I am taking a break from my regular life in Edinburgh to discover what I want to do with myself and my future. I’m walking my way into my next half century.
Ken and I were wandering together years ago by a river in Cardiff and he was telling me how walking helps the brain settle, how it gets the creative juices flowing. Simply setting one foot in front of another helps the thoughts to move along, and gets you from one place to another.
Downton, England.
Luckily I am healthy; my beautiful daughters can now manage brilliantly without me, and so with lots of support from family and friends I have taken time off to explore. I intend to spend time sitting, resting, listening, watching, meeting new people, speaking another language, and of course, walking.
Walk without design
Aphra Behn
I started my Autumn walks in the New Forest with Angela – snake stories, practicing Spanish verbs, annual acorn-eating pigs, and some donkeys.
Our excuse was to take Polly, Christinas’s dog, out for exercise, and we roamed along grassy paths with the smell of Autumn all around us. We tried to avoid any wildlife that might readily be chased.
Donkey foal.
As we roamed along valleys beside meandering streams, and as the bracken seemed to turn browner by the minute, we got to know each other and Polly explored. Inevitably she discovered the donkeys which are free to roam as part of the peoples’ rights to graze their livestock (and also to pick holly and cut peat.)
I recommend this gentle part of the world for walking. It will deepen your appreciation of your surroundings, and moving side-by-side with someone is perfect for meaningful exchanges.
Detail on thatched ridge (blurred from a distance).
Today’s walks – Aberdour: Silver Sands, tiny part of the Fife Coastal Path; Edinburgh: Lothian Road to Granton
The journey from Edinburgh to Aberdour takes 31 minutes and it cost me £5.35 return (I have a Scotrail Over 50s card). What a bargain!
Aberdour station has won many ‘best kept station’ awards. It is all co-ordinated in blue and white.
There was the new Forth Road bridge in all its glory! A yellow crane stood beside each of the uprights, and it was teeming with vehicles, and people in high-vis jackets!
It’s a bonny sight, and takes the number of crossings to three: the red rail bridge, buxom and with a reputation for needing a new coat every year; the old road bridge, swanky but showing signs of age; and now the elegant, silver-white virgin, as yet untouched. They all, more or less, connect South Queensferry to North Queensferry, and the views are impressive.
Part of the red rail bridge in the lower corner
That’s North Queensferry on the right
There used to be a train which trundled along where Lower Granton Road is now, taking passengers and goods to Fife, Dundee and beyond. It rolled onto a large piece of wood with rails, floating in Granton Harbour, and was sailed across to Fife, before it drove off and up north without anyone having to get out. How clever is that?!
On the other side of the blue water, the white things all in a line, are the yachts in the harbour.
Aberdour is an historic village in Fife – pretty, well-off, and you can see my flat from its sands. After work, I walked down to the beach and wandered east amongst the seaweed and rock pools (approx. 5 mins) smiling at dog walkers as I went; and then west to where the boats are moored, across the wonderfully named ‘Dour Burn’ (‘dour’ means ‘relentlessly severe, stern, or gloomy in manner or appearance’, and a ‘burn’ is a small river or stream) on the wee brown bridge. From there I joined the Fife Coastal Path onto the headland and around to the next bay. I am definitely coming back to walk that Path when I have time.
The wee brown bridge..
..across the ‘Dour Burn’.
You will need proper boots as it is a steep, slippery climb.
There’s a municipal tourist board to help you identify the islands and hills you can see across the water, including Arthur’s Seat, Salisbury Crags, the islands of Inchcolm (the one with the Abbey), Cramond (the one you can get stranded on if the sea covers the crossing before you get back), and Inchmickery. Apparently it is the latter which was said to resemble a battleship to scare off invaders during the war, although I thought it was Inchkieth (the one I can see from my yoga class and front room).
This is the first walk I have had outside Edinburgh city since I returned from Yalding (Kent) where I spent New Year. First I got the scent of the sea, the sea plants, and the sand in my sinuses, and they cleared (fantastic after my cold); then, as I walked slightly inland, the whiff of the newly disturbed earth and the wet bracken. My respiratory system sighed with joyful relief!
This morning’s hard frost had given way to a warmer 7 degrees by early afternoon.
Everyone was very friendly. There were helpful directions, and a Scottish version of ‘Buen Camino’. ‘Enjoy your walk, she said, smiling. I have a fear of going the wrong way. I think it is because I never have enough time and so do not want to waste what I do have. As it was I ended up at the ‘Silver Sands’ car park twice.
I spotted a bird of prey I could not identify. I kept seeing an unusually long body part as it turned around on the air current (neck? legs?) and hovvered in the sky above. I asked a man with binoculars and he kindly told me the difference between a sparrow hawk (red tummy), buzzard (‘very large’), and kestrel (pointed wings). I am still not sure what I saw, but it was the size of a large gull. He drew out his camera and sifted through several 100 photos before showing me a gorgeous picture of a robin silhouetted against a dramatic sky whilst perching on his hand (which, he explained, was poking outside the car window) .
2.30pm. It is February after all!
I enjoyed a green tea and scone at the McTaggarts Cafe (was that where I lost my keys?). Good service, delicious cakes, WiFi – recommended.
Here’s another shot or two of the station. Only I can wax lyrical about a station, but it is so pretty. And it’s got a blue and white pot on a barrel (almost like a museum-exhibit, it could have come from friend Lesley’s kitchen), a most interesting clock, and a greenhouse. I have never seen a station with a greenhouse before. The man in red (can you spot him?) was potting up the containers while I waited for the 3.15.
There is more to Aberdour than I that. There is a castle, at least one church, an obelisk, and a shinty club, so I recommend you stay there for a couple of nights.
I gave a very enjoyable Shiatsu to a client after my return (or did the keys drop out of my pocket on the train?), and then I had my second walk of the day.
It was raining heavily all through the 50 minutes it takes to get home, indeed my shoes and coat are steaming on the radiator as I write. My toes got wet as I traipsed the first few streets, and the pools of water in my trainers had spread to my insteps by Stockbridge. Eventually my heels were soaking too – that was when I was passing the Botanics – but inexplicably they were still warm. And what a lovely walk it was. I had loads of creative ideas (eg I decided what my book is going to be about, and I came up with an alternative topic for the Eastwood House residential), and even if I do not get my keys back I will manage somehow.
There are no photos of this walk as it was dark, but I will take the opportunity to moan about the lack of street lighting, especially on Doune Terrace and Gloucester Street. And I will leave you with the last, lovely photo of the beautiful, blue, Firth of Forth. Sweet dreams!
The Fife Coastal Path http://www.fifecoastalpath.co.uk/
Walking without a donkey 