Aylsham, Norfolk...

Wound up in Aylsham this evening, parked up in the little market square. Not a good day for weather - it's been wet and squally - but some good pic sales have cheered me up...

Village cricket...

I watched the second innings of a cricket match yesterday. The cricket grounds in some villages are hidden away down some track, but at Hartley Wintney the ground takes centre stage… like the jewel in a pendant. The ground is huge. One of the batsmen gave the ball a mighty hit over square leg, only to see it stop before it reached the boundary. He called his partner to run; in the time it took for a rather tubby fielder to retrieve the ball and throw it back to the keeper, the batsmen had run four.

There were plenty of spectators. If they weren’t all watching the cricket very intently, the game at least supplied a good excuse for lolling around in deck chairs, sharing village gossip and drinking a glass or two of prosecco. I bought a beer in the clubhouse, and watched Hartley Wintney Second XI notch up a good win: scoring the required 231 runs with seven overs to spare...

Lost...

Back in Hartley Wintney, staying with sister Kari. We drove down to Selborne this morning, and walked along the Lythes; then we walked through the woods that the Rev Gilbert White knew so well; then we got thoroughly lost. A short walk became a gruelling route-march, but at least we found the Red Lion at Oakhanger for lunch…

While we still knew where we were going...

M25...

I made an early start this morning, hoping to negotiate the north-west quadrant of the M25 - London’s orbital car park - before the worst of the traffic. But even at 6.30am it was gridlocked. There may have been an accident, or, God forbid, it may be like this every morning.

Birds seen (or heard) in East Anglia these past three weeks: great grested grebe, little grebe, fulmar, cormorant, heron, little egret, bittern, mute swan, pink-footed goose, brent goose, canada goose, shelduck, mallard, gargany, gadwall, pochard, shoveler, tufted duck, teal, kite, buzzard, marsh harrier, kestrel, hobby, red-legged partridge, pheasant, moorhen, coot, avocet, oystercatcher, ringed plover, little ringed plover, grey plover, turnstone, lapwing, dunlin, knot, redshank, common sandpiper, curlew, bar-tailed godwit, black-headed gull, herring gull, lesser black-backed gull, greater black-backed gull, common gull, kittiwake, sandwich tern, arctic tern, little tern, woodpigeon, stock dove, collared dove, cuckoo, swift, green woodpecker, great spotted woodpecker, kingfisher, skylark, swallow, house martin, sand martin, meadow pipit, pied wagtail, dunnock, reed warbler, sedge warbler, cetti’s warbler, whitethroat, blackcap, dartford warbler, willow warbler, chiffchaff, garden warbler, goldcrest, stonechat, wheatear, robin, nightingale, blackbird, song thrush, mistle thrush, bearded tit, great tit, blue tit, marsh tit, long-tailed tit, wren, yellowhammer, reed bunting, chaffinch, goldfinch, greenfinch, linnet, house sparrow, starling, jay, magpie, rook, carrion crow, jackdaw (101).

Dartford warbler, Cetti's Warbler and little ringed plover are new species for me, and the gap between hearing nightingales this spring and the previous occasion is - gulp - fifty years...

Cow and calf, Lakenheath...

Lakenheath...

Before I came down to East Anglia, I had an image in my mind: marsh harriers flying over reedbeds at dusk, bathed in a golden glow. Well, it hasn’t been quite like that… until I spend a few hours at Strumpshaw Fen, an RSPB reserve near Brundall in Norfolk. The harriers drifted across the reedbeds - this way and that - and I saw the male drop food to the female in flight. A kingfisher hovered a few feet in front of me, as I sat in a hide - a blurred silhouette rather than the usual flash of blue - before diving headlong into the water. A great crested grebe carried young on her back, while her partner brought food (I’m making assumptions about gender, based on behaviour rather than plumage; male and female look alike).

At every reserve there’s been something of interest to see. This morning, at Lakenheath, another RSPB reserve, I saw a bittern in flight, hobbies hawking for insects - they catch them with their feet - and a gargany duck. There were marsh harriers too; I’ve seen them at every wetland reserve. That’s remarkable, considering they were almost extinct thirty years ago…

Lakenheath...

Gawd bless you, ma'am...

An event I'll miss, alas...

Is everything OK?

