Poole Quay

Tuesday 31st December 2013

I had a walk along the Quay at Poole this afternoon.  It's not a place I have been to before but it's somewhere I will come back to and explore properly when we have more time.  It was dull and overcast (but at least it had stopped raining) so my photos are a bit uninspiring and colourless.

Nice, if you can afford it, obviously quite a few can as there were many large luxury boats (should I be calling them something posher than boats?)

A Padstow registered fishing boat in the foreground with Brownsea Island in the background.

Just imagine a strong smell of fish and you're almost there amongst the pots!

There are signs of brightness in the sky, looks almost promising (and so it was when I got back to the car!)

On the way back I passed this lovely old hardware shop, with goods spilling out over the pavement, it reminded me of Arkwrights shop in Open All Hours.

Finally, I am celebrating one year of blogging, (I started one year ago yesterday) and it's been great. Here's to the next year.

Happy New Year!

Boxing Day in Swanage

Thursday 26th December 2013

Having had a lazy day with family,  by late afternoon we were in need of fresh air and ready to blow a few cobwebs away.  We walked just over a mile into the centre of Swanage, taking in the Christmas lights,. There were more people wandering about than I expected and a few pubs and cafes open.  Some of the shop windows were beautifully decorated, and in the dark looked amazing, we needed a bit of sparkle.  Having had a quick look round we walked back for more festive food! 

Lots of festive glitteriness

The seafront at Swanage

Station Road, Swanage

On the journey home we had a traditional stop off at Corfe to have a look at the lights and the nativity people in a 'stable/shed' thing!  For a small village, the residents of Corfe pull out all the stops with their Christmas lights, it's well worth a look.  As usual my photos don't really do the lights justice because I wobble and move too much - even though I try not to breathe as I take them!

The Nativity, Corfe Castle

Corfe Castle

Empty roads in Corfe Castle

Seasons Greetings

Tuesday 24th December 2013

What a dreadful 24 hours we've just had weather wise.   The trees in our garden have taken a beating but are still standing and that's amazing as  the old plum tree in our back garden is most definitely on it's last legs.  We have had persistent rain running down the hill outside our house for hours and it's high time it stopped!

We were due to go walking today and I was hoping to take some festive photos but unfortunately circumstances have changed so I am posting a photo that we  took a few years ago of a fairly friendly robin that visited our garden every now and then.

 Happy Christmas and best wishes for a happy and healthy 2014

Family Christmas Walk and Picnic

Sunday 22nd December 2013

Yesterday was very wet and windy and tomorrow is forecast to be as bad but today we were very fortunate to have a dry bright day for our annual family Christmas walk and picnic (with a duck race and treasure hunt thrown in for good measure!).  We met up at Anderwood car park near Burley in the New Forest and had a short walk to the River Blackwater, which eventually becomes the Lymington River.  We have had a great deal of rain lately so the river that we were planning to use for the duck race was swollen and quite deep (too deep for wellies!) so having put a test duck down it we decided to use a smaller more sedate stream.

Blinged  up ducks - mine was the Christmas duck and it came last in both races - I blame the scarf it was definitely not streamlined!

The test duck - stuck!

You can't beat a good bit of cheating - my duck is still back at the starting line in the background.

Proof that there was a blue sky!

Following a walk, we had a picnic lunch and got competitive over a treasure hunt - a great pre-Christmas family get together, with lots of laughing and silliness, just the job.

Bolderwood and Bratley Wood

Sunday 15th December 2013

We had a pleasant but wet walk this morning starting from  the Bolderwood car park.  There is a useful deer observation platform overlooking a couple of fields not far from the car park but unfortunately today maybe due to the weather there were very few deer visible.  

Starting off from Bolderwood in the misty rain.

Five deer just visible in the distance.

The rain got steadily harder as we got further from the car but it didn't stop us finding a fairly newly placed geocache under one of the many  very large fallen trees in this area.

Rain on the lens!

I had a chat with a friendly local!

Getting murkier by the minute!

We came across this memorial stone on the way back,placed by the Forestry Commission,  the sides were beautifully engraved with different animals birds  and plants found in the New Forest.

A couple of seasonal engravings

An owl with very expressive eyes.

Then it was back to the car and time to get home and dry out.

It's Christmas in Romsey

Tuesday 10th December 2013

We had a walk around Romsey last night just to take in the Christmas lights because nowhere does Christmas lights quite as well as Romsey, in my opinion.  There are twinkling lights, trees and festive shop displays everywhere and it was well worth looking in out of the way places too. It was a bit tricky taking clear photos of the lights, and it didn't help that it was really cold and I didn't want to take my gloves off.

Bell Street

The Market Place

Reindeer wearing glasses in an opticians window

The Hundred

A traditional tree in Bradbeers shop window

The Corn Market

A modern display in a florists window

The Hundred

Palmerston Street

Godshill & Submarine Pens

Thursday 5th December 2013

There was a brisk cold wind blowing from the west this morning and we chose to walk in open heathland, this may not have been one of our best ideas.  Our aim today was to find two geocaches on a short walk of just under four miles.  

Along this valley it was very exposed and very cold, there was even thin ice on the edges of the stream in places.  My brother and I used to mess around here on the thick ice on this stream as children (many years ago!!) and I always seem to remember it being cold whenever we were here.

On the edge of Pitts Wood we came across this sign.  Apparently Pitts Wood was enclosed in 1775, thrown out in 1815 and re-enclosed in 1903.   Thrown out????  It must have been thrown out again since then as there is no fence or gate here any more!

This is looking back towards the sign in Pitts Wood, we successfully found cache number one not far from here.

Cache number two was on the top of this mound - submarine pens.

Submarine Pens in the middle of the New Forest?

During the Second World War this area was the Ashley Walk Bombing Range. The RAF brought back evidence that the Germans were building vast structures of reinforced concrete to house their submarines. This knowledge led to a massive reinforced concrete raft, 6ft thick, 79ft by 70ft being built of high quality concrete, for the purpose of testing. It is supported on five equidistant walls 6ft high on a foundation 20 inches thick. In 1942 this cost £250,000!

During the clear up of the area, after the war, this structure proved to be indestructible and so had to be buried. Today it is marked as a Tumulus on an OS map.

As you walk to the top of the ‘Pens’ you will be able to see some of the reinforced concrete. When at the top look around and you will see many small depressions, these are the remains of bomb craters. To the NW (about 100 metres) there is a larger crater. This is where the only ‘Grand Slam’ bomb (22000lb) was dropped on test and exploded. It created a crater 100ft in diameter and 70ft in depth. Today it is marked by a large growth of reeds in a slight depression.

http://www.newforestww2.org/submarines-in-the-new-forest/

This massive old oak tree was just asking for a hug!  Last night there was quite a hard frost and suddenly the leaves have dropped, it had to happen eventually, and it is December!

Just a few of the many ponies and cattle grazing on the heathland back near the car.

Heron Up a Tree

Monday 2nd December 2013

Southampton Common is looking very gold and orange in colour today,  this was the Cemetery Lake mid afternoon today.

And this was the Ornamental Lake, the fir trees are on an island and on the island was .......

.......... a heron!  We tried to get closer further on round the lake but it took off and flew ...........

.......up into the top of one of the fir trees - they look even more odd and dinosaur like up in a tree!

The last photo for today, bulrushes.