We are now into November and this week, I have been planting a variety of Spring bulbs into the pots, now devoid of their resplendent summer flowers. Autumn is here and we are into the 3rd month of this season already. The clocks have gone back an hour and it is dark at 5pm. The photo below shows a beautifully dark maple tree in the gardens at Spott House, on our walk and often featured here on the blog. In Clive James poem Japanese Maple, he writes “My daughter’s choice, the maple tree is new./ Come autumn and its leaves will turn to flame”. James sensed that he was nearing the end of his life and he added, poignantly “What I must do/ Is live to see that”. In the photo, the maple tree stands out, even if it is in shadow, against the greenery of the grass and nearby trees, the pale sandstone of the house, and the blue of the pond, the sea and the sky beyond. The shadow at the bottom left is cast by a nearby building which has a brewery-like chimney pot on its roof.
Spott House in the sunshine and shadows (click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
Walking back from the house, we pass one of the driveways up to the house itself. The photo below shows the leaf-laden driveway, with many more leaves to come. In Emily Emily Brontë’s poem Fall, Leaves, Fall, she writes “Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;/ Lengthen night and shorten day;/ Every leaf speaks bliss to me/ Fluttering from the autumn tree”. In this photo, there is certainly a kind of bliss, with the yellowing leaves on the ground, the evergreen bushes to the left and right and the trees, some of which are deciduous, in the sunshine beyond the path. There was little wind on the day, so there was a calmness about this scene, which can be wild, windy and noisy on some autumn afternoons.
The side driveway up to Spott House
Walking back down the driveway, the view is one which can be appreciated at all times of the year. The trees on both sides of this avenue still have their leaves but those they retain are changing colour, from green to yellow or russet. While the trees change shape and colour throughout the year, the view in the distance, to North Berwick Law (good photos) is constant. The brown fields you see below The Law ( as it is known locally) have recently been ploughed but will soon turn to a brilliant green (on sunny days) as the Spring wheat emerges. This was late afternoon, so a perfect time to catch the multiple shadows which stretch across the roadway from one grass verge to the other, with patches of white sunlight seemingly randomly scattered amongst them. This is one of these vistas that, no matter how often you see it, you have to stop walking and just take in the beauty of it.
Another autumnal scenario can be found at the Knowes Farm Bridge, also featured more than once on the blog e.g. here. The recent rain has greatly increased the flow of water in the River Tyne at the bridge and the water was hurriedly hastening onwards towards, eventually, the sea. The photo below shows the river from the side with the fading grasses and young trees. This is a crossing but a dangerous one on a day like this and you can see the exit point in the left middle of the photo. Once across the bridge – to the right of the photo – you can walk behind the trees on the far bank and follow the river on an often muddy track all the way to Preston Mill (good photos). The water is calm to the left and then hits some rocks to form a rushing, white-water gallop, before settling down again as it goes under the bridge.
Looking from the bridge – photo below – at this time of year, you see the river below through the berried branches of the hawthorn tree. To the left of the river, there are fields where the spring wheat is just emerging and bringing a new, startlingly bright green and signs of new growth in this season of decay. John Clare delighted in this time of year in his poem Autumn – “I love the fitfull gusts that shakes/ The casement all the day/ And from the mossy elm tree takes/ The faded leaf away/ Twirling it by the window-pane/ With thousand others down the lane”. No gusts on this day but there are times when a gale blows and you have to hang on to the side of the bridge to keep upright.
River Tyne and autumnal berries
I took this video of the river, so look and listen and enjoy the energetic but peaceful sound the water – no commentary needed.
One of the late blooming bushes to be seen up the country lane from the bridge is the holly. The photo below shows the prolific amount of berries on this bush, which forms part of the hedgerow at the side of the fields to your left and right as you walk up the lane to the road leading to East Linton (good photos) to your left and Tyninghame (good photos) to your right. The holly is usually associated with winter but autumn brings vibrant displays like this, but only on some bushes. Further down the lane there is a large holly bush, but it remains a thorny green, deprived of solid red berries. So, if you look around on your autumnal walk, you see the last of the leaves falling and dying – but later feeding the ground as they rot, but also the recent growth in the fields and on the holly bush. It may be colder now but, in some ways, autumn is the season of colour, perhaps in a more subtle manner than the gaudy summer, but no less beautiful.