Oh, God, a young man just sidled up my my table in McDonalds and asked, in all seriousness, “Is everything alright with your meal, sir?” I was so surprised that I blurted out “Yes”, before I could frame a more logical response, such as “Well, it’s probably as good as I can expect for a meal that I’m eating off a tray”. I’m sitting at a table that’s screwed to the floor, in a ‘restaurant’ decorated in primary colours, and the last thing I want is a solicitous enquiry about the food. I eat fast, like a dog, because the whole experience is shameful. When the food is prepared on a production line, I’d rather not be asked for my opinion. I come for the loos, the free wifi… and reluctantly stay for the food…

Walberswick...

Ideal place to stay...

Ferry...

The Ferry across the River Yare at Reedham...

Dartford Warbler...

Had a busy couple of days, watching birds and taking pix. I visited Dunwich Heath, overlooking Minsmere, and was lucky enough to see a dartford warbler (that’s a first for me). It was unmistakable, as it posed on a gorse bush. I had a walk across Westleton Heath early next morning, and was lucky again: a nightingale gave me a solo performance.

This morning I took pix at Beccles and Oulton Broad: already edited and uploaded. I’ve just driven to a village called Reedham, on the River Yare, little realising that I had to take a ferry - which accomodated just two cars - across the river. At the other side is a pub - the Ferry Inn, naturally - where I’m having a beer. Having taken so many pix these past few days, I’m feeling rather disorientated…

Westleton Heath... with invisible nightingale...

Family of swans at Carlton Marshes...

Signs...

I’m rather taken by the village signs down here. Maybe we could do something similar up north. Bradford’s sign could feature a curry house and a kerb-crawler…

Fingringhoe Wick...

I had another half-day at Fingringhoe Wick nature reserve. The nightingales were still singing. I walked around the reserve in a daze, listening to sedge warblers, reed warblers, blackcaps, whitethroats, willow warblers and chiffchaffs. It reminded me of how I used to experience birds - more than half a century ago - in Bramhope, north of Leeds. Though it was really just a ‘dormitory suburb’, our house was the last but one before the countryside began. I could wander "up the fields”, past the farm to the bluebell woods; the old part of the village even had a duck pond. Nearby was Golden Acre Park, with a lake, old quarry, deciduous woodland and scrubland with gorse bushes. With such a variety of habitats on my doorstep, it’s no wonder I saw so many birds.

Fingringhoe Wick reminded me of these places. It was also a vivid reminder of how I felt, all those years ago, and what first piqued my interest in birds. I’ll happily watch ducks and geese from a hide, or scour the sea for gannets and shearwaters. But what I love best are the birds of woodland, scrub and heath - stonechats, wheatears, woodpeckers, redstarts, yellowhammers, flycatchers, warblers, etc. These were the birds I grew up with: the same birds that are found - in much greater profusion - at Fingringhoe Wick.

To see and hear them you have to walk quietly and stand still. All you may see, at first, is a sense of movement; all you may hear, at first, is a snatch of song. You have to recalibrate your senses, and become attuned to the rhythms of the woodland. Gradually, you pick out small brown birds as they move from branch to branch, mostly hidden by leaves. A few birds will break cover. A whitethroat sings from a the top of a hedge; a flycatcher flies up, for a few seconds, and returns to the same perch; a wheatear flies a few yards ahead of you, in the direction you’re walking, seemingly beckoning you to follow. Close observation is rewarded. The birds don’t suddenly appear; what changes is your awareness of them. The mind is quieter, the heartbeat slower; you don’t become the woodland, or the birds, or any nonsense like that. But the space between you and the woods, you and the birds, contracts. You’re looking - without any effort - and that makes all the difference…

Long Melford...

Found in Holy Trinity Church, Long Melford…
“In 1436 William Clopton, Lord of Toppesfield Manor, granted a guildhall and land for a market to the town of Hadleigh, the rent to be one red rose per annum. Each year the payment of a red rose is made by the Mayor of Hadleigh, who places the rose on the tomb of Sir William Clopton. It is considered to be the oldest rent still paid anywhere in the United Kingdom”…

Walton-on-the-Naze...

In Walton-on-the-Nave this evening, uploading 100+ pix. I’ve rejected the jellied eel option for my evening meal, in favour of fish & chips…

Lavenham...

Cavendish...

