The previous clay modelling post in May: Modelling with Garden Clay. I once again visited family in Hampshire, and this time took extra care when digging the hole for clay. In my previous attempt I contaminated the clay with soil and so went through a process of washing it. This time I kept it as clean as possible and so didn’t…
I discovered this Warwickshire Wildlife Trust (WWT) nature reserve whilst on the hunt for a good source of blackberries. I’ve been going through a bit of a apple crumble phase and the one thing that improves apple crumble is a handful of blackberries. Over the summer I’ve been trying to see as many of the WWT reserves as possible and…
We started at Eylie in the Biros Valley for our second wild camping walk in the Pyrenees. The day before consisted of close monitoring of the weather forecast to ensure that it was worth while climbing up into the mountains. The next day was forecast drizzle but the day after it said “a glorious sunny day”. We decided it was…
I recently visited Swithland Wood SSSI (a nature reserve designated as being of particularly special scientific interest) on the way back to Warwick from a work trip. I put the route into Google maps and hunted along it for a good stretch of woodland to spend a couple of hours walking. After 10 minutes I found Bradgate Park country park,…
As well as the two wild camping trips higher in the Pyrenees mountains, we also had five or so day walks to recover and shelter from bad weather. The weather this year was unusually bad compared to what we normally have over the summer. Walk 1 – Precipitous Backpacking Walk 2 – Into the Spanish Pyrenees Castillon-en-Couserans The weather was…
The first stage of my Pyrenees hiking trip was to get from England to France, and then into the mountains. I landed in Toulouse at 21.30 and spent the night at a hotel close to the airport. The next day we went to collect the hire car which my dad and I would share driving. The process went smoothly until…
I recently visited my sister near Dusseldorf in Germany, they were busy one afternoon so I grabbed my camera and walked to the nearby Stinderbachtal nature reserve. The aim of the trip was to test out my new Neewer macro extension tubes for the Sony A6000 camera. I’ve only had it for a couple of weeks so an afternoon of…
In the words of this person I sent a message to about their lens: “It’s an absolute minefield!” Overview When summer began here in Warwick I started to notice so many more insects about. Maybe because it was summer, but also because I installed an app called iNaturalist that can identify anything which led to trying to identify everything. I’ve…
Hampton wood was the first Warwickshire Nature Reserve I cycled to and is one of my favourites. It has over 25 species of butterfly and a mix of different environments which range from woodland to riverside to meadows, and the reserve is only 12 hectares! Unfortuantely the only time I’ve visisted so far is in Summer, so the other seasons…
After climbing Ben Nevis, our next destination was the Cairngorms. We wanted time to dry out so we stayed Aviemore youth hostel for the first night. I shared with three other people in a dormitory. They were mostly fine to share with other than the one who thought it was acceptable to snooze his alarm twice between 6.30 and 7.…