I am still in catch up mode with topics for the blog, so we are going back a month or so to when there were still some leaves on the trees and they were turning to shades of red, yellow and brown. John Keats’ poem Ode to Autumn has been studied widely and this Guardian article stated “And if critical essays were apples, and the poem a tree, John Keats’s ode, “To Autumn”, would have toppled by now under the mass of its exegetical fruit”. This sent me searching for the meaning of exegetical and it means explanatory. There are some wonderful lines in this poem and you can appreciate it for the language alone, before delving into what it represents e.g. “To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,/ And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;/ To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells/ With a sweet kernel; to set budding more”.
In the autumn, you do not need to venture into large woods to appreciate the splendour of the autumnal trees. The photo below was taken near the centre of Dunbar, outside the local Co-operative store and it is as good a display of the vividness of autumn as you might see anywhere. There is such a variety of colours here – greens, yellows, brown, reds, all of different shades, that you would be hard pushed to count them. Now the trees are completely bare but then, the trees looked more lively, more youthful and more alive, with their look-at-me and admire poses.
Trees in Dunbar displaying their colour (Click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
When I looked at the grass below the trees, there was little sign of the actual grass, as the leaves had accumulated and huddled tightly together to form another artistic display for the viewer. The photo below shows this mass gathering of leaves, formed into a kind of collage of which many an artist might be proud. On first close-up viewing, you see the colours – from the brightness of the newly fallen leaves to the faded grey of the older leaves, but you can also see the range of shapes in the now curled up specimens on display here. See also the veins in the leaves, like life lines in your hands or the lines in the stone in the previous post.
Collage of autumn leaves
We saw more examples on our regular walk near Spott House which is often featured on the blog, e.g. here. The photo below shows part of the walk near the big house. On the left is a superbly structured curved stone wall. If you look over the wall at the corner, you look down to a burn (stream) about 30 feet below. Looking towards the trees was a heart-warming sight and although it was a cold day, the yellow colours in the trees made you feel warmer. There is a nice contrast between the yellow leaves on the deciduous trees and the still bright green of the trees on the right.
Stone wall and autumnal trees near Spott House
On the following day, I took this video from the car, as we went along the long drive to and from Biel House (scroll down to location and setting). Strictly speaking, this is a private road but the autumnal scene was too tempting and I am sure that the owners would forgive this brief intrusion.
Later that week, I was in Edinburgh doing some research at the National Library of Scotland and then going for lunch with my pal at the excellent Bailie Bar (video). I briefly walked along part of Princes Street Gardens (good photos) and stopped to take the photo below. This is a content-full photo with, from the bottom left, the attractive cottage with its elegant chimney and interesting rooftiles (see larger photo). Just to the left of the chimney, you can see a wall which separates the gardens from the hidden railway line below. The gardens were constructed in a way that disguised the railway which runs into Waverly Station at the eastern end of the gardens. At the top of the photo is the world famous Edinburgh Castle (good photos) which attracts thousands of visitors each year in normal times. The castle rock is as permanent as most things on earth, but the leaves on the deciduous trees only provide a fleeting glimpse of their graceful splendour. The overhanging branches of the tree at the top of the photo are more or less leafless. So, farewell to another autumn which Keats called Season of mist and mellow fruitfulness.
In most places around here, the daffodils have had their days in the sun, hail and rain. In some spots, to where the sun does not reach, late flowering, often white daffodils can be seen around the town. My first location was on The Glebe in Dunbar. The word Glebe has clerical origins. It is defined here as “Land granted to a member of the clergy as part of a benefice”. In the Dictionaries of the Scots Language, Glebe has several different spellings over the centuries – Gleib or Glyb – and is defined as “The portion of land assigned to a parish minister in addition to his stipend”. In past days, this land would have been farmland and therefore a source of income for the minister. This glebe belonged to the local Parish Church, at the other end of the High Street i.e. not all glebes were next to the church in question. These daffodils now come up every year and as you will see in the video below, have to survive the quite often fierce winds.