Busy photographing pretty Suffolk villages, and uploading them. I’m on a roll. But it’s a bit like eating a whole box of chocolates at one go; I’m feeling slightly nauseous. Maybe I need a few wet days in Cleckhuddersfax to recalibrate my senses…

Cavendish...

This is probably the version that will sell the best...

Lavenham...

Driving from Hadleigh to Lavenham this morning, a man flagged me down. I stopped; “Give it a minute”, he said. Another man appeared, marshalling a duck and her ducklings safely across the road. What a great way to start the day…

Lavenham is picture postcard pretty, especially early on, before the cars had filled up every available parking space. I got touristy shots of some of the half-timbered houses (there are about 300 in the town, I was told), and then carried on doing more pix… showing how traffic can bring the place to a standstill… how we now do our shopping, with supermarket delivery vans scooting around… how these old buildings are being renovated… etc. There are so many types of pix to be shot in a place like this, on a day like this: everyday life in a small market town…

Tony Cozier...

Sad to hear that Tony Cozier - the voice of West Indian cricket - has died. Since the 1960s he’d been in the commentary box whenever England played the West Indies, so his was the voice we heard when the great West Indies fast bowlers were knocking us over. It was quite a shock, just a couple of years ago, to see him on TV rather than radio. I’d obviously created a visual image, to match that Bajan lilt, but Tony Cozier wasn’t black… he was white…

Wivenhoe...

Tollesbury...

With yesterday being so wet, I took the opportunity of staying over in a campsite. This one was a bit different - at Tollesbury Marina in Essex - because my ‘neighbours’ were boats rather than other motorhomes. I keyworded 200 pix - phew - and edited a few more: a boring but necessary job…

Nightingales...

I’d heard my first nightingale even before I reached the car park at Fingringhoe Wick, one of Essex Wildlife Trust’s nature reserves, near Colchester. There’s no entrance fee, just a £2 optional donation; I paid up, got a little map of the reserve and had a wander.

I was halfway to Laurie’s Hide when another nightingale started to sing. Nightingales don’t sing from the top of a tree, like a mistle thrush or a yellowhammer; they sing from the middle of dense scrubland. Despite that, the bird was able to project its song with incredible power, effortlessly dominating the scratchy song of a whitethroat and a flock of bickering gulls on the estuary. It stopped me in my tracks.

The song is complex, full of stops and starts. Breathy notes, barely audible, are followed by loud trills and crescendos, which seem to come from more than one source simultaneously. It fills the air and feels like a concert, a performance, an event; no wonder the poets rhapsodise.

Fingringhoe Wick is my kind of reserve: lots of different habitats - heath, scrub, woodland, saltmarsh and small freshwater lakes - in a compact area. A web of paths - between impenetrable patches of scrubland - makes it easy to explore the reserve ( but without the map I would have got lost). There are hides overlooking patches of water (including one that was more like a conservatory, with a big ‘picture window and a row of armchairs!). One of the hides is called the Nightingale Hide, though I heard nightingales all over the reserve. Anyway, nightingales are elusive rather than shy. I stood maybe six feet away from a singing male, with my presence doing nothing to disturb it.

Though I didn’t actually see or hear a lot of species, I lost myself in the woods, listening to whitethroats, blackcaps, sedge warblers, jays and woodpeckers. I saw people sitting on benches, captivated by birdsong. It was a magical morning. I watched a pair of coots on the water, ‘running’ across the surface in pursuit of each other: a mating ritual, I imagine. Little grebes - dabchicks - dived every few seconds; they could ‘scoot’ across the water, at speed, like some wind-up bath toy! I’ll call in again, in a couple of days, to hear the nightingales sing at dusk, when most of the other birds have stopped.


Listen to a nightingale...

Fingringhoe Wick...

Dick Turpin's Cottage...

Stopped on my way through Thaxted, Essex, to take pix… including this Porsche Boxter parked in front of Dick Turpin’s Cottage (that’s more horse-power than the highwayman ever knew)…

Nightingale Wood...

Busy taking, editing and uploading pix. I’ve sorted out an itinerary for the next few days, including bluebell woods and nature reserves. Still drawing a blank on nightingales, except for listening to a two-part drama on the radio: Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons (who’s best known for Cold Comfort Farm). Her dialogue is wonderfully waspish. In one scene two characters are talking while a nightingale is singing in the background!

Pollarded tree and River Stour...

