A Closer Look

I had a reasonably busy morning with a visit to the Health Centre for an INR check which controls my warfarin intake, bills to pay, feeders to fill at the Moorland Feeder Station then coffee at Wauchope Cottage. As I Left I arranged to go for a walk later in the day with Tootlepedal. I continued my busy morning by sorting out what items I'm going to take on the upcoming holiday to Thailand that I am embarking on next Tuesday. 

I collected Tootlepedal later as arranged then we drove down the A7 stopping off at the lay-by at the Seven Sisters and to a wander down the old road to see if we could get some autumnal shots.

I spotted this tiny snail perched on a dandelion.......

.........I had to have a closer look.

We negotiated our way past this muddy entrance to make our way down to the river bank....

....and took this shot looking back......

.......but there wasn't much to see.

 We returned to thecar and stopped at the Hollows Bridge to admire the view, both up stream... 

.....and downstream.

Just to let us know what river we were looking at.

After a quick walk to the Bryeburn Bridge we returned home, it was an enjoyable short walk but a bit disappointing as far as picture taking was concerned. 

In the evening I attended the Buccleuch Centre with my friend Stuart for a very enjoyable concert with Phil Cunningham and Ali Bain, two very accomplished musicians.  I saw that Mr & Mrs Tootlepedal were in the audience so if you click here you should get a more in depth account of the show. 

I'm off on holiday to Thailand next Tuesday for three weeks with my travel companions George and Kenny, spending time in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Phuket. A great adventure and hopefully some good photographs. Depending on the internet connections I'll do my best to post pictures here and on Facebook.

Another Grey Day that Goat Better

We woke to yet another grey day among grey days that seem to be endless at the moment. After breakfast I put a week of the E & L into the data base then added some pages from Matt Ewart's scrapbooks onto the the photo archives. These are scrapbooks by the late Matt Ewart who was a great Common Riding stalwart and had collected some interesting facts and pictures of Common Ridings dating from 1901 until 1975. This kept me going for most of the day apart from stopping for lunch and a snooze and trip to the feeder station with Tootlepedal. He text me to see if I was interested in a soggy walk, I wasn't but was quite happy to spend an hour at the moorland feeder station. 

This usually one of my favourite views.....

....the feeders were looking rather gloomy too....

......but with the wonders of modern camera technology I was able to get some acceptable shots.

In the evening I went off to the Buccleuch Centre to listen to Ten Strings and a Goatskin, a  traditional band from Canada's Prince Edward Isle, they were three pleasant young men who were enthusiastic about they're traditional roots and music who were on a short tour of Scotland ending at the Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow at the weekend. For a more knowledgeable account of the concert click on Tootlepedals blog. 

A Pleasant Walk and a Kinky Night

Just a short relatively uninteresting blog today but as I'm back in a blogging mood I need to keep it going. we woke once again to some warm sunshine and after a leisurely morning catching up with some TV programmer I had a late lunch then headed off to go round the Murtholm via the Becks and Gaskell's Walk. 

A popular gateway for some local photographers me included

This lone daffodil was worthy of a shot as it gave some hope that the coming Spring was just around the corner.

The effort the tenants put into their small fields and constructions never ceases to amaze me

These boards were originally designed to cross over extremely muddy patches but for some reason they have dried up and re surfaced else where on the path

Continuing past Ha'Crofts I noticed the hedges were all neatly trimmed by modern methods. My father in law was a lakeland hill farmer and was very skilled at the old craft of hedge laying where when regrown in the next season they were impenetrable. I wonder what he would've thought of today's methods?

I paused to take couple of shots of the Auld Stane Brig....

.......from both sides before....

....going through Gaskell's Walk...

.....passing where the Becks burn meets the Wauchope....

.....on towards the Stubholm.....

.....where there was a lovely smell of wood smoke

I continued towards the Skippers Bridge....

....where I took the obligatory photo of the old distillery.

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Looking back at the skippers bridge it brought to mind the painting I've got hanging in my staircase...

....which was done by a local artist by the name of Davy "Fitba" Ferguson many years ago. Apparently he was quite a popular artist in his day and by local legend he would produce local scenes to gain money for refreshment. One story that was related to me was you could tell when he was under the influence when he painted the Skippers |Bridge, the river somehow appeared to run upstream.

.  

This painting was done by Fitba as a wedding present for my late wife's grandparents and is possible one of the few he did on canvas.

I continued on home and made myself some spaghetti and homemade sauce for tea before getting ready to go to the Buccleuch centre where the Kast off Kinks were playing. They are ex members of the original band and gave an excellent nights entertainment apart from the the first half where the sound wasn't quite right and the vocals were being drowned out by the instruments, but a quiet word in one the staffs ear put things right for the second half. The show was perhaps a little loud for Tootlepedal but I'm sure he would've enjoyed the nostalgic hits all the same.