H2Oh my God!

Well what is there to say about the last week other than it has been wet. We have had flash floods, rivers bursting their banks, road closures and general traffic chaos. On Wednesday it took me an hour and a half to travel about 4 miles, at the end of a long day it was not pleasing for me or all the other commuters trying to get home.

Ocean terminal.

For me, like many others I presume, the bad weather really does take it's toll on my mood and motivation. The Summer is the time when I like to recharge my batteries with plenty of outdoor activities and fresh air, I need this to survive the long dark nights of the Winter, but this year so far that has been so hard to do. Granted I was not well recently but today was the first dry day in weeks that I have been able to go out for a wee tour on Dolly. She has been so underused that her tyres had gone quite flat. I hope that does not happen with the real Dolly! It was great to get out, although I am kind of worried about my fitness levels, but will struggle on.

I think this is referring to Summer.

Fog and rain.

Hearts and flowers.

Forget me nots?

I eventually found some sunshine on Friday in Aberfoyle. It really was quite blinding to my unadjusted eyes, but sat out for my lunch and tried to absorb as much vitamin D as possible.

I found the sun.

Yesterday (Saturday) was still absolutely disgusting and rained for the whole day, so the only sensible thing to do was go for a bit of retail therapy. I found what I think will become my most loved pair of shoes. Always been a fan of them cowboys. Further cheering up was found in a bottle of wine and a good blether with my fabulous friend Hazel. Good times.

New shoes. Yee Haa.

Peace x

All photographs by Caroline Harvey.

Friday Flowers

Well it's Friday and the end of another short chapter in my life as I start a new job on Monday. Hopefully this will also give me some new photo opportunities as I will be travelling to different places.

Todays photo is an oldie from my Squamish days. Love them Squamish days. Good times. Good people.

Pretty.

Peace x

All photographs by Caroline Harvey.

Mostly Green Things

Monsters?

A few weekends ago I visited some dear friends in Dumfries and Galloway. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, so a walk through one of the many forests was called for. I had a "Ooh all the plants are so lovely" day and went a bit snap happy with my camera. There were some weird plants though! A copse of monkey puzzles and millions of skunk cabbages. Who would of thought you could find those in D & G.

Monkey puzzles on a telly tubby hill

Jaggy!

Almost tropical!

Very straight trees

A skunk cabbage. Smelly!

Cabbage as far as the nose can smell

 

Rhododendron

Dead tree

Foggy

All photos by Caroline Harvey

Hepburn

Fantastic view and blue skies

With the memories of soggy Spain well and truly behind us, we have had much more successful and cheaper trips down the A1 to Northumberland recently.

 I love my bouldering. I am not super strong, I often fail on problems because I have the flexibility of a plank of wood and will never achieve fame or recognition for my performances, but it is great fun! Especially on sunny days with good friends.

Hepburn was our choice of venue on both occasions. It is a very peaceful place on the moors with great views and some excellent and tricky problems. Many of the problems have obviously not seen much traffic, so be prepared to go with a brush or two, and I highly recommend you invite Emma too as she is ever so slightly obsessive about cleaning, so you can be guaranteed good clean holds.

A pretty wall and tree

Pretty flowers

Dandilion, before I blew it and made a wish

Emma on a warm up traverse

Me getting pumped on the warm up

A slightly more flattering angle of photo than the previous one

Clean me, clean me now!

Emma. OCD. Never.

What a lovely clean hold.

Trough traverse 6c

All photos by Caroline Harvey with the obvious exception of the ones of me which were taken by Emma.

Tis the season to be Springy!

It is so nice to feel that Summer is nearly here. I love this time of year when all the daffodils and crocuses come out, everything seems much more colourful and cheery. Since I had a little free time I took my usual route along the canal and through the Meadows, because the flowers there are always good. Although the Meadows probably needs an extra week or so to be in full bloom, hopefully if the frost stays away! They never last long so go gaze at the purple and yellow carpet before they get either trampled or die.

All photographs by Caroline Harvey