Midsummer meanders on the Avon and the Trym

I decided I wanted to see some bee orchids, so one sunny morning last week we set off for Lamplighter's Marsh near Shirehampton, where they're reputed to grow, in Daisy Field. 

It's an interesting place to walk, lying between the Portway, one of the main arterial routes into and out of Bristol, and its predecessor in that role, the River Avon. 

In the past, this area was used as a grazing marsh, and when WWI broke out, the Army established a remount depot there. The depot requisitioned horses and retrained them before sending them to their deaths at the front. 

This sculpture was installed in Daisy Field only last year. The War Horse is made entirely of horseshoes, and is a memorial to the many horses that passed through the depot. 

Images of horses are also engraved on this rather rustic bench. 

During our wander in Daisy Field we saw our first Meadow Brown of the summer ...

... plus, crow garlic ... 

... common knapweed ... 

... this umbellifer which was new to me, and is the strangely-named corky-fruited water dropwort ...

... and comfrey, but sad to say, no bee orchids that I spotted. 

We then headed down Station Road to the Lamplighters pub and the river, with its muddy view across to Pill, which is one of my favourite places in Bristol. 

Pill

Looking up to the M5 bridge over the Avon

The tide was pretty low, exposing the salt marsh that gives the area its name and the rather more famous mud that characterises the tidal stretches of the Avon and Severn. 

viper's bugloss

wild carrot

hemlock

It was even warmer a couple of afternoons later, so we headed for the relative cool of Badock's Wood. 

by the round barrow

The lower part of the badger sett in the mini gorge hollowed by the River Trym

This upper part of the Trym runs pretty dry in the summer, but it was still nice to see Cwtch approach it on her own and with confidence after all the hard work water-walking we put in over the winter.

lovely magpie feather

A little sit-down on the bench that always reminds me of my late parents and my late collie, Ted

Walking back to the car through the upper part of the wood

some hoggin

Poems in a Garden and the Graveyard Shift

One of the most enjoyable things about poetting in the summer months are the beautiful places you get to read in, such as the Polygon communal garden. This was thanks to Lizzie, the proprietor of Heron Books, who arranged an invitation for me and fellow Bristol poets, Bob Walton and Jo Eades, to share our poems there during the Clifton and Hotwells Open Gardens weekend.

The garden was reclaimed by residents from longtime neglect, overrun by brambles and bindweed, but although it now looks rather gracious, there's a wild patch and a mini-meadow. And poetry!   

The audience looks a bit sparse in this photo, but there were actually more than thirty people spread out through the garden. (We were glad of Bob's mic.)

The last poetry walk the IsamBards held before lockdown was one around Arnos Vale in March 2020. We've often mentioned it as a favourite between ourselves, but it's taken us more than four years to organise a rerun - or rather, re-amble. 

The forecast was dodgy all week, but improved the closer we got to the appointed hour, and by the time we'd parked in the street next to the top gate and wandered down to the East Lodge  through sumptuous summer overgrowth, it was fine, if a little breezy. 

One of the especially enjoyable things about poetry walks in Arnos Vale is that the poems are interspersed with information from one of the guides, in this instance Alix, an English teacher at nearby St Mary Redcliffe School. 

Our first stop was the memorial to the stillborn, who, in previous decades, had been buried without ceremony or respect and often even the knowledge of their parents. I read my pantoum 'Small Lives', which is dedicated to my late godmother, Betty, and her son, Richard, who was stillborn in Bristol in the mid-1950s and who might well be buried here at Arnos Vale. Aways an emotional one for me to get through, especially in conjunction with poems by my fellow IsamBards that remember similar losses.

Pameli reading at the Matthews' tomb

mackerel skies

After the performing was done, there was cappucino and cake in the cafe, followed by a wander back up the path to the car. 

Forsooth, shut up now poets, it's time to go, says Cwtch.

My final poetry outing for June (so far) consists of three poems from my forthcoming collection, 'Love the Albatross', newly posted on the website iamb ~ poetry seen and heard, in written form and recorded. Thanks very much to Mark Owen for including them. You can read/hear them here.

The Poor Magpies of Lyde Green Common

Less than two months since the first time we walked there, two return trips to Lyde Green Common, and what a transformation, from mud, bare trees and blackthorn to honeysuckle, flag irises and masses of hemlock water dropwort.  

We walked further down the road this time, rather than squeeze through the gap in the hedge, and saw this sad sight. Poor magpie. 

This time we followed the route of the 19th century railway for carrying coal from the pits east of Bristol to the docks - known locally as the Dramway - under the motorway and alongside a couple of fields at Henfield. I'd like to walk the length of it sometime, from Coalpit Heath to the River Avon. 

A roe deer - middle distance, by a clump of nettles ...

 

... in addition to which we also saw plenty of swallows zipping over hedges and a pair of buzzards spiralling, all of which were even less obliging than the deer. I did, however, pick up no less than seven beautiful buzzard feathers. What a great start of the season of falling feathers.

It was a very different walking experience ten days later when we set out again for Henfield. On the way to Lyde Green the skies emptied but cleared again the moment we arrived, and we set out over the fields full of gladness.

Not my first Meadow Brown this year, but the first one I've managed to photograph

No buzzard feathers this time; only the feathery remains of their meal - another poor magpie bites the dust. 

When we were at the furthest point from my son's house, the clouds came rolling in and it started to rain. And thunder. Cwtch set off back towards the car and safety at a very smart pace indeed. 

There even looked like there might be a teensy tornado at one point. 

It was a shivery drive home but I'd had a lovely walk with my dog and my boy, even if we were all drenched, and I'd found a nice bit of hoggin too, so as not to forget.