New Forest Ponies

Last Wednesday we decided on a day at the seaside and headed for the Dorset coast. I like my blips to represent the focal point of the day where possible and therefore expected to be blipping something oceanic. We hit the coast near Christchurch and stopped near the quay, which is at the mouth of the River Stour, for an exploratory stroll in a park and drove westwards thereafter, hugging the coastline. We stopped at Fisherman's Cliff to see the sea from above; drove past Bournemouth Pier and on to Sandbanks, Britain's costliest neighbourhood, and an interesting promontory which has the sea on one side and Poole Harbour (but known as North Haven Lake locally) on the other; and finally to Poole itself, visiting Poole Park, which has a large marine area, teaming with gulls, geese, ducks, swans and boats.

However, we had also wanted to see the New Forest and so had detoured on our journey south in the morning in order to drive through it. As always there were donkeys and ponies roaming wild in the road and on the adjacent common land, and we stopped a couple of times to experience these more closely. We stopped for cappuccino and cake at the excellent tea rooms  in North Gorley and encountered a group of several ponies and foals a little further on.

This was the first photograph I took and shows a young mother with her foal and one of the other horses from the group behind them. The foal grazed closer to where I was standing and approached me with some interest while the grey pony grazed apparently unconcerned.

However, to my bemusement she then came running towards me and stopped, looked at me, turned around, ran a few paces in the opposite direction, stopped again, ran in reverse, and before I had a clue what was going on, threw her hind heels in the air and kicked me in the shins, elbow and stomach. She then ran back to where she was and continued grazing, now rejoined by the foal, as if nothing had happened.

I had an interesting muddy hoof print on my tee-shirt and a multi-coloured bruise that appeared on my leg a couple of days later. So this peaceful scene rather had to be my blip.

The rest of the day passed by without further misadventure and was most enjoyable. We had a stop at Wimborne Minster on the way back and one at Wylye. We had a wander along the River Wylye and came across a pair of swans that I named Jo and Pete (after Jo Whiley and Pete Wylie, do you see what I did there?).

L.
4.7.2012


Blip #747
Consecutive Blip #000
Day #826

Alternatives:
No You Can't Have It Yet! (Christchurch)
Fisherman's Cliff (Bournemouth)
Sandbanks (West)(Poole)
Sandbanks (East)(Poole)
Breaking Formation (Poole)
Jo And Pete (Wylye)

A Day Trip To The Dorset Coast, 27 June 2012 (Flickr album of 82 images)

Lenses: Pentax 17-70mm, Sigma 70-300mm

One year ago: Lower Glebe Farm