OK, So now we Fielded our own International Player

 Found myself playing for third team this weekend, in a match I wasn't actually supposed to be playing in and hadn't indicated my availability for, as my ankle flared up again after last weekend's match and may back has been sore.

Too bad. Lots of players missing, so I was drafted in. I bought an ankle brace specially, which was very quickly needed as I found myself opening the bowling against our opponents from Claypole.

Opening the bowling really badly. 

Couldn't find a length at all, slipped in a couple wides which means my action has splayed open again, and just got battered. Well, I haven't practiced in a couple of weeks, but it's more than that. Simple fact it, without regular match bowling, my ability falls away. The pandemic has basically ruined my cricket.

My ankle, and the skipper, gave up after three overs.

Luckily there were other good bowlers around, including the skipper himself, plus a mysterious player none of us had met before.

Initially I just assumed that this was one of the skipper's baseball contacts - we had an American with us as well - who would probably be a decent fielder with a strong arm, but that was to understate things massively. 

He produced a dazzling aerial one handed catch initially, before producing some quickly bowled, sharply turning off spin of a standard way too high for the third team - god knows how he didn't take a wicket - then to round things off took the last Claypole wicket with a 70 yard run out from the boundary, that clattered into middle stump on the full. 

The rumour is he has played international cricket for Luxembourg, which I suppose made our complaints about last week's opponents playing a Barbadian overseas pro slightly hypocritical.

I was laughing with both disbelief, and envy at this fielding prowess. I had fielded with great enthusiasm and as much movement as my ankle would allow, but the captain had been careful to put me where the ball tended not to go, knowing well that I am clumsy talented oaf who fields like a baby giraffe. 

Claypole got to 132, far below their usual scores this season, and after a decent start we had a mini collapse. Luckily our captain and our opening bat then took control to steer us to a 7 wicket victory. Knowing I was never going to get a bat as usual, I walked around the ground enjoying all the insects feasting off bramble flowers while watching the game. 

Plenty to see and enjoy during this game, the third team's first victory of the season. As for me, always next week to be rubbish again.

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 27.06.21

The Mud of Barnby, Claypole and Balderton

I've done a ten mile walk today, as if to reinforce the point I made yesterday about the countryside around here just being a barren wasteland.

Today, it was muddy as well.

The first part of my walk was on tarmac however, and there was plenty to see in the fields next to the road. There were goldfinches aplenty, two or three flocks of redwing, and a big buzzard being harassed by a crow. A very noisy cockerel brought his hens over for a look at me. But after Barnby church, there was nothing apart from either empty pasture fields - no problem apart from the cowpats - or empty ploughed fields. I came across several of these today, and after the recent rain within 10 metres my shoes had grown to the size of canoes and weighed 5 kilos each. .

Bloody paths! They didn't exist. Rather irrationally, I began to curse all farmers for, I don't know, not putting paved paths everywhere. The only difference was the subtly difference colours of mud I found.

It all ended up being a rather grim slog through very unscenic land, the only highlights being the occasional footbridge traverse over water before taking on another hell hole of heavy soil. Every time I came across another such field I just wanted to scream.

Well, you can see a path on the OS map, but until you walk it, you have no real idea about the nature of the route.

Eventually I found my way back to civilization and the purchase of a very large bottle of rum!

Happy New Year everyone.

Si

Well I wasn't Expecting to see that!

Off my poor achey legs today, and on went my bum onto a bicycle seat. I headed off through Claypole, Stubton and then onto Fenton, with its attractive village pond acting as a home to a pair of moorhens.

I've run past Sutton earlier in the year, but it is actually off the road. The next village I came to was Beckingham, one of the larger satellites of Newark with a population of over 1000, a fine tower church, a pub, and a couple of very strange animals I cycled past in a field by the road.

"What on earth were they?" said my brain to itself when it had processed the white flashes I had seen through a gap in a hedge. I let the bike coast to a halt, turned around, and went back to have a look at what I had initially thought were a couple of alpacas - an increasingly fashionable item of livestock to keep around here - but soon turned out to have the wrong number of legs.

For in this field were standing two tall, creamy white birds with long necks, feeding with their backs to me. They were a little way off, but they appeared to be easily five feet high, with legs like Usain Bolt. On closer inspection, a chick could be seen feeding with the two adult birds.

I took some photographs of these birds - clearly rattites of some description, and carried on my ride, an enjoyably sunny 40km trek around these villages of the Lincolnshire - Nottinghamshire border. Pondering on these birds, I didn't think they were large enough, or indeed black enough, to be adult ostriches but thought they might be immature birds.

It was when researching this piece, that I remembered the large flightless bird that had made the news nationally when it escaped from a farm in North Nottinghamshire. The picture with this article identified the bird straightaway for me.

