Shapwick Heath

Tags

Avalon Marshes, Burns the Bread, coot, dendrochronology, heron, Natural England, RSPB, Shapwick Heath, Somerset Levels, Somerset Wildlife Trust, swan, Sweet Track

A few days ago, when the weather wasn’t as bitterly cold as it is now, a London friend came to visit me, and among other things we had a lovely walk on Shapwick Heath, part of the Avalon Marshes, also known as the Somerset Levels. The whole area has been restored for wildlife after a century and more of being worked for peat.  Natural England, the RSPB, and the Somerset Wildlife Trust each manages part of the Marshes.  The visitor is rarely aware of who owns and manages what, and the bodies work together as part of the Avalon Marshes Partnership.

Another feature of the place is the existence of the Sweet Track,  built by people living in the area in 3807 BC or 3806 BC.  How so precisely dated?  By the science of dendrochronology, reading the tree rings of this wood beautifully preserved by the acidic bogs.

We walked for about two miles each way along the River Brue, straightened and canalised as part of the draining of the Levels centuries ago.  To our left was the river, to the right marshland.

Coot

We walked as far as, and examined as best we could, a new hide being built,

opposite this view beyond the Brue

before turning back and along a track

to an old one, called Noah’s Hide.  We stayed there for quite a while, enjoying big landscape views and smaller more intimate sights, bordering on voyeurism once or twice.

We were disappointed that no pair was formed from the three Great crested grebes we saw.  Their courtship dance is wonderful to see, as they bow and weave in perfect mirrored harmony on the water.

When it was time to return to the car and home, we congratulated ourselves on the weather which had certainly been better than forecast, and felt that the exercise we had done amply justified eating the Eccles cakes we had bought from Burns the Bread earlier on in the day.

Singing in Thorverton

Tags

baroque music, Brumel, early music, gravestones, renaissance music, Robert Harre Jones, singing, Tallis, Thorverton, Thorverton Arms, Thorverton Parish Church.

It’s been a while since I posted, so I thought I’d do something on another of my great interests, singing.  Especially when it consists of singing with a group of others (the fewer the better, for my liking), and when the music was written in the renaissance or baroque periods.

Today I made my way to Thorverton, a village in north Devon.  It was bitterly cold outside my car, so I didn’t stop long to take photos on the way.

The music-making was to take place in Thorverton Parish Church, which I was very pleased to find was heated.

Cottage by the side of the church

I was to join a number of other ‘Early music’ fanatics, to work on, under the direction of Robert Harre Jones, two sets of Lamentations, based on extracts from the Bible’s Lamentations of Jeremiah:

 

This little fellow, about 30 cm/12 ins high, was at my right shoulder all day.

It was admiring his carving that gave me the idea of taking sufficient photos to do a post, though sadly I only had my not-very-good phone camera on me. (That’s my excuse anyway.)  Anyway, I took photos of a few things around the church during the coffee break.

(I have no idea..)

I did pop out into the churchyard for a couple of minutes, but soon popped in again, it was so bitterly cold.

We had to go out for lunch though, taken in the Thorverton Arms.

Here are mein host and his frau.

It had warmed up a bit, so I spent a little longer in the churchyard after lunch, admiring the great diversity of headstones.

Only as I came back to the church did I notice a monument, set into the outside wall,  dating back as far as the eighteenth century, though I hadn’t studied the very worn tombstones in detail for dates.

During the tea break

an audience started arriving

to hear a final run through of the pieces we had been working on.

RHJ introducing the pieces

I just adore the Tallis – that’s what had attracted me to do the workshop – and the beautiful Brumel piece was a real revelation.

It was warmer as I drove home, and I stopped a little more frequently to take photos.  Fortunately, after a while I found myself on roads that didn’t permit of stopping, or I’m not sure when I would have managed to get back.