In 1998 I took my first walking holiday. The United Kingdom is a good locale for walking holidays, because villages dot the landscape and the paths are protected from encroachments. We drove from Barnstaple, where we stayed overnight, to the beginning of our country walk. At that time I favoured video (digital tape) over still photography (35mm film). Some of the photos in these posts are captured from the video.
Today was exactly what I wanted – we started in one place (Prixford) and walked to another place (Saunton Sands Beach ). This morning was in woodland and between hedgerows. This afternoon was across fields, through dunes (grass covered), to the sea.
Barbara and I are the only walkers. A pair of sisters and their husbands cancelled six weeks ago because of the death of their father. Thankfully, Barbara and I are She is a retired high school teacher of English Literature, from New York City. She likes to walk slowly, although all day I trailed, taking video and photographs, catching up to her and Andrew. Andrew and Jane Bull own Greenscape (the Jane took a turn leading by walking us through Braunton village after lunch,
In the morning we walked along many narrow roads suited to their origin as cart tracks, now paved. Yards and houses open unexpectedly from high hedges. In many places the fields themselves are shoulder height, topped by a stone and earthen wall, overgrown with grasses and wild flowers, topped to a height of ten feet by a hedge. The wild flowers are overwhelmed by the gardens in the yards, bursting with purple or mauve hydrangeas, red begonias, purple fuchsias, and riots of yellow, white, and pink petunias.
In the afternoon, as we moved out to the cultivated fields and then to the dunes, smaller weedy flowers found their own place. Tiny thistles bloomed purple. Flax was just still in blue bloom. Queen Annes lace bobbed with a similar yellow plant. Evening primroses, a beautiful yellow bugle, showed the best.
The dunes are grass covered with bushes in small groves. Except where there are paths and vehicle tracks from defense training maneuvers, the sand is not obvious. Only two sand walls showed the rolling hills to be what they really are.
the top of a dune, and theres the sea – distant, with traditional white lace surf. We walked on the hardened sand where the and still we were perhaps half a kilometer from the water! At the end of the beach, near the cliffs of the next point, were the desperate English sitting defiantly on the beach behind plastic windbreaks. All these families were enjoying the last day of school break. Two fortunate families were at least enjoying the strong winds by flying kites.
