Skyhill

A walk in the woods

Saturday 3rd November 2012

 

    Not quite Bill Bryson and the Appalachian Trail - just a stroll with Tim and Leo on Skyhill on a lovely autumn morning. 

 

    I have been meaning to go up with a camera ever since the work on the service reservoir was finished because I wanted to photograph the completed project.

 

    We started off from the gate at the top of our garden and I stopped to photograph some fragile little toadstools growing on an old log.  They looked prettier (and a bit less mashed) a few seconds before I took the photo.  Leo was impatient about the holdup in his walk and stuck his big, clumsy nose in for a sniff while I was getting my camera ready.

Higher up in the plantation, under the pines, there were some perfect, shiny little toadstools.

The service reservoir across the glen - photographed from the edge of the plantation above Ballagarrow Farm.

I like this photo which Tim took of Ramsey in the morning sunshine.

We stopped to look at an old Scots pine at the edge of the plantation.  It was obviously much older than the other conifers and must have been there before the plantation was created.  Tim told me about the old pines in Scotland, remnants of the Caledonian forest, and mentioned that the oldest trees are sometimes called "Grannies".  I took this photo of the bark on our Skyhill Granny.

Then we walked along a very muddy mountain bike track near the Skyhill Farm boundary.  The sun was shining through the remaining needles on the larches

And at the top of the main track we stopped to take a few photos of upper Glen Auldyn.