Have you guessed yet?

It was a rhea!

Rheas are normally dark in colour, but it seems that leucistic white birds are common, and cursory web research indicates that they are becoming increasingly farmed in the UK for their meat, with chicks on sale for £65 and adult birds £200 or over.

Whether these birds were pets, or for the pot, I have no idea.

I wonder if any of my steampunk friends would be interested in their feathers?

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 02.10.15

Fenton village pond

The church is hiding

The Beckingham "alpacas"

In this shot you can see the two toed hoof

Sorry these aren't the clearest shots

Beckingham church

The view deep into Lincs. The photo just does not do it justice, it was magnificent

Public footpath to certain death

Out in the sticks

A barn fit for swallows

River Witham at Stapleford

I love these village boards

Onion harvesting. The smell was quite something

Lanky bike rider

The Escape from the Rain

Today was mainly pretty darn miserable. It was the sound of rain battering down my window from my slightly leaky guttering that woke me up, and it was this same persistent scudding sound that dogged my entire day as I tried to read.

Iain M. Banks Culture novels are tricky enough without a tropical rainstorm hammering down outside.

I was fretful and prowling, too much energy needing burning off. But eventually the rain relented, and a magic weather front of blue sky made its way over from the South West, and I was able to get out on the bike, new Trespass trousers aboard my legs.

I wasn't meaning to go that far, but eventually ended up going 25 or so km on a foray over the border into Lincolnshire. First I went to Claypole, where the willow tree hung greenly over the River Witham as it has done for many years.

Next up, I was cycling through the village when a sign marking a "Solar Park" caught my attention, and soon I could see the glittering solar panels in the far distance. This was the new, and still under construction, Copley Solar Farm, which at 30MW has way more capacity than the Hawton one you cycle past on the Sustrans 64. Evidently the farmers who own the land don't think beef and arable farming are any longer sustainable there.

A legbreaker of a climb - luckily a short one - brought me into Dry Doddington village on my trip on what were all new roads to me. The major landmark here is the church of St James, with it's noticeably leaning 14th century tower.

From here it was across to Stubton, where I found myself entranced by a rainbow like hedge, before dragging my stiff legs home into the breeze. Luckily the sight of a few swallows and martins still around in the villages kept me going.

I'd certainly burnt my energy off. I was indeed CreamCrackered at the end of the ride!

Si

All text and images copyright CreamCrackeredNature 21.09.15

First thing; a glittery spider web

Good weather front approaches! Time to be out.

The Witham at Claypole

Copley Solar Farm

The leaning tower of Dry Doddington

St James' tower, complete with jackdaw

The far off flatlands of Lincolnshire

Illuminated streetsign - I love these olde worlde ones

Golden hedge, and dark knight

On the Bicycle to Claypole

Having decided that all the photography was slowing me down too much, I just ran my 10km along the Owl Road and Pykett's Wood today flat out to try and get a decent time in.

As chance would have it, a sharp pain on my foot on the woodland path turned out to be a wasp of some kind stinging me four times after it somehow got trapped under the tongue of my running shoe. A bee would have died after one sting, and this was a rather dark red looking insect as opposed to your standard wasp. Hence the stings didn't become weals, but still hurt at the time.

Still, ironman Si still got round in 55.17 for 10km.

Deciding it was too beautiful a day to waste, I decided to forget trying to run to Claypole, and cycled there instead, a distance of about 7.5km give or take. It's one of the larger outlying villages round here, dominated by the sharp spire of St Peter's church, and the River Witham.

I remember a friend of the family taking me fishing here once, me with my tiny little bright yellow fishing rod. Parked up by the river, and seemed to walk miles downstream. We fished for the large Witham pike, with luridly coloured yellow and green plugs that sank, swam and wriggled in the manner of a wounded fish. He could cast them for miles, my pathetic efforts went about 10 feet and wouldn't have caught the stupidest pike in the aquatic universe.

But then, he caught nothing either.

I saw no pike today where the river swiftly runs under the bridge, but instead I had the pleasant surprise of two egrets suddenly taking off from the south side of the bridge. Wasn't expecting to see that!

So, enjoy the photographs from my sunny day out, and hopefully nature will spring surprises on you too.

Si

Pleasing bluebell island in library gardens

Biggest blossming tree in town

Close up of the scentless flowers

I've crossed the border!

Witham downstream

Witham bridge

Tulips in the middle of nowhere for some reason

Looking upstream

St Peter's church

Blossom

Claypole high street

Not getting eggs from this farm

Fernwood bird hide 

Inside th hide

Wasp chewing up garden tree stump for pulp

Garden cherry blossom