree near Clayhanger Common this year has been hit heavily by the gall wasp that causes oak apple galls.

These growths – protective structures grown from corrupted leaf buds – house gall wasp larva that will eat their way out of the gall as the season progresses. The corruption is caused by the parent wasp injecting the larva’s egg into the nascent leaf bud covered in a chemical that causes the cells to deform.

It’s one of the odder evolutionary parasitic actions I’ve ever come across and it fascinates me. And it doesn’t seem to affect the tree at all.

One of the more peculiar aspects is all the oak trees around the one affected are completely untouched. But this one is affected more heavily than any I’ve ever seen in my life. There must be several thousand oak apples.

But why just this one tree? A fascinating thing.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2Tg9KZl
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Still high

May 2nd – Chasewater’s water level is now just below the weir top in the Nine-foot Pool: But only just. Not even an inch. The continued seepage from the dam and around the penstocks in the canal outlet valve will be steady, slightly and continually draining.

It’s been dry now pretty much a month or more, and at one stage last winter it felt like the world would never be dry again. The rain was such that it became a state that just was: I continually dressed for it and it didn’t trouble me much. But by god it was relentless and grim.

I’m glad that period has passed, and at the moment I’ll take any positives from life I can find.

Chasewater remains high, but is falling slowly.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/36eZBBx
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking This heart is attached


May 2nd – Chasewater, deserted and peaceful with no traffic noise is magical.

Apart from us, not a soul was around to witness the beauty. Just us, and several thousand waterfowl. I love this place so very much.

A beautiful, uplifting experience.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2X3BjWP
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking A complex question

May 1st – Not far away, just a few tens of yards up the Chester Road, the new nursing home, built on the site of a former quarry and blockworks seems open.

Castlehill Specialist Care Centre seems to cater for people with quite marked dementia and it seems to be intended to serve a growing market – and it’s a very decent looking building, which now appears staffed, and open.

I found myself wondering if they were admitting residents yet, what with coronavirus being so pronounced in such places.

But it’s a fine looking place and I wish all concerned with it – residents and staff – well.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2TahSe0
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Climbing, slowly

May 1st – A ride down into Stonnall and the lanes. It had been a rollercoaster of a week emotionally, but at least we seem to be getting the virus under control. Things don’t seem as terribly threatening as they did.

Winching my way up Castlehill out of the village onto the Chester Road, the lanes here – severed by the straightening of the Chester Road many decades ago – are leafy and peaceful, and diverge oddly.

But in the quiet of a lockdown spring evening, with birds singing and soft sunlight coming through the leaves, this was close to heaven, and like my body, my mind was climbing, slowly.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2Wz30ry
via IFTTT

#365daysofbiking Flower power

April 30th – Nature gets me through times of no hope more reliably than hope gets me through times of no nature – and throughout the pandemic, for all the horror of the news and social media, the simplicity and beauty of the world continuing to turn about it’s seasonal axes is really keeping me going.

The hedgerows, waysides and edgelands are alive with ragwort, bluebells, green alkanet, forget me nots, dandelions and a whole host of others.

And on that daily exercise ride, they really bring joy to a troubled, concerned soul.

This journal is moving home. Find out more by clicking here.

from Tumblr https://ift.tt/2zDRxOG
via IFTTT