Daffodils on The Glebe in Dunbar (click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
I took this video on a very windy and decidedly cool day to show the daffodils on The Glebe in motion. The noise from the wind was so loud, I could not do an immediate commentary, so I added a voiceover on Animotica. You will have to imagine the whistling sound of the wind.
Coming home recently from my sister’s house, I took the first photo of the Parish Church from the top of the station road, where there are clumps of daffodils. The trees are only just coming into leaf and the church – lit up at night – is partly visible through the trees. This is an unusual angle from which to see the church and it is only at night that it stands out, as during the day, it is much less visible. I like the different lights in the photo – the shining white of the church and the more subdued yellow light from the lamppost, showing off the sandstone walls on the path to the station, as well as the shadows of the trees. The second photo shows the daffodils in the foreground, with the church face on, the pink sandstone and the blue windows highlighted by the lights on the ground around the church. There was a collegiate church on this site from 1342 and the modern church was noted here as “The original church of Dunbar parish was described as being cruciform, 120 feet long, 25 feet wide, with a gothic transept and choir, and a Saxon nave, possibly originating from the ancient chapel of the parish”. A huge fire in 1989 (photo) destroyed part of the church, which had to be restored to its original interior.
We had a large turnout of daffodils above my stone walls at the front of the house and also many in pots on the decking at the back. The pot in the photo below showed off the daffodils to good effect against the blue sea. In the next pot, the daffodils are not yet fully out, although both pots were planted on the same day. You can also see a couple of early tulips as well as orange pansies, which are now twice the size. I planted the pots in the autumn and have got my reward for waiting patiently over the winter and very cold early spring to see this brilliant display.
Daffodils at high tide
I have featured the walk up to Spott House earlier this year on the blog, when the snow was still blanketing the ground. Now it is daffodil time and the drive up to this impressive house (history and photos) which stands on land acquired by Elias de Spot in 1296, with the modern house built in the mid-19th century. There are thousands of glistening yellow heads and green stems on the driveway in mid to late April and it is a sight for sore eyes indeed. The photo below shows the extent of the daffodils on each side of the drive and I comment more on this and views behind in the video below.
Masses of daffodils on Spott House Drive
At the bottom of the drive, across the road and next to Spott Kirk (good photos) is the garden of a large house with an extensive garden. The blossom on the trees at the end of the garden was just emerging above this wonderful old stone wall and the clumps of daffodils and the huge tree in the middle enhance the quality of the view on show here. This really encapsulates the variety of nature on show in Spring and was a heartening sight on a cold day.
Stone wall, blossom garden and blossom in Spott
I took the video below on the day of our visit to the driveway. Once again the sound of the wind might have drowned out my voice, so Animotica came in handy again. The views all around the drive depict a rural scene that has not changed very much over maybe a hundred years, apart from new houses in the distance.
Up until the end of last week, we had (for us) an extensive snowfall and freezing easterly winds which threatened to cut your face in half. Going out for a walk into this very picturesque but icy landscape involved an extra layer of clothing, a bigger scarf than normal and 2 pairs of gloves, plus a walking pole. As the roads were clear, we drove the short distance up to Spott Village and walked up the drive to Spott House – last mentioned here on the blog. The big difference this time was that the fields and the grass on the long driveway were covered with snow. The photo below shows the driveway with North Berwick Law (good photos) in the distance. You can see the ice at the side of the driveway and in some parts, there was black ice which was difficult to see. The green stems of what will be daffodils were just peeking above the snow in places.
