New Year Sky

For new year I was in Edinburgh, and though that city is renowned for it’s phenomenal Hogmanay street party, we were there for a relatively quiet time visiting old friends. On New Years Eve morning we peeped out of our bedroom window to find the sky filled with whirling snow – a sight that we are now very familiar with in the UK, but last decade it was still exciting and new.  Despite my love of snow I was hoping that the sky would clear by nightfall as New Year this time around fell not only on a full moon but a blue moon, and as if that were not enough, it was going to be a partial eclipse as well. As the sky began to darken the signs were good – the clouds began to lift, and the early sunset was spectacular as they did so. We set out for a walk.

We wandered through canyons of stone tenements, the chimney tops catching the last salmon pink rays of sun; the air sharpened and pinched at our cheeks and noses. As darkness fell and we wandered along Princes Street it was preparing for a night of outdoor revelry with lights, a funfair and the din of sound checks as the stages were set up ready for the show. And above it all glowered the castle, perched high above the city on it’s snow dusted crag.

The trees that pour down the volcanic slopes on which the castle sits were dressed in lights, and as they twinkled it would not have seemed odd to me if one or more had pulled up it’s roots and begun to stride down the hillside.

But the snow wasn’t done with us yet – the wispy cloud that seemed so thin began dumping huge wet snowflakes on us as we drew level with the funfair, and my friends decided it was time to wander back. It wasn’t such  a terrible wrench – soon the huge crowds would come and I’m not so good at dealing with those, plus there were good things to eat and drink and more friends to see back at the flat. And there was still my hope of seeing that special moon. We’d agreed that when midnight came we’d all be standing on the roof no matter how cold, and I have to admit I had a couple of secret peeks out there on my own before that.  So the time came and one by one we clambered up the ladder and onto an icy, treacherous roof with our glasses and bubbly and big coats and wooly hats, clinging to the chimney pots for warmth and safety. I did see the moon and lovely it was, but I missed the eclipse despite determinedly checking for it all night long. Here’s what we did see though – the fireworks from the castle lighting up the sky.

I hope you all had a good new year,  and that this year will bring your hopes a little closer.

For more beautiful and fascinating images of the sky around the world, visit Skywatch Friday!

To Land’s End… and beyond!

It’s been so busy here with orders and commissions, and as a result I know I’ve been neglectful of my blogging friends – taking an age to reply to comments and not keeping up with my blog reading.  I wish I could say this slovenly state of affairs will improve but in fact they’ll be taking a nosedive as of tomorrow – because I’m going away for three weeks and will have absolutely no internet access in that time. I can’t deny it, I’m thrilled skinny!

First off R and I will be going to Cornwall, camping near St Just on the Land’s End Peninsula. There are many rare wild flowers and insects to be found in the area as well as some great walking and beaches as good as you’ll find anywhere.

After a couple of days exploring this lovely place we’ll be catching the Scillonian III from Penzance to The Isles of Scilly (pronounced “silly”) where we’ll be camping on the beautiful Island of St Agnes, by far and away my favourite of these enchanted islands. A haunt of rare migratory birds (though we’ll be too early for most of those) and carpeted with wildflowers, St Agnes also has the best snorkelling and rockpooling I’ve ever done in the UK – here’s hoping that the sea will be calm and the water clear! And not least because that ferry journey is never anything less than rough… although it’s worth it for the sightings of dolphins, basking sharks and the heart stopping flight of hunting gannets. You can fly across to the islands, but watching dolphins play on the bow wave of the ship and rare birds gliding alongside it is a lot more fun.

So I’m dragging out the field guides, polishing up the binoculars and getting all nerdy at the thought of all that wildlife. I need to take a notebook too, because there will be a lot to remember. And a lot of shells to collect for jewellery making purposes. Oh, and there will be a lot of cream teas to eat, but that’s another story.