The river, a few minutes later, looking the other way... and an obliging mallard...

Flatford...

Stayed in Maningtree last night, next to a pub where they were showing the Liverpool game. Man City capitulated meekly, the previous night, against Real Madrid, but Liverpool went one better: beating Villarreal and setting up a Europa League final against Seville. Liverpool ‘went for it’ from the moment the ref blew his whistle, and never let Villarreal settle.

This morning I took pix around Flatford Mill. The National Trust have tried to keep the view much as Constable saw it, when he painted the Hay Wain. Willy Lott’s House is still there, and the River Stour; what Constable wouldn’t have seen is a National Trust shop selling expensive tat. It’s a pleasant spot, especially early in the morning, before people have arrived. I may go back in early evening, when the sun will have moved round…

Paths converge on Flatford...

Willy Lott's Cottage...

The cottage... at twilight...

Acoustics...

Had another very enjoyable day at Minsmere yesterday. It wasn’t really a whole day, but I was settled into the Bittern Hide by 7am, so it just felt like a whole day. I enjoyed the first two hours best, when you could feel you had the reserve to yourself. Actually, I felt like an intruder. There were things going on around the salt-flats that didn’t really need an audience.

I spent a bit of time away from the wetlands, spotting blackcaps and whitethroats in full song. Birdsong, in May, seems amplified: not an echo, but a doubling of effort and result. The acoustics have changed somehow; it’s like hearing birdsong in the vaulted space of a cathedral, instead of an oak woodland. I saw - and heard - sedge warblers, perched on a single reed-stem and swaying in the breeze. Reed Buntings too… and stonechats… and linnets… and wheatears. But no nightingales…

Minsmere...

Scallop sculpture on the beach at Aldeburgh...

Minsmere...

Arriving at Minsmere in late afternoon, I left the camera behind and had a walk around the reserve with my monocular, spending a bit of time in each of the hides. I couldn’t believe the number of avocets; I must have seen a hundred from just one hide. They’re nesting on the islands. Last year 58 nestlings survived at Minsmere; maybe 2016 will be even better. The birds are fantastic to watch… whether they’re wading, swimming, sitting on eggs or just tear-arsing around the reserve in excitable groups.

Birds spotted this evening include little egret, barnacle goose, shelduck, mallard, gadwall, teal, shoveler, tufted duck, coot, moorhen, oystercatcher, avocet, ringed plover, lapwing, redshank, common sandpiper, curlew, bar-tailed godwit, kittiwake (and other gulls), common tern and sandwich tern (they were pointed out to me). No harriers, or any other birds of prey. Heard a bittern ‘booming’, and sedge warblers calling from the reedbeds. A stonechat sang from gorse bushes.

Staying in Aldeburgh this evening, and will be back to Minsmere tomorrow… with monocular and camera. I’ll hope to spot a stone curlew (they’ve been seen this week).

No nightingales...

Nightingales...

I'm not the only one on a quest to find nightingales this spring.

I slept on Salthouse Heath two nights ago, which represented my first attempt to find nightingales on my tour of Norfolk and Suffolk. The only time I heard nightingales (in England) was here, in a tent, while on a school trip. If there was one nightingale singing that night, there must have been a dozen, and they kept us awake.

My sleep was uninterrupted by nightingales two nights ago, though I met a guy in the morning, with binoculars, who was looking - and listening - for nightingales too. Salthouse Heath remains one of the few places where it's possible to see them... but he'd had no more luck than me...

The wetlands at Titchmarsh RSPB reserve in North Norfolk...

Top of the league...

So Leicester have won the Premier League - demonstrating, against all the odds, that a band of brothers can beat an army of over-paid mercenaries, with egos to match their salaries. It gives hope to those who like football, but who don’t like the idea that only those with deep pockets can compete at the top level. If money is all that matters, then the FA should have bowed to the inevitable and published league tables which ranked clubs in order of their share price.

Everyone (except Spurs fans) seems to be enjoying this unlikely overturning of our footballing universe. It’s like one team has suddenly found a way to defy gravity. Will Leicester sink like a stone next season? Who knows? If the pundits could really see into the future, they would have had a bet on Leicester at the beginning of the season. Anyone who wagered £200 on Leicester to win the league, when the odds were 5,000-1, would now have a million pounds to bank. But no-one saw it coming… which makes the story even better…

Holkham Beach...