Looking down Spott House driveway (Click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
We walked round Spott House and past the farm cottages to the foot of Doon Hill. I have taken photos from this spot quite often e.g. here but never with this amount of snow, which from where I was standing in the photo below, was about 10cm deep. It was easy to walk on the snow at this point as the snow was still soft above the frozen, compacted snow beneath. On other parts of the paths up to this point, the surface snow had been blown away and you were walking on frozen slush i.e. there had been a slight thaw the day before but then the temperatures had plummeted to -7 degrees overnight. The photo below looks down the path which leads to the group of houses known as The Doonery and you can just make out the houses in the centre of the photo. I like the bare elegance of the bare trees which line one side of the path and your eye is taken down the right hand side of the path by the grassy verge. To the upper right of the photo is my home town of Dunbar. The sea is beyond and the Bass Rock stands solidly on the horizon, beneath a varied sky, which had some smaller clouds gracefully making their way east to west.
Path to the Doonery
The video below gives a better view of the panorama in front of us as we stood at the top of the hill, with the higher Doon Hill behind us. If you look at the still picture below, you can see the red roofs of some of the houses in Spott village, as well as the western and eastern limits of Dunbar. Just beyond the last tree on the right, you can see Dunbar Parish Church, built on a hill to dominate the skyline. As in the photo above, the video mostly shows the glimmering whiteness of the snow on the fields. If you walked up there today, the fields would be back to their pre-spring green as this year’s crops of barley, wheat and oil-seed rape, known as Canola in Australia are in the early stages of growth.
As we walked back down the driveway, I took the photo below, again looking over the fields to Dunbar but this time through the trees. I like the ways the trees look intertwined with each other with the spiny branches reaching out like antennae. The tree in the middle of the photo appears to have some green leaves on it but this is a smaller tree in front of it, obviously of a different type. There is a contrast between the glaring white of the snow, the dark trunks of the trees and the differently coloured strips of sky above.
Looking towards Dunbar from Spott
The latest novel I read was Ian McEwan‘s Machines Like Me (review). This is a fascinating book in many ways. McEwan is a consummate novelist and the book flows along with his deceptively easy style. The novel is partly counterfactual in that Britain has ignominiously lost the Falklands War in 1982 and Alan Turing, the computer scientist, has not died but has developed artificial intelligence to a high degree. In this tale, the world has the Internet in the early 1980s and a much more sophisticated version than we have now. One consequence of Turing’s work is that 25 humanoid robots have been made and Charlie, one of the novel three main characters, has bought one of them at a high price. We read of Charlie putting Adam together and, with his lover from upstairs Miranda, programming Adam and give him human traits. McEwan’s story is partly about moral philosophy – e.g. what does to be human mean? Can Adam, who looks and sounds like a human and who can think rationally and display feelings, be treated as a human or a machine? Adam is also sexually active and after Miranda sleeps with Adam, she tells Charlie that she has not been unfaithful to him as it would the same as if she had used a sex toy. Charlie – and the reader – have to think carefully about this in moral terms.
McEwan is also an excellent story teller and the plot develops as Adam reveals that Miranda has a secret, linked to a violent offender in prison. Adam has – in the Guardian review – an “inhuman iciness” in that he always tells the truth. This has consequences for Miranda not to be revealed here. McEwan also develops a number of themes, including literature as Adam is an expert in constructing Haikus, having read all the world’s literature via his super brain. As you read this novel, it makes you think about the possibilities of scientists developing machines – or people? – like Adam. There is more drama near the end of the novel which is a very satisfying read and highly recommended.
A Guid New Year to you wherever you may be reading this first post of 2021. On the 1st January, we ventured up the country to the top of Doon Hill, stopping at the trig point (good photos) to enjoy the views. As you will see in the video below, you get a wonderful 360 degree view of the sea and the surrounding countryside from the top of the hill. Doon Hill is also known for its Neolithic settlement and I featured this on a blog post in 2015. When you stand at the trig point and realise from the settlement’s information board that people lived up here 6000 years ago, it is hard to imagine that world, with its (to us of course) basic technologies. From the vantage point at the top, you look out to the sea and on New Year’s Day, the Bass Rock (good photos) was glinting in the winter sunshine, surrounded by a sparkling blue sea. To the east, you can get a bird’s eye view of two major Dunbar local employers – the Tarmac Cement Works and Torness Power Station. To the south, you see the rolling Lammermuir Hills (good photos), now topped with wind farm turbines, which were slowly turning on New Year’s Day. The wind farm area is a popular walking and cycling area.
