bewilderbrain

A brilliant frosty landscape, apple-noshing blackbirds, soaring buzzards and grumpy sheep…

Tuesday 14th January 2026
Walk start time: 9.31am
Walk finish time: 10.45am
Walk area: Gelliwion lanes
Miles walked: 2.2

Today is my first proper walk out for far too long. The chaos of Christmas has eaten my energy, at the same time as I ate most of its energy -and it felt like there wasn’t time or space to get out.

Which there always must be.

However, what’s done is done, new year, new resolve.

And always present, but newly awakened, the visceral pull to be outside.

A few steps from my own front door, a little wagtail appears from nowhere and bobs merrily along the kerb a few steps in front of me, as if to encourage me along, and to congratulate me on leaving the house. I have never seen one on my own road before, and I take it as a glorious omen.

Ascending Gelliwion road, the air is crisp, and the hard frost of the morning is just starting to thaw under the watery sun. As the sun peeps over the field edge through bare trees, it gilds it with that purity so unique to a winter landscape.

A little further up the road, the sound of cars is already fading, and small fleets of birds flit busily between bare branches and still evergreen bushes. The song of the robin is everywhere, and the hedgerows feel alive with their energy.

I become absorbed and fascinated in trying to photograph frost, tripping with my usual grace over a large clod of earth into a fence as I balance precariously over a frosty bramble.

I can’t stop stopping, to look at the shapes of the icy formations on different shapes of leaf and plant, and the intricate lace-like patterns it forms.

As I near the houses on the upper stretch of the lane, a coal tit calls distinctly from the fields beyond, similar to the Great-tits saw-like call, but like a smaller, gentler saw.

Beside me an unexpected bright patch of colour, a bounty of autumns windfall apples, lying in a nest of bronzed but frosty leaves.

As I look at this patch, it is like the seasons, though distinct, can never quite be separated. Here, the clean, barren winter and warm bountiful autumn co-exist in splendour, and in glorious natural harmony.

Bob the blackbird looked a bit furtive caught amidst his treasure as I walked up the hill, but I was able to spend some truly quality time with him on the way down.

Beyond the houses, as I approach the cattle grid to the lane proper, so many small birds are flitting back and forth that it’s hard to keep up with them. I think I spot a tiny secretive wren for a moment amidst the bare branches.

Winter opens such different vistas – landscapes once obscured, appear in different scale and detail, birds otherwise hidden amidst green canopies become suddenly and joyfully visible.

On the forest side of the road, further evidence of autumn’s resolution not to be forgotten, a sheltered tree clinging to its crop of bronzed leaves, the warm russet of the bracken like a woodland blanket against the icy air.

Near a gate post with glimpses of a beguiling misty horizon in the high field beyond, I stop. I imagine that if I stand here still for a few minutes, birds will come close.

After only moments, my reward is an enormous buzzard, taking off a mere twenty metres or so on the field horizon beyond. He sails majestically up into the diluted rays of the sun and disappears silently into the mist.

On the lane, my frost fascination continues with a series of seed heads, gilding and showcasing the winter’s light, and the stark tree silhouettes in the frosty fields beyond.

The mist hovers in the distance, trailing a path through the valley that separates Mynydd Gelliwion from the Graig mountain – the wending pathway of the river Gelliwion in its depths.

Spectral tree shapes arise from the misty air, in images where the clear cold of winter seems to infiltrate, and emanate, from the scene.

By stark contrast, the warmth in the vibrant colours of mossy dry stone wall, and frosty moss and fern.

I reach The Dingle, a magical place in any season, and the soft trickle of the stream that wends its way beneath the road here slows my pace naturally to the softest wander.

The only sound here is the water, and the dense, joyful ever-changing melodies of the birds. A complete stillness which is utterly suffused with life.

I allow myself to simply stand, mesmerised by the vistas from this spot. The low winter sunlight, even now, starting to gently increase its strength, filtering through to a positively Avalonian landscape beyond.

It is not a complete moment of solitude and reflection however, I have company and solidarity in my moments of wonder, in the form of Brenda the less than impressed sheep, who stares at me slightly belligerently for the duration of my visit.

Reluctantly, I turn to trace my steps away from my mystical haven, and from Brenda’s scintillating company, and begin to return to the bend in the road.

On the horizon to my left, an ancient and impressive stone ruin stands proudly, almost like the remains of a remote church, but probably a large farm-building, no doubt derelict for centuries.

One end wall still stands tall and complete, arching into the heavens with a dark hole of window just beneath it’s apex. As I pass, another buzzard rises silently from this pinnacle, silhouetted momentarily against the grey sky before disappearing over the hill.

Descending the lane, the song of dunnocks accompanies me, and further on they are joined by the tenacious robins, as well as blue, coal and great tits flitting back and forth across the path.

As I reach the apple tree, a blackbird ( I can’t of course be quite sure it was the same one as on the way up) is tucking heartily into his all day dessert menu.

His determination is evident, and even my presence, inching closer and closer to his feasting table, does not seem to diminish his desire for the delicious bounty of rotten apples.

He is quite a character, and I watch him in close proximity for a good five or ten minutes. He pecks industriously and messily, hurling little chunks of apple into the leaves as he snaffles them up, furtively looking around him after each bite to see if he has been spotted. I see him close up, can see him blink his eyelids, the luxuriant fluffy plumage of his breast.

I feel, as I take a few sneaky photographs, that ours may be a reluctant friendship, as I rather suspect he has rendered himself too full to move…

I leave Bob behind to recover from his stomach ache.

The mists have been gradually clearing, but the ice remains on the roadside ditches, green grass crunching amidst mud and leaf mulch. The frosty view of Graig mountain is breath-taking, and the air smells sharp and tingly, my senses awakened, as I leave the high roads behind me.

Meteorologically, we are at the mid-point of winter today, and astronomically, we are not even half-way. But at nearly a month past the solstice, this is the point in January at which incrementally, we start noticing the gentle lengthening of the light.

After a difficult journey full of road closures, heavy traffic and delays yesterday, I ended up after several hours of driving, taking a diversion through spectacularly quaint and quintessential English villages in liminal sunset lighting to reach the Old Severn Bridge.

It was approaching five o’clock, but the streaks of deep gold, brilliant pink and azure blue on the horizon, together with the spellbinding reflections of the sunset on the river, reminded me of the slow but ever-present cycling of the seasonal clock.

We are already lightening, but there is no hurry – we know it will come. Mid-winter is magical (see the Joy of January- why we should embrace the deep dark of winter) and arriving back home rosy cheeked from my walk today, I felt determined to love the season…

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