A walk from (delightfully named!) The Bog. It was a bright sunny afternoon when we left home; by the time we’d walked to Shelve Pool it was raining – I’m sure it wasn’t forecast. “It will only be a shower” as we sheltered beneath the trees. It was only a shower, fortunately…
Great refreshments at The Bog Visitor Centre, housed in the old school

   

   

   

   

A walk through Chestnut Coppice and the riverside path to Apley bridge, back via Astley Abbots and Boldings Pools

   

   

   

   

   

A walk on the “Fenn’s, Whixall & Bettisfield Mosses National Nature Reserve”

   

   

   

A walk from Hay Bridge, via Chelmarsh reservoir, to Hampton Loade – and back along the riverside path.

   

Curiously, the Yorkshire Dales poster uses a few lines of Housman’s “A Shropshire Lad” to extol their virtues…

Across the glittering pastures
And empty upland still
And solitude of shepherds
High in the folded hill

 

   

   

We’ve seen eagles on previous visits to this quiet lochan – would we be lucky again?

…yes, only this time, not the golden variety, but a white-tailed eagle (we only realised on studying the photographs carefully), which circled lazily, high in the sky, for several minutes before drifting away and out of sight.

   

   

   

   

“Hugh’s Castle” – a walk along the shore near Cuidrach, Skye, to the ruins of a 17th century site of (inevitably) evil deeds…