To the west, in the distance, you can see across East Lothian and take in Traprain Law (good photos) and North Berwick Law (good photos) which are, like the Bass Rock, structures which emerged as the result of volcanic activity in the area. The Bass Rock is reckoned to be 320 million years old. The video below is one of the first I’ve taken on my new phone. I needed to talk a bit louder because of the wind but the views are more important than the commentary.
It was a cold day – only 3 degrees with a distinctly cool wind – so it was not a day to hang around for long on Doon Hill. We walked back via Spott House and down the elegant driveway. I have posted this view (photo below) at various times of the year but, no matter the season, the trees retain their graceful stature and the view is always slightly different depending on the month and the time of day. It was after midday when I took this photo, so the sun was still casting strong shadows across the driveway. You can see North Berwick Law in the distance.
The driveway from Spott House (Click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
We had our first snow of the year last week. It did not last long here in Dunbar, as we are near the sea. In Edinburgh, the snow came earlier and lay for much longer. The photo below, taken from my back door, shows the snow lying on the historic Parish Church roof to the left and on the rooftops of the nearby nursing home Lammermuir House. Below that, you can see that there was covering of snow on the beach. There was a big Australian cloudless blue sky which enhanced the view across the snowy roofs.
Snow on the rooftops and on the beach
The photo below takes a wider view of the town from our decking, with the snow covered pots, to the snow on the beach and I also managed to capture the moon in mid morning, just before it disappeared. By the time the tide came in later in the day, some of the snow on the beach had melted in the sun, so the incoming waves fell short of the snow at high tide. At the bottom left of the photo is the snow covered hydrangea plant. The flowers have faded from their exquisite blue but the snow enhances them.
Snow on the decking and the beach
I was given permission to post the next two photos by expert photographer Alison Leslie, who has a real eye for a photo and excellent compositional skills. The photo below shows Princes Street Gardens and Edinburgh Castle in the snow. It is not only beautifully composed but very atmospheric. Unusually for this scene, there are no people on view. The pandemic has robbed Edinburgh of its tourists. There is much to see and admire in the photo, from the path leading down to the gardens at the bottom right, to the delicate layer of snow on the trees and the deeper snow in the gardens. Your eye is taken up the up the hill to the castle rocks, on to the castle itself and then on to the puffy white clouds and the different blues in the sky. It is a very impressive photo.
Princes Street Gardens and Edinburgh Castle
The photo below is also beautifully composed and structured. It is an early morning view of the Grassmarket Vennel steps, with the untrodden virgin snow. This site indicates that vennel is a Scots word derived from the French venelle meaning little street. The Vennel steps are also known as The Miss Jean Brodie Steps (good photos) and were named after the character in Muriel Spark’s novel in 2018, the year of what would have been Spark’s 100th birthday. Interestingly, the Atlas Obscura site linked above defines venelle as a small street between two large structures. This is another eye-catching photo with superb composition. I like the way the photo takes you down the steps and then up again to the castle. There is an archway in the bottom middle with the walls and top outlined in snow. Part of the castle is seen through the bare branches of the trees. You can admire the view but also feel the cold. We get some wonderful blue-skied days in winter in Scotland and this photo shows one of these days.
The Grassmarket vennel and looking up to Edinburgh Castle
Three years ago, I posted a review of Sebastian Barry’s outstanding novel “Days without End”. I have now read the follow up to that book – A Thousand Moons (review) – and was not disappointed. The new book is much shorter than the previous one and focuses on one character from Days Without End – Winona Cole, the adopted daughter of Thomas McNulty and John Cole. Winona is a native American – referred to in the book as Indian – whose family was slaughtered by the American army in which McNulty and Cole served. At the start of the novel, Winona recalls that “In early times, I was Ojinjintka, which means rose”. Her family were “..souls of the Lakota that used to live on those old plains”. The teenager Winona, who may be 17 or 18 when the novel takes place in 1870s Tennessee, relates her story in the first person and is a realist. “Even when you come out of bloodshed and disaster, in the end you have got to learn to live”. We are only on page 2. Barry is an enviably graceful writer and the novel is full of memorable sentences e.g. “But the years went by fleet of foot. Like ponies running across endless grasses”. Winona often uses reference to her Indian background.
