Trade Winds

I have been following the Vendee Globe, the single-handed, round-the-world non-stop with no assistance yacht race which is ending now with 21 of the 33 starters safely back in port, four still working their way up the Atlantic and the remaining eight retired, though two of them will make it to the end. It's been fascinating, as video uploads have enabled armchair watchers like me to share the experience some of the extreme stresses of 80 or more days at sea in some of the worst conditions one can imagine.

While the technology of these boats is mind-blowing - some of the fastest sit up on hydrofoils when they're at full speed - and watching the skippers has been fascinating, particularly when they have been up against severe technological problems in rough conditions with absolutely no-one to help them, what I have most enjoyed has been sitting with them in the open deck of their boats watching the sea go by - the photo of an albatross is by one of the young competitors, Alexia Barrier.

There is something wonderfully peaceful about the feeling of being alone in an immense ocean, particularly on a fine day with the trade winds blowing. This picture of Elizabeth and Mrs MW was taken on the Amersfoort on our way to Jamaica in 1973 on just such a day.

I would love to cross an ocean again, mostly to experience trade wind days like these but also the excitement of arriving, something which the participants of the Vendee are now richly enjoying.

That Lucky Snap - 5

This photo was taken about an hour after dawn along a narrow, unremarkable beach at a small hotel called Lazy Lagoon just to the north of Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania. When I took it - and I was taking masses of pictures each sunrise as it is one of my favourite times of day in the tropics - I didn't think it would be anything special, but there's something about it that makes it stand out. As with so many pictures, it's difficult to put one's finger on exactly what this is.

First, there's the small detail. The boat on the horizon is as example. It's a working cargo dhow called a jahazi, and it's perfectly positioned in the centre of the picture. To its right, and quite difficult to see, is another boat, a small dugout canoe used for inshore fishing called an ngalowa, and one can just see the fisherman standing in it.

Secondly, there are the textures and patterns in the sky, wet beach and sea, all drawn together by the same colours, and contrasted against the rather forbidding black of the land, which is saved from being too fierce by the silhouettes of the palms against the sky.

Then there's the colour, because there really is only one colour, with shades. The resulting skyscape isn't at all usual for a Tanzania beach sunrise. There's something angry about it, something portentous, as if a great storm is coming - yet no storm came.

In the end, it isn't one thing that makes the sort of picture I like, it's a combination of factors and, I suppose, a fortunate composition of them - added to the fact that it brings back many happy memories of Tanzania's coral coast.

The Estwing Hammer

With the ice inches thick on the birdbaths during the last week I've been using this hammer to break it. It's a sad, sad use for a machine of which I was once immensely proud and not a built guilt-ridden, for this is an Estwing hammer, in its time and, as far as I can see, still THE hammer that any self-respecting geologist would wish to own.

Not that I would ever have described myself as a 'geologist' but I was a teacher of geology for many years, during which....

....the highlights were always the field trips, this picture of a Plume School 'A' level group in Shropshire in, I think, 1994.

The Estwing was a pleasure to use as well as a safe piece of machinery which didn't, as happened with....

....'ordinary' hammers, snap in vigorous use so their head went flying lethally away. Before I paid a small fortune for the Estwing - which is why I said I felt a bit 'guilt-ridden', as we could, as a family, ill afford it at the time - I owned a hammer like this given to me by Mrs MW. I lost it or, rather, I made the mistake of lending it to a student on a field tip who "left it somewhere".

So I bought the Estwing in the mid-seventies and used it for over thirty years until my interest in lumps of rock turned from hacking at them with a hammer to understanding their archaeological significance.

The Thaw

The thaw has set in. Last night, for the first time in a week, the temperature didn't drop below zero and the snow and packed ice began to melt but, if the temperatures are letting up, the wind certainly isn't. We're 'enjoying' an east to south-easterly today, force 5 gusting towards 7 at a guess, bringing heavy waves against the sea defences and....

....surf onto the beach along the town front, a beach which is usually fairly well protected.  With the thermometer struggling to lift itself above 3C it still feels bitterly cold so, when we walked along the front this morning, we weren't surprised that we hardly saw a soul.

