Devon Sojourn 4 - A Mobile Miscellania

I also made sure I took a lot of pictures on my mobile phone too on my Devon trip. They are lower quality than the compact shots, but I still got some good ones! Putting these in for the sake of completeness for you, and also there are more shots of some of the stunning scenery around where we were staying in Okehampton.

Please enjoy! I'm busy planning adventures in my familiar Nottinghamshire stamping ground to see what late summer / early autumn might bring.

Si

All images and text copyright CreamCrackeredNature 02.09.15

Bull Ring close up on the way

Great Bristol House

Okehampton

Moors 

The far hills

Fuschia

Lush landscape

Very odd and tatty looking holly blue

Speckled wood

Tall tors

From the viaduct

Along the Melford valley

Babbling brook

Water drips down

Hoverfly

Flowery boat at Roadford

Martin nest at Hatherleigh

Devon Sojourn 3 - High on Hatherleigh Hill

After the first reservoir, came the second. And after the second reservoir came a trip up to the pretty village of Hatherleigh. Up being the operative word, because this is another sky scraping place, reached by a ladder like road I kept trying to imagine cycling up.

At the top of the village, was the former market garden-cum-nursery home of an entirely formidable couple with a combined age of 187. It may no longer have been used for commercial purposes, but it was still a jungle of apples at the back, and vegetable beds up the side.

Wasps had colonised the bird box, but luckily the garden was an avian paradise anyway. A bird feeder under the kitchen window was sheltered in a magnolia, offering great views of sparrows, tits, and a spectacular nuthatch, characteristically feeding upside down, I was told.

Outside swallows were plentiful, and honeybees and bumblebees fed on a rampant hydrangea and other garden flowers. The sweet peas smelt like they'd been picked on Olympus, and Le Crunch Bunch of days of yore could not have eaten all the apples in the orchard even if they'd had all eternity.

Si

All text and images Copyright CreamCrackeredNature 01.09.15

Stripey squatters

Nuthatch. Sorry that the pictures were taken through a window

Sneaky blue tit

Busy on the feeder

Carder bee

Still blooms to feed off

Sunflower bees

Fiery colours

Great tit now on the feeder

Moon over the moors

Devon Sojourn 2 - Roadford Lake

After exploring the Granite Way and Meldon Dam, we then headed for Roadford Lake, not far from the enticingly named village of Broadwoodwidger and not far from the Cornish border.

As soon as I arrived at the lake the first thing I thought was how much it reminded me of Rutland Water back up in my part of the world. It may not be as large, but the feel of it, with the cafe and shop, bike trails and sailing school is very reminiscent. But at Roadford, you feel very high up, wind turbines dot the horizon and there is the sense that the sky is not that far away.

The winds blow the training dinghies about the water as we have tea and cake. The world's tallest man stands in front of us and looks at the world's smallest puppy, a baby meerkat sized chihuahua.  A giant metal sundial glitters in a lowering sun.

A bird hide proves the birds are hiding. But there are plenty of butterflies, and a big hawker flies over my shoulder like a strafing Spitfire. Muddy ground hints at the autumn to come.

A child screams eerily in the trees. The dense woods surrounding the lake might be very scary at night. But in the day, it was lovely.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 

The calm waters

Sailing woes

Damselfly

Splashing at the edge

Small tortoiseshell

The butterfly seeks a different world view

Very tatty meadow brown

Silver sundial

Chubby hoverfly

Devon Sojourn 1 - Meldon Reservoir

Found myself having to make an emergency visit to Devon in very unfortunate circumstances, but there was still an opportunity to have a lovely day in late summer sun amongst the Tors of Dartmoor.

Our first port of call was The Granite Way . This wide, traffic free cycle path runs for about 18 miles through Dartmoor, and combines damp wooded sections moistened by the sort of cliche babbling brooks I remember from childhood days in the Brecon Beacons; and also open sections above which a good number of swallows were dancing in aerial pursuit of insects.

There were plenty of butterflies too; butterflies and swallows abundant, so different from back home where summer has seemingly given up and gone to bed, pulling its equinox duvet up towards its head.

And then there is the viaduct, where the path crosses a deeply lush and green chasm below, and the Tors dominate the high skyline above. In the distance, water tumbles down the face of a dam...

Holly blues still having a good year

Feeding away quite peacefully

The peaceful greenery of The Granite Way

Very tatty red admiral seems to be trying to turn itself into a swallowtail

I'd be shy, if I were that tatty

Speckled wood

Surprised looking butterfly

And another, sunning itself on a fence

The viaduct. The railway carriages contain a cafe

The far Tor

The waterfall

...so onto Meldon Reservoir itself, 900 feet above sea level and boasting a dizzying drop down its wall, where the water falls into a turmoil at the bottom. There's less life here, almost as if it is in awe of this power.

Looks fairly normal here

But there falls the water

On one side tranquillity

And on the other, the drop 

It's a long time since I'd been back in Devon. It is still beautiful up there.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 30.08.15