Winona lives with Cole and McNulty on Lige Mangan’s farm along with two former slaves. They are poor and live in a state dominated by racism where black or Indian people can be assaulted legally. The main plot revolves around Winona’s brutal rape and how she resolves to revenge it and identify her attacker. The background to this is how people’s lives intertwined in the state of Tennessee still haunted by the Civil War and where there is a struggle to combat lawlessness. Winona is an articulate girl and works for the lawyer Briscoe, who seeks to bring a shared sense of what is right amongst the people of the town of Paris. Barry deftly describes the wide differences between the affluent lawyer and the poor farmers to give a convincing portrait of the times.
The book is not at all dark despite the circumstances in which Winona and her “family” live. On a Whitsun holiday, there is merriment, with Lige Mangan taking out his fiddle “.. and shone it up with wax and tightened his strings and off he flew with his Tennessee jigs and reels”. Winona dances wildly – “I let my limbs be crazy and there was no civilised name for how I did”. Rosalee, the former slave also dances – “she threaded herself through the air like a lithesome swan”. Barry also writes poetically about the land and the air – “A high cold sky was speckled with stray blues and greys like a bird’s egg”.
There is drama – but not melodrama – in the book’s conclusion as the plot comes to a climax. A lesser writer than Barry would have over dramatised the ending but we are in the hands of a master writer here and what we read is convincing. I bought the hardback version of this book and it is well worth reading now or when it comes out in paperback. As always with Sebastian Barry, readers are treated with an excellent story, vivid characters and moral dilemmas which the reader must face and sometimes question his/her prejudices. You can listen to an interview with the author on Friday 28 August as he takes part in the online Edinburgh Book Festival.
A superb novel from one of today’s best writers (Click on all photos to enlarge – recommended)
I was recently asked if I would give permission for one or two of my blog photos of Spott village to be used in a local calendar for 2021. My photos are resized and sometimes cropped for use in the blog and the two identified, from 2015, might not have a high enough resolution for the calendar, so I went back to Spott which is 2.6 miles/4.2K from Dunbar. Spott sits in the now lush East Lothian countryside, with swaying fields of barley and wheat, and green fields of potatoes and sprouts on view. The first photo below is taken in the graveyard of Spott Kirk/Church (good photos). I like the shadows from the trees and the gravestones, some of which appear to be leaning towards each other, like two Scottish country dancers preparing to start. In the enlarged photo, over the wall, you can see the fields of wheat and barley in front of Wester Broomhouse farm (photo). In the 1853/4 Name Books, Wester Broomhouse is described as “A farm house with offices, a thrashing Mill worked by steam, some Cottages, and a large farm attached; belonging to Mrs Ferguson of Beil”.
Spott Kirk graveyard and beyond
Crossing the road, I took this view of the kirk (Scots for church). The kirk, with its little bell tower, looks crowded out by the trees around it and in the foreground, there is a field of wheat, which will be harvested in the near future. The heads of grain are large, sharp and have taken on the colour of late summer. There is a variety of trees on view, with the tall, skinny looking pine tree taking centre stage and lofting it over the rest.
Spott Kirk beyond the wheat field
The photo above was taken at the side of the road up to Spott House (history) and the one below shows the driveway up to the house. The trees are in full leaf and displaying many shades of green. The dappled shadows across the road and on the grass make little patches of white. Compare this to the next photo – from a blog post in 2019 – where the trees are bare and their rather inelegant branches appear to be stretching out. On the other hand, the Spring photo shows the brilliant display of daffodils at that time of year. The shadows are also thinner in the 2nd photo. So there is always something different to see here no matter what time of year you come.