It's been a hard few days for the wildlife.  Some birds, like the blue tits, seem to have survived fairly well but we are still waiting to see how many coal tits come back.  I almost feel sorry for the crows.  In their desperation they've taken to digging through the snow on the green space beside our house to reach the moss, which they tear up in search of food.  Usually it's the rooks that exploit this food source but today it was a mixture rooks and jackdaws, all feeding together quite amicably.

An Icy Glen

 
As well as being a popular walk for local residents, Golspie Glen is one of the town's few notable tourist attractions, EU / Scottish government grants having created a series of paths, walkways and bridges so it is easily accessed. Most visitors start at the bottom end, by the A9, passing under the railway bridge, but today the car park there was empty and the going underfoot treacherous in places.

It's a pity that more people couldn't or weren't able to enjoy it as the glen was certainly at its most spectacular, with snow and ice clothing the banks and the river surface, for we met only a handful of walkers.

The further we walked up the glen the colder it became, intricate icicle structures having formed wherever moisture dripped down the steeper cliff sections.

The main falls were impressive, sunk as they are in a deep canyon into which the coldest air will have been sinking for the past few days.

Last night the temperature dropped to -6C but rose later in the night along with a bitter wind. Fortunately, this didn't penetrate the glen and its miles of woodland, while the sun did, so, with the snow still crisp underfoot, we enjoyed some pleasant walking. The only thing missing was the wildlife. Innumerable tracks criss-crossed the paths, and a few birds, particularly great tis, were singing, but the walk was made by....

....the sight of the first catkins forming on the hazel.

Snowscapes

Under a clear sky and with, mercifully, no wind, last night's temperatures dropped to a new low, although when compared to other places in the Highlands, where they dipped well below -20C, our minimum of -7.9C seems positively balmy.

As a result, the snow is as extensive as yesterday yet it remains pleasantly powdery underfoot and, even where it has been compacted, not too slippery. So we walked gently along the coast following the ancient track northwards, enjoying the stillness, the silence and some....

....stunning views. Although the air temperature was still hovering around zero the sun was warm on our faces, and doubly warm where it was also reflecting off the mirror sea.

As if not to be outdone the wildlife came out to perform for us, with....

....stonechats, robins, dunnocks, blackbirds and various pipits on display and....

....snowdrops shouldering aside the snow to show themselves off.

Along the shoreline we spotted this juvenile black-headed gull, redshanks, oystercatchers, curlews, mallard and....

....three goldeneyes diving amongst a small flotilla of gulls.

Although not visible, there was plenty of evidence of wildlife on land, with innumerable deer and rabbit tracks in both open and wooded areas. However, not all was perfect picture-postcard, for....

....this young roe deer had obviously been caught and killed by someone's dog. It must already have been weakened, perhaps by the cold and lack of food, because normally it sshould have escaped easily.

Redwings

We had more snow last night but, mercifully, not the low temperatures which the BBC had promised, the outside minimum on our thermometer being -3.5C. This picture shows a hill called The Mound on the OS map, just to the southwest of Golspie: surely it must have had a more poetic Gaelic name.

One of the pleasures after new snow is wandering round the garden to see what visitors we've had overnight. Whatever this was, it came into the back garden, made its way along the side of the house, checked out the bird feeding area at the front, and then left the garden by jumping over the front fence. The tracks are too big for a cat and unlikely to be a deer, so my guess is a fox.

There are plenty of these in the local woodland, both in and out of town, at the moment. They're redwings, winter visitors from Scandinavia related to our thrushes. They tend to go round in flocks, sometimes in very large numbers, but ours are in groups of about twenty, often accompanied by incomer blackbirds.

As one might expect of birds accustomed to the heavy snows of their homelands, the redwings seem to be experts at mining under he snow for food. In the flock we watched today each bird had its own 'workings' and was most loath to allow disturbance.

The wind has dropped completely but not the waves, which were splashing over sections of the promenade this morning.  Even in the sunshine the North Sea seems to show a grey and troubled face. Heavy waves and high tide....

....leave the resident redshanks with nothing to do except hang around, resting alternate legs, and wait for the tide to fall.