Then it’s back home on the ferry and the sleeper train – arriving in London at 7.00 am – and a day in which to unpack, do laundry and make a fancy dress astronaut costume, repack and then catch another train and another ferry to Bestival on the Isle Of Wight! I have to admit I’m a little bit daunted by that bit, but I’ve never failed to have fun at Bestival so it has got to be worth it.

For the Cornish part of my travels I might be able to Twitter, but as we get further from the mainland on the ferry journey to Scilly the phone signal will start to fade out and I probably won’t have any reception at all once we reach the islands. So it will be a genuine break for me – in a place where technology cannot follow. I can hardly wait.

PS:- It’s possible that if you leave comments after Friday morning they will not show up for a very long time, as I will not have a chance to moderate them. I do love geting comments though, so if you leave some for me anyway it will be a lovely thing for me to come home to.

Scillonian Sky

Where is this tropical seascape with it’s turquoise water and brilliant sky? You may be surprised to learn that it is a mere 30 miles or so off the UK coast, and I took this photo while leaning over the rails of the Scillonian III, the ferry boat which plies it’s trade between Penzance and one of my favourite places in the whole world – the Isles of Scilly. I’ll be there early in September, so you can expect some pictures of my adventures there at some point – but as to the skies we’ll see… I’ll have to trust to the weather!

For more beautiful and fascinating images of the sky around the world, visit Skywatch Friday!

Summer on the wing

At the risk of being corny, I’m amazed at how time flies. Two weekends ago (it seems a lot longer somehow) I spent a perfect summer afternoon investigating a small bramble hedge in the middle of Hampshire. Who knows how long I spent there; I was utterly absorbed, but I do know that I could barely see past the butterflies. There were clouds of them! I was astonished at how intently they foraged, as many fiercely territorial species sat calmly together and drank deeply from the bramble flowers. Perhaps it was the heat, perhaps it was the end of the breeding season; maybe it was just that they were getting drunk on good nectar, but I’ve never had so many butterflies sit so patiently for me.

First up was Polygonia c-album, or the Comma, a lovely amber coloured creature with attractively raggedy wings. Wondering how it got that name? Look at the bright marking on the underwing in the picture below – you should be able to tell!

At first I thought this Argynnis paphia, or Silver Washed Fritillary was a Comma too, but its larger size and calligraphic markings gave it away. Although this particular individual is very much past its best you can still see what an impressive and beautiful creature it is.

Let’s take a closer look at its wonderful green and orange furred body and spotted eyes

A little further along I found a Pyronia tithonus, or Gatekeeper – these sprightly butterflies were very active and though I saw many in the hedgerow this was the only one that would sit for me. I think it’s a female.

Time passed, and I realised that most butterflies had drunk their fill and moved on. I stalked the perimeter of the field and found nothing else that would sit still for me. Time to try the garden (we were staying at R’s parents house) which has many plants beloved of butterflies. Sure enough, there was an Aglais urticae, or Small Tortoiseshell on the lavender.

And the Gonepteryx rhamni, or Brimstone butterfly looked well on this striking blue flowered shrub. They particularly liked this plant, which seemed quite poetic given how the fizzy yellow of the butterfly looked against the improbably blue flower.

I had been anxiously hoping to find some Inachis io, or Peacock butterflies, having seen a colony of their caterpillars on nettles much earlier in the summer. They couldn’t all have been killed, surely? It seemed wrong that I hadn’t found an adult yet. Then, on a trespassing bramble I saw this…

What a showstopper! It was worth a bit of mild anxiety just to see this glorious insect – a male, fresh and glossy and presumably just emerged from its pupa.  I intend to write a little more about peacock butterflies, but I’ll leave that till another time.

What do we know

I saw so much that day, but it’s the ephemeral things that I can’t get out of my head.

Pine tree tops
In the blue night
frost haze, the sky glows
with the moon
pine tree tops
bend snow-blue, fade
into sky, frost, starlight.
The creak of boots.
Rabbit tracks, deer tracks,
what do we know.

                   Gary Snyder

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