Driveway to Spott HouseDriveway to Spott House in Spring
I left Spott and drove down the road to Wester Broomhouse to get a view of the village from the north. You need to enlarge the photo for best effect. The wee kirk is just to the right of centre and Spott House driveway can be seen to the left of the red roofs. This photo also gives a view of the pre-harvested fields of barley in the foreground and wheat above. This is a view that will not have changed much in a hundred years, with the sheep in ultra relaxed mode and the fecund fields of grain. The big difference would be that the fields would be much smaller in 1920.
Over the past 2 weeks, there has been a proliferation of daffodils around East Lothian – on the approaches to towns and villages, at roundabouts, on the edges of woods and in gardens (including my own) around Dunbar. My wife returned from her Wednesday walking group outing to tell me of a spectacular display of daffodils on the driveway up to Spott House (good photos), the residence of the owner of the local Spott Farm. The next day was bright and sunny, so we returned to capture the scene. The two photos below are looking up the driveway, from the left hand side and then the right hand side. The trees are still bare, so the daffodils have no competition in the colour stakes with the green leaves which will appear later. The starkness of the trees in fact enhances the brilliant yellow of the daffodils, although the tree trunks along the edges of the driveway are tall, slim and elegant.
Looking up the driveway to Spott House (Click on all photos to enlarge) Looking up the driveway to Spott House
There had been rain that morning and this had left most of the daffodils with pearl-like drops of rain on them. The two close up shots below – from the front and the back of the flowers – show the translucent quality of the outer leaves, which are paler compared to the brighter yellow. The sun on the first photo makes the delicate raindrops sparkle on the flower head.
Raindrops on the daffodils
In the second photo below, I like the way that the stem behind the rain-spotted leaf is like a shadow and the natural structure of the flower head is something that a human designer or engineers might be proud of. Again the sun helps to give a wonderful sheen to the silk-like texture of the leaves.
Rain on the back of a daffodil head
There are superb views across the countryside from this driveway. The next photo shows the view to the west and you can see that the daffodils are now in full bloom and are complemented by the background of an oil seed rape field which is just turning yellow. When the daffodils fade, the field behind will be a huge swathe of even brighter yellow.
Daffodils, trees and ripening oil seed rape near Spott House
The next photo shows a view of Doon Hill from the driveway. The hill is famous for its neolithic settlement and its proximity to the site of the Battle of Dunbar in 1650. In the photo, you can see the gorse bushes on the hill which are also yellow at this time of year.
Doon Hill seen from Spott House Driveway
From this location, you get a superb view over to Dunbar and you can see how the town has expanded in recent years with the building of hundreds of new houses. On the right hand side, just next to the trees, is Dunbar Parish Church and our house is down the hill from that church.
Looking over Dunbar from Spott House driveway
The final view is looking down the driveway, which gives a splendid view of the trees and the daffodils on either side. In the distance, the hill you can see is North Berwick Law (good photos) which dominates that area of East Lothian. So we enjoyed a fine walk on a Spring morning with invigorating views and an entrancing display of daffodils.
Looking towards North Berwick Law from Spott House
I have just finished reading Robicheaux by the noted US author James Lee Burke. This book is classified as a crime novel and indeed, there is much crime and many criminals to be found in the book, but Burke is such a lyrical writer, especially when describing the bayou settings in the novel, that it should be a novel first and a crime novel second. The titular hero Dave Robicheaux, has featured in many of Burke’s novel and is now semi-retired – officially – but he becomes fully involved in an investigation of a series of murders which involve police on the take, corrupt politicians, gangsters and a terrifying psychopath. Burke has always been a social commentator in his novels, although he never preaches. The book highlights the social tensions in US society between rich and poor, black and white, moral and amoral. One of the key characters in the book is Jimmy Nightingale, a populist politician who plays on the racist and anti-immigrant prejudices of many of his constituents, and is running for the senate, with hopes of higher office. Sounds familiar.
