Planet Ruby Starrs

We seem to be experiencing a life as we knew it again.... A walk on the beach with a good friend from Northumberland - a long overdue get together and in spite of lock down limitations we still seem to have plenty to chat on about... then visitors (in the garden) at the weekend and then a day out in the van..  It was very glorious to get up silly early (for us) with the sunrise - have our marmite toast and then head across country and be parked up in a little layby by 9.00 to have a rambling wander along the valley near Ullswater.  The weather was completely amazing - you just don't get many days like this in the Lake district and we were glad we had made the effort to make the most of it.  There were few people about - to be honest we didn't expect to see any one but we did come across a couple of other walkers. The fields were full of lambs pronking and the grass was full of wildflowers.  We meandered along the valley path for about an hour and then made camp and a...

It was wet and windy down south – so much that the Bristol balloon festival was delayed.. and the Boardmaster festival – not that we were going – was completely cancelled so there were quite a few lost campers trundling around the south west looking for alternative entertainment… We did quite well -on a mission to find and ‘tick’ all the remaining esoteric crags on Dr Freds list and I followed with camera, sketch book and reading material in hand finding nice spots to photograph, sit and draw.  We were lucky with the weather - we managed to dodge all the really bad stuff and some how find quite a lot of sunshine...   We had a very pleasant walk from Frome to Mells through some ancient woodland – we were only going to do a couple of miles but got carried away chatting and wandering and ended up doing over six instead!   Beautiful woodland complete with running stream, waterfalls, mill houses and some almost complete lime kilns. Made all the nicer ...

Caldera Blanca One of the reasons for coming to this part of the world was to explore the volcanic regions – we were a tad disappointed to find driving around and exploring the main group in the Timafaye national park has to be done as a tour – due to limited access, its just not practical to let endless tourist do their own thing.  After a bit of research we found a walk up a volcano on the edge of the national park which was acceptable.  So that’s where we headed.  We parked the car in a cinder car park and hit the trail.  It was a slag stone heap cinder path cut through the lava fields.  The lava flows went on for miles all around us mile after mile of just black lumps and chunks of stone, some very jagged looking others having really smooth flowing surfaces.  On some of the rock a grey lichen has formed but for a great part of the landscape that is the only evidence of life.   the ascent begins The day wasn’t too good weather wise – ho...

It was a weekend of tea and cake... Saturday we had visitors who arrived armed with yummy cake and I baked scones so it was a bit of a cake fest... and then Sunday brought more visitors with more cake ... which necessitated a long walk to earn the sugar overload.... lone tree with moon in shot... We had a fabulous walk taken from a friends Oxfam book find ''100 great walks in the UK ''- or something like that - it was pretty amazing to find such a pleasant varied and quiet peaceful walk just minutes away from Newton Aycliffe and Darlington.  The day was a glorious fresh sunny February day hardly a cloud in a fantastic blue sky, and we wandered across fields and through woods. We had a sandwich and cake picnic, sat in the sun by a deserted barn from which we watched a bard owl swoop across the landscape.  We meandered back alongside the river and back into Barmpton village,  an excellent 8 mile circular walk.  Definitely earned cake.... into the w...

Life continues in our new cottage and amazingly we are almost completely unpacked and nearly everything has found its place to live.  We flattened  83 boxes yesterday, and there are still some full of books which kind of travel with us and never manage to get unpacked... maybe this time!!!! My studio needs some organising but that is a task that I look forward to and will evolve as I start to use the room.  The weekend weather was reasonably clement for mid February and we had some friends come and visit.  We spent some time almost basking in the sunny courtyard garden ad Dr Fred enlisted help to clear the flags ready for the pots we hope to furnish it with as soon as we get Beryl back!!! We also started some exploring of the local village and countryside. We went for a nice walk down through the quite picturesque village and up past to the gallops where the race horse breeding farm were exercising some of the horses.  Apparently there are 98 hor...

We moved on from the motel, the storm the storm the night before had caused lots of damage and I was so glad we had been in the motel and not the tent.   storm clouds over the motel We headed down the highway to find a campsite near Lake Louise.  Camping is limited here and was busy but we were early so go sorted and then went off to look at the Takakaw Waterfalls – very spectacular…  DR Fred at the Takakaw falls back to the camp – there is so little flat land around here that everything is crammed in so we are right next to the road and worse still the railway (miles and miles of freight trains) !!! Anyway we didn’t really notice the traffic or train noise in the evening as we went to a talk on the Burgess shale  Fossils, (interesting and google them for more detail) and then came back to base and went to bed!  The trains were ridiculously noisy in the night and they go on for ever… and then there’s another one!!!!  but in the end...