Take a Walk on the Wild Side...of town.

Some days it feels like if I'm not out in the woods, lighting fires, cutting down trees or foraging in the undergrowth for edible plants, then I'm not really a true outdoors / bushcraft type. To be honest, I'm not sure if I really want to be, but I do like being outdoors as much as possible. Or to be more truthful, there are times when I don't want to be outdoors, often quite a lot of times, but it does appear to be the environment in which I best thrive. And so I am incredibly fortunate to be paid to spend a large part of my working week exploring the wilder side of the national arboretum.

However, does 'wild' always mean remote locations? (And yes, I do count the arboretum as a remote location as at 600 acres, I still keep finding areas I've never been to before).

What about the wilderness on your doorstep?

Living in what is thought to be the oldest continually inhabited town in England, you would have thought there would be no room for anything wild, but a short walk from my front door would prove you mistaken.

Daniels Well after the rain

A hilltop town, almost completely surrounded by the water, means housing development has been almost non existent until recent years and a green corridor encompasses the town to the benefit of both residents and wildlife. Within a five minute stroll from the house and I was at Daniels Well (named after a bishop of the early Church of England who had a liking for standing neck deep river here), watching a family of five buzzards soar over head, wrens, robins and blackbirds hop between the branches on the riverside willows and spotted a birds nest beside a street lamp, presumably making the most of the free electricity. Nettles were beginning to show themselves above ground after their winters retreat and golden celandines shouted out to all passing that  spring was on it's way.

Past a site notorious for its rioting and debauchery, (admittedly nearly 500 years ago, when the last fair held there was cancelled due to the anti social behaviour - but it must have been debaucherous if it still hasn't been reinstated), to the old silk mills where willow and alder
flourish.

Then onto one of the most exclusive clubs in the world; to belong, you have to be a direct descendant of one of the men  who fought for Athelstan over 1000 years ago, past ivy clad walls and a stream lined street, both of which in warmer months will be full of small flying insects, and all that feed on them. Past the pigs (which appear to have gone away for the winter) and a scene of murder deduced from the large amount of brown feathers floating in the breeze - either another sign of the wild side of life or a rather remote pillow fight.

Murder Crime Scene

The final stretch, by this point a good half mile from the house, winds its way through a small nature reserve where mallards and moorhens navigate the river, magpies screech in the trees and all around the air is filled with the sound of feathered evensong of numerous birds whom I could only hope to one day recognise the calls of.

Then home

An hours walk, never more than half a mile from the front door, yet totally wild.... Oh... and a duck