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an afternoon ramble

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ric
 ric
(@rustic)
Posts: 624
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One afternoon during the recent hot spell I finished early and decided to swing by one of the local bird reserves to check out the possibilities of a  stroll in the sunshine, mid afternoon mid week the reserve should be deserted. I was gob smacked to find the carpark full with cars parked along the road verges aswell,  ive never seen the car park even half full when ive taken the kids there to escape the xbox. I guess the rspb must have had some sort of event on.  I decided to pootle on home and amuse myself in the garden till tea time, but a couple of miles down the road I noticed a small English nature sign on a gate with a notice board and just enough room to park a couple of cars off the tarmac, it looked worth investigating.  The gate opened onto a gravel tree lined track , as I parked up an English nature landrover driven by a female warden and what looked like a load of escapees from the local school came out along the track, it was getting on for 3 so I assumed they were leaving for the day.  Looking at the map board id found a small nature reserve, basically a lot of wet pasture  fields with mature hedges , some woodland and a couple of lakes, presumably old peat workings..  Anyway the gravel track ran straight at right angles to the road  for about a kilometre then did a right angle with another couple of kilometres before rejoining another public road.. I had a couple of hours to spare so decided to inveatigate further.  As I set off up the track I could see there was a tractor parked on the track about half a kilometre in. As I got close it became obvious as it had a large chipper attached and a heap of safty helmets and cloves that was where the departing teenagers had been working and there was probably noone else about now so off came the shorts  which I stuffed in my camera bag.  Near the corner there was a lake off to one side with a bird watching hide, no sign of any twitchers about though. . the terrain was a mix of grassfields enclosed by tall hedges with patches of woodlan on the damper ground, some of it with surface water amongst the trees. After the corner the track became a bit more wriggly  rather than the dead straightness of the first bit,and the surface became less gravely eventually turning to grass as the track came out onto open moorland with grassfields separated by rhines,  (water filled ditches). Only one field had cattle in it the rest were tall grass and wild flowers, presumably destined to be hay in the near future. As there were no hedges now I could see the occasional traffic on the road where I was parked and a couple of  sets of farm buildings across the fields.. I carried on along the grass track across the open moor as the track was fairly soft grass I left my shoes hidden in the grass and carried on totally naked and in tune with the surroundings  till I got near another tarmac road, time to turn round and amble back. When I got back to the corner the tractor had gone so I continued  down the straight kilometre to where id parked, an occasional car passed along the road but I reasoned I was effectively hidden on a narrow track between high hedges. And should be able to go the whole way bare.  When I was about half way along a car pulled in and parked next to mine, the shorts were on by the time it was stationary and I had to do the last bit  with them on, . the driver of the car came up the track towards me wearing long trousers, long sleeved shirt and a back pack.. don’t think he was a bird watcher on the way to the lakeside hide cos there was no obvious sign of binoculars or camera,.. Istill wonder what he was doing there!. When hed gone on a bit the shorts came off again and I did the last couple of hundred yards back to the car in my shoes, then took them off  and drove most of the ten miles or so home  totally naked.

 
Posted : July 10, 2009 11:05 pm