Late exploration

It seems a bit late to be exploring a new part of the area, when I'm about to move away from it. And it's also funny how these things happen - we were completely lacking in inspiration for somewhere to walk on Sunday, and resorted to looking at the TripAdvisor Top 10 New Forest pubs. Oddly, several weren't really in the Forest at all, and thus we ended up parking at the Rose and Thistle in Rockbourne for a most delightful loop.

Next to Damerham and Martin, Rockbourne is a beautiful little village in Cranborne Chase. Our route took us via the pretty church and patches of ancient woodland carpeted with the fresh green leaves of bluebells, across fields with wonderful views, connecting to the also-pretty church in Whitsbury. Needing to be back at the pub for lunch, we then walked through more ancient woodland and ancient trackways, with primroses and the odd wood anemone in flower, before returning to Rockbourne. It's a great place to walk as there are lots of short connecting paths, so you can make a route to sort your needs. And in a few weeks' time, it will be beautiful with the wildflowers. Walking back through Rockbourne along the road meant we could admire the small winterbourne up close. It doesn't flow during the summer, as groundwater levels in the chalk bedrock drop, but it flows long enough for the water crowfoot to flower. And in fact, it was already flowering - very early, but a joy to see it doing so well in the crystal-clear waters, when in other rivers it is declining.

Alas, the pub was fully booked, and the one in Whitsbury was also rammed. This is how we ended up in The Bat and Ball in Breamore, in the edge of the Avon Valley. Also rammed, they found us a tiny table for our lovely roast, giving us time to plan our afternoon. We had time for a quick walk, and as the sun was shining, we headed up to Castle Hill in Woodgreen. We've been here before - it has amazing views across the wide, flat River Avon floodplain, and given the enormous amount of rain we've had with the storms, it was looking rather soggy!

We walked through Godshill Enclosure listening to the spring birdsong, looping down and up to pass out of the enclosure and into some lovely ancient woodland, criss-crossed with streams. Walking along an old trackway, we had a great view down the valley to a herd of female fallow deer. We then followed the Avon Valley Path through part of the village before heading back to the car, admiring the sun shining through the clouds down onto the floodplain again. A lovely way to end the day.

Slippy-slidey

And so the unpredictable spring weather begins - heavy showers, blustery gales, bright sunshine - hard to keep up!

And of course it's typical that when you have a birthday outing planned in, the forecast is dire. Thankfully, it wasn't as bad as we thought it was going to be, and managed to complete our lovely loop in north Wiltshire.

We started off in the village of Ford, north of Chippenham. We headed north, along ancient trackways, up steep and very slippery slopes (thanks to all that rain and the clay soil), and would have had lovely views across the By Brook (tributary of the Bristol Avon river) valley if not for the poor weather. Our mid-way stop was in the pretty village of Castle Combe - usually, I only come here for something car-related due to the racing track, so it made a change to admire the lovely honey-coloured cottages along the high street.

Our return route to the pub at Ford for our delicious lunch was along the valley ridge, having crossed the By Brook along an ancient clapper bridge earlier. A very slippery (only two falls, thankfully not me) and wet walk but lovely terrain, lots of variety and probably some great views!

I'm making the most of exploring Wiltshire and Cranborne Chase as I'm moving to Winchester in a couple of weeks, whereby the blog will have a re-branding! However, the walks will still continue, just exploring further east perhaps.

Conflicted

Oh I've been so conflicted these past few days - the stunning weather has meant some spectacular walks but it's really far too warm for this time of year. A taste of things to come and more than slightly depressing. Instead, I'll focus on a fab weekend of wildlife watching.

First up was my (ashamedly) first visit to Martin Down this year - as the sun was shining, we obviously needed to head high for the views, so we ended up on top of Pentridge Hill, outside of the NNR. The hazy sun picked out all of the ancient earthworks on the slopes of the Hill - a very heavily used part of the world at one time.

Our circular route descended to join an ancient trackway, having passed through the pretty village of Pentridge. The sun was getting lower in the sky, casting long shadows from the trees and hedgerows. In the adjacent field, we spotted a good number of roe deer feeding - we watched each other for a while, so we could clearly see males (bucks) with their short antlers as well as females (does). They live in small groups in winter, but as they head towards the rut in the summer (as opposed to the autumn for red deer), they become more solitary. The females give birth in January, and although the light was a bit dim in this field, I was certain I could make out some smaller deer lying on the ground - perhaps this year's fawns.



Heading back towards the NNR, and approaching the other side of the ancient Bokerley Dyke earthwork, we had an encounter with some sort of raptor. Again, light was difficult, but it looked to be bigger than a buzzard, mostly white underneath, with pale buff wings on top. It quartered the ground in lazy flaps across the field, catching something and tearing into it ferociously on the ground. It didn't look heavy enough to be an owl, and the head shape wasn't as blunt. We are told it could have been a female hen harrier, but it seems to be completely the wrong colouration. We are stumped - perhaps a new species?!!

The following day, we headed back to one of our favourite haunts, the Lymington and Keyhaven Marshes Nature Reserve on the New Forest coast. A stunning day, with amazing views across to the Isle of Wight and along the coast. but our attentions were fixed on the copious bird life. At this time of year you get a strange mix - of winter migrants about to head off to their breeding grounds, such as the brent geese, as well as the spring breeders getting ready for the forthcoming season. progress towards Lymington (our lunch stop) was slow consequently.

Birds seen include: lots of teal (barely any seen on our last visit - must be an influx of breeders), some wigeon (not as many as last time - numbers boosted by winter migrants from Scandinavia), pintail, little egret, avocet, shelduck, bar-tailed godwit, redshank, dunlin, lots of black-headed gulls getting nosily ready to breed, displaying male lapwing, more than a few brent geese, oyster catcher, and probably many others I've forgotten about. In particular, one male lapwing gave a spectacular display over our heads for many minutes, tumbling acrobatically in the air, alternately showing gleaming white belly against glossy green-black back, all the while accompanied by it's other-worldly bubbling song.

Alas - or perhaps for the good - the weather has broken slightly, and we're back to more normal conditions. However, spring is clearly on the way for the birds, so hopefully many more encounters to come.