hello again old tree(s)

This is not the picture I had in mind when we set out for a walk this morning.  But bear with me.

Three years ago I started blipping a particular tree in Rushmere County Park on the same day of each month.  I managed 22 months before I called it a day.  I didn’t know at the time that this project would last that long - my original plan was to record the changes in and around the tree over a period of a year.

But the tree sat at the end of a long and (to me) steep walk up on to the Greensand Ridge footpath and so an unintended consequence of this project became the changes in my fitness and recuperation from illness as I made the long and tiring trek.

Sometimes I would have to stop half way and, if there were people around, pretend to fiddle with my camera while I caught my breath.  Today, with just the briefest of pauses to shake paws with a muddy labrador, I managed the walk without needing to stop.  A long way behind Anniemay of course, who is always desparate to be let of the leash when it comes to hills - “I don’t like them so I have to get up them as quickly as possible” - but a good enough result for me.

The old tree (a 200 year old Hornbeam) looked splendid in the sunshine (see extra).

We walked on for over an hour and came across Bakers Wood, the largest area of deciduous woodland in Bedfordshire.  It’s a site of Special Scientific Interest (SSI) having been coppiced for the past 800 years and possibly in existence for past 10,000.  I really liked these twisty shapes in the sunlight and felt it was time to put some other trees in the spotlight.

The other extra show my companion photographing something which may or may not be her blip for today.

Best viewed large.