It being half term, I decided to visit a couple of places in Bristol I'd never been to before. It's not hard to find such places in South Bristol,where I only really venture for poetry events or to walk the dog at Ashton Court or Arnos Vale cemetery, and Brislington Brook as it meanders through Nightingale Valley and St Anne's Woods on its way to the River Avon had been on my list of local places to visit for years.
It was a lovely sunny morning and Cwtch was basking in the delight of being somewhere new.
harlequin ladybird
Brislington brook rises on the northern slope of Maes Knoll, a few miles to the south. It never gets as big as its north Bristol cousins, the Rivers Frome and Trym, all of which eventually decant their waters into the River Avon, but its valley is a lovely spot.
A communication line of tree roots
Where Nightingale Valley assumes the name of St Anne's Woods, I paused on the railway bridge to look at the goods train beneath it. The railway was built in 1840 by Brunel and splits the valley in two. The line ends at Paddington.
After negotiating Newbridge Road, we entered the woods again. There was earlier traffic here, of a different variety: namely, that of pilgrims, coming to visit the chapel and sacred well dedicated to Anne, the patron saint of sailors.
Of the chapel, with its thirty-two model ships left as offerings, there's no sign, though it was once important enough to be the subject of a visit by King Henry VII. Ironically, its demise was instigated by his son during the Reformation.
The well's still there, though, surrounded by railings, though there was only a drop of water in there when we visited, and signs that someone tried to use it as a barbecue pit during the long hot summer. A nearby tree had some faded clouties tied to it.
Of the chapel, with its thirty-two model ships left as offerings, there's no sign, though it was once important enough to be the subject of a visit by King Henry VII. Ironically, its demise was instigated by his son during the Reformation.
The well's still there, though, surrounded by railings, though there was only a drop of water in there when we visited, and signs that someone tried to use it as a barbecue pit during the long hot summer. A nearby tree had some faded clouties tied to it.
On our way back up towards the upper stretch of Nightingale Valley, I saw my father on the bridge over the railway. At
first, he was looking down at the train beneath it; then he started pacing up
and down as if he was waiting for someone - neither activity particularly
odd, except that he died nearly eight years ago.
The thought occurred to me
that maybe the person he was waiting for was me, so I held back until he
disappeared down a side street. Getting close enough to see it wasn’t my father
would have been weird; getting close enough to see it was, something else altogether.
a one-legged apple tree
the packhorse bridge
There are several impressive trees in these woods, but none so strange as this London plane, the hollow trunk of which was bricked up, apparently to stop people lighting fires inside it.
My second new place to visit was Royate Hill nature reserve in Eastville, which lies north of the River Avon. Our walk, though, started somewhere familiar, namely, Greenbank cemetery in Easton, which was brilliant with foliage despite the overcast weather.
Three headstones, close each other and with angels as security, commemorating children who died between the ages of 12 and 18 in the 1930s and 40s
Just alongside an entrance at the northern edge of the cemetery, there's a flight of steps that leads up to the disused viaduct that's now part of Royate Hill nature reserve.
I remember the painful birth of this place thirty-plus years ago. It was saved from redevelopment in 1991 and listed as a Site of Nature Conservation Importance, only for the owner, who wanted to build houses there, to send in the bulldozers at 6am on a Bank Holiday Saturday the following spring. Local protestors arrived within minutes, but it took took hours for the council to get an injunction, by which time a third of the five-acre site had been destroyed.
The developer didn't get his way, thankfully, and it's now a lovely and very unusual place to wander.
The developer didn't get his way, thankfully, and it's now a lovely and very unusual place to wander.
view of Clifton in the distance
jelly ear fungi
Much of this section of the walk took us through allotments, bright with foliage, late-blooming flowers and plastic.
a piece of hoggin in situ
Our return route took us under the viaduct and back into Greenbank cemetery.
I was quite intrigued by this modest stone dating from 1982, propped up against - and partially obscuring - the older, grander one, especially since the surnames are all different.
It was exhilarating to visit a couple of new places, and I'd like to say I'll try to keep it up once a month through the winter, but the season of mud will be setting in presently, so maybe I'll end up sticking (ha!) to ground I can be sure of. We'll see.
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