Swanning

River Kent, Kendal

Two swans were dozing on the Kent at lunch-time, the flow is so slow after several weeks without rain, that they were almost stationary as if on a lake. I kept watching to see if they would drift down to the weir that was 20 metres below them, but they were always alert to it and would paddle upstream again.

A late blip tonight. Matt and I went climbing in Trowbarrow Quarry after work. We were a bit tentative without Simon, but we did all right. Trowbarrow is only a couple of miles from home for me, an old limestone quarry. The first routes were climbed in the 1970's and were named after David Bowie songs: Jean Jeanie and Aladdinsane amongst others. We're not up to Jean Jeanie yet, though it's my favourite there. The sheer face is the fossilised bed of an old tropical sea, full of corals and turned through 90 degrees by tectonic earth movements in the intervening 350 million years.