June 27th – Another beautiful weed is the thistle. There seems to be a very large variety of these spiny, prehistoric looking plants, and their strains seem endlessly complex – but whether a light mauve like these at Shire Oak Hill or a pink or deep, deep purple, they are all gorgeous and fascinating, particularly in the hostel-looking buds.
June 27th – Another grim, overcast day threatening rain but there is always brightness in a midsummer gloom – and here, it’s ragwort.
Another yellow weed that’s usually overlooked and indeed hated by horse owners, to whose animals it’s poisonous, this is actually a beautiful wayside flower that feeds bugs aplenty and keeps pollinators busy.
Many of what we would ordinarily class as weeds are very, very beautiful if we stop and look closely.
May 4th – On the way back, I had to pop to Stonnall, and it looked fairly clear so I had a quick go at Lichfield Cathedral from Shire Oak Quarry gates, a favourite muse of mine.
Not too bad for a handheld shot I don’t think. Nice to see the trees around the Old Ladies of the Vale greening up so nicely at last.
April 21st – I was still doing short test runs come sundown, when passing the site of Sid Cohen’s transport cafe on Shire Oak Hill I noticed I’d just missed a beautiful sky. I’m always sad when that happens, as you never really know when you’ll get a good sunset again.
It was very cold and whilst spring this year is sunny, bright and dry, I’m getting fed up of the cold and distinctly harsh winds. As soon as the sun goes in it’s bitterly cold.
It’s like the season’s been delivered, but a vital component to put it all together is missing…
April 13th – Spring flowers are coming thick and fast now, from dead nettles to bluebells, both Spanish and English lining the hedgerows, edge lands and verges.
Spotted at Shire Oak, some beautiful sights just growing in a mundane, roadside here that most would just pass by.
There’s beauty out there in profusion if we’re open to it.
March 31st – Also seeming to prosper at the moment is the Shire Oak, a pub that up until the last change of stewardship last year was experiencing difficult times. After a period of closure, the lights are back on and welcoming in the dark of the night.
The place always seems busy and I’ve not heard anyone with anything bad to say about the place.
Must take a trip up the hill sometime and try it out.
March 13th – This is a terrible photo, and sorry about that, but the mood I was in precluded concentrating on image quality; but the subject did very much cheer me up. On the way home, I rode up Shire Oak Hill from Stonnall in the dark. Since I was tired and not 100%, I rode up the pavement, as I feared my speed would not keep with the traffic. It was then I noticed them.
Loads of clumps of beautiful, white spring snowflakes – leucojum vernum- which are very like snowdrops, but the blooms are more bell shaped, the plants taller, with more foliage. Each flower has tiny green tips to the petals which the harshness of the flash sadly stripped away in the photo.
These gorgeous flowers grow in increasing numbers in this spot every year and they always surprise me. Today, on this dark and weary night, they were a real tonic.
March 12th – Perhaps unwisely, I continued on a ride I’d done many times – Down through Stonnall, Shenstone Woodend, Canwell, then to Hints, Hopwas and Whittington via the canal; from there back over Common Barn and the heath to Weeford and back home via Shenstone. It’s a short ride. I know it like the back of my hand.
I struggled and fought.
At Shenstone on the way home, it felt like I’d never reach home. When I did get there, I was in bed well before midnight.
All this was a shame, as spring was showing the way; lambs were in the fields, the weeping willows were coming into leaf and daffodils marked every verge, hedgerow and garden. It really was beautiful.
Shame I felt so rotten.
February 9th – The end of a long day. This week hasn’t been easy and I’ll be glad when Friday ends. The first couple of months of the year are always hard but January was particularly cruel. I’m welcoming the gradual return to light, and the generally brighter, colder weather is much better than the murky damp of last week.
Bu my goodness, work had been demanding of late.
Rolling downhill from Shire Oak to Brownhills with no energy left in the tank, I was exhausted, tired and hungry. I think I need a holiday. Already.
January 16th – As I neared the crest of Shire Oak hill, it was murky and drizzly and the kind of night you really don’t want to be out in.
There wasn’t much traffic, either, which seemed strange – but I did note the model ‘works buses’ – not these days going to Crabtree or the BRD, but shuttling workers back and forth between the Birmingham and Black Country conurbation and Amazon at Rugeley.
These services run seemingly throughout the day and night and I’d love to know more about them.
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