Robicheaux himself is a complex character, who is a recovering and occasionally lapsing alcoholic and Vietnam veteran. His fight is against criminals and the corrupt, but also against himself and his sometimes violent tendencies. His best pal is Clete Purcel, another complicated man whose view is that injustice is best served via violence against the perpetrators. Robicheaux tries to help Purcel and Purcel tries to keep his friend sober. Burke’s dialogue is one of his great strengths and it can be humorous. The pair meet in a bar and it looks like Purcel may be on a bender. Robicheaux asks “Why not put your brain in a jar and give it to a medical school”. The reply is “I did that five years ago. They gave it back”.
This is a mainly male-dominated novel but some of the female characters are well developed, such as Robicheaux’s female boss. Burke has always been a superb story teller and he keeps a complex plot moving and provides the reader with intriguing possibilities as to who might be behind the crime wave that is emerging in the county. Another character is the bayou itself and Burke has many poetic descriptions of the environment in which Robicheaux has his home. For example: “The coastline was a heartbreaking green inside the mist. Flying fish broke from the bay’s surface and sailed above the water …. The salt spray breaking on my bow was cold and fresh and smelled of resilience”. Reading Burke’s novel, you get a sense of the beauty and the danger (e.g. crocodiles) of the natural world, as well as the human world. This is a pacy thriller – but much more than that.
James Lee Burke’s captivating novel (Click on all photos to enlarge)
We now go from the heat and humidity of the Louisiana bayou to the cold and frost (but beautiful blue skies) of south east Scotland. On a recent Sunday morning, we drove 2 miles up country and parked the car at Oswald Dean, locally known as Oasie Dean and went on a circular walk. There was a heavy frost at our house and it was even thicker up the country, but there is a startlingly bright beauty about a frosted scene, such as this one, looking over the bridge at Oasie Dean. The trees, bushes and grass are all whitened and make the blue of the burn more outstanding than normal. The burn interrupts the imposed stillness of its surroundings.
Frosted meadow at Oswald Dean near Dunbar
Just across the road, on the wall above the neighbouring field, I spotted the frozen ivy leaves. The leaves and grass on this side of the wall remained white and stiff, while the leaves at the top and the yellow moss on the right of the photo below, had been restored to suppleness by the sun.
Frosted ivy and sun restored moss on the wall at Oswald Dean
On closer inspection (photo below), the ivy leaves appeared to be delicately dusted with frost, which served not to conceal, but to emphasise the delicate patterns of the veins on the leaves. Some were completely iced over and prickly-looking, while others were only fringed by ice and displayed what looked like a huge river, with tributaries on either side.
Frosted ivy leaves at Oswald Dean
We continued our walk up past The Doonery, now a collection of houses but formerly a farm, with an impressive chimney. Looking back at the Doonery (photo below) the edge of the path which was sheltered from the sun, was still frost-bound. I like the long straight lines in the photo, leading your eye to the bare trees and the former farm buildings.
Frosty pathside leading to the Doonery
Further up, this path has some magnificent trees which glowed in the bright blue winter sunlight. In the photo below, you can see the shadows cast by the trees. It looks like a man or woman is reaching up to pick something off the branches. The tress maybe leafless in January but they still impress with their sturdiness and shining trunks. Above the darker blue sea in the background, the sky goes from pale to a similar dark blue.
Trees on the path up to Doon Hill cast interesting shadows
We came back down the hill via Spott Farm which now appears to be open to walkers and runners, having been closed off for a number of years. The farm has many solid sandstone buildings and as you turn one corner, you see the farm clock (photo below), with its small campanile above. The roof had been partly in the sun, but the frost was still thick on the unwarmed sections.
We were walking down the driveway from the main Spott House building, when 3 deer leapt the fence to our right and bounced across the road into the next field. Seeing deer dash away from you, with their white rumps disappearing into the field, is always a pleasure to see. I managed to catch one of the deer (photo below) as it crossed the tree-lined driveway and the still frosted grass. Again, the trees cast shadows which left sunny rectangles on the road and the grass. A fine end to a very enjoyable walk.
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