What I had stumbled upon three days ago was the edge of Barton Common, into which, Jackie had read, had been reintroduced New Forest ponies in order that, by their chomping and defecating, they could return the area to its natural habitat. As it was indeed a day of enticing light, Jackie drove me there this 
morning. I wandered around the common, and found the six very well fed ponies. As I crouched down to take its companion’s portrait, another crept up behind me and disconcertingly breathed down my neck.
I then walked through the golf course that was still undergoing maintenance, and back along the cliff top to West Road and home through Shorefield.
Golfers were out in force. A trio of the sportsmen, silhouetted against the skyline, gesticulated and indicated that I had strayed from the public footpath. Once I got the message, I called to them and, waving my camera, asked for a repeat performance. One gentleman obliged. I can only assume he was being polite. The patterns on a neatly raked 
bunker had yet to be disturbed.
A helicopter, its propeller blades whirling overhead, was probably safe from sliced golf shots.
From the golf course I could see a family walking along the cliff path which, keeping as far 
away as possible from the edge, I soon joined. At one point I preferred a scramble 
between brambles and barbed wire to the precarious looking path. An approaching gentleman, made of sterner stuff, stuck to the footpath. When I told him he had more nerve than I have, he replied: “Stupid, probably’.
While I was uploading these photographs Barrie dropped in to present me with a signed copy of his latest publication ‘Lawnmower maintenance and other pastimes for the elderly’. I shall enjoy reading it.
This afternoon I continued digging up bramble and ivy roots from the North side of the back drive. Now I have reached inside the gate, I am measuring my slow progress by the lengths of the bricks in the border that we have been unearthing as we go along. Today’s total was eight. I’ll probably need an abacus by the time I have finished.
Our dinner this evening consisted of tender beef casserole, mashed potato, carrots, cabbage, cauliflower and broccoli, followed by lemon drizzle cake and evap. Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I finished the rioja.
Tag: footpaths
Charge The Battery
Taking my normal route this morning to Hordle Cliff, I then turned right and walked to Barton on Sea. From there I took a steeply undulating footpath, initially gravelled then turning to mud. Emerging at Barton Lodge Care Home I took another two right turns into Milford Road, passing Taddiford Farm and picking up the footpath across a fallow field, alongside the wood, through Roger’s fields, into Downton Lane, and home.
The path to Barton comes close enough to the crumbling cliff edge to remind me of my frightening walk with Paul. 
At one point I stepped aside for a cyclist wobbling towards me. She continued towards the safety of the made up path to Milford.
A courageous runner was unperturbed by the proximity of the drop into the ocean.
A variety of mushrooms had pushed their way up through the undergrowth on the borders of the track.
Unfortunately I missed a number of good shots on this walk because my camera battery ran out of juice. There was just enough to fuel a message that read ‘charge the battery’. Barton on Sea Golf Club was having some new landscaping undertaken, and figures were happily silhouetted on the hilly slopes. The gravelled path ran alongside this course, and walkers were warned that on rare occasions miss-hit balls could possibly come whanging their way. As a muddy track took over, and ran through bracken and gorse, we were asked to keep to the footpath and not feed the animals. The only sign of such creatures were what looked like pony droppings and hoof prints on the path. There were some picturesque views out to sea from a number of memorial seats nestling in appropriate vantage points.
On Milford Road I found a small purple rubber duck with a spiky hair-do, that I thought our
water boy might like to play with. This unstable little creature tipped upside down, so Jackie sat it on the side of the water feature’s shell. Once the battery was charged, I could photograph the toy.
If I can summon up the courage to hug the cliff top, to run the gauntlet of golf balls, and to tackle the speeding traffic on Milford Road, I must take that route again, in similarly enticing light, when I have a fully charged battery.
Dinner this evening consisted of chicken breasts marinaded in piri-piri sauce, roast potatoes and other vegetables, and boiled peas and carrots. For afters we enjoyed egg custards. Jackie drank Hoegaarden from what she said was a good year. My wine was Lion’s Gate cabernet sauvigon shiraz 2013.
Studio Portraits
Becky, Ian, Scooby, and I repeated yesterday’s trip to Barton on Sea. This time the rain kept off and we walked down to and along the beach, climbing, by way of a fenced off footpath, up to the road near Sails Coffee Shop, and returning along the straight to Becky’s car.
On the grass near the Beachcomber Cafe we met two women and a young girl with a Scooby lookalike.
The owners released their pets so they could make each other’s acquaintance. The humans chatted whilst the new-found friends frolicked. We soon realised we all 
came originally from London. The cameras were not long in coming out, and various owners attempted to cajole the animals into posing. 
Ian was particularly tender as he caressed Scooby’s ear, no doubt attempting to encourage the forthcoming smile. 
The doppelgänger, Jack, also responded to his owner’s gentle touch. Eventually, hands were withdrawn, and suitable studio portraits achieved.
We walked past a heavily eroded cliff and eventually reached a sign explaining that the area beyond it was closed because of the very high risk of landslides. To the right, some way behind the sign, a woman and child slithered down some scree and made their way to the beach. 
They had descended from the road above, and presumably seen neither the warning nor the high fence. They must, however, have slid under the barrier bordering the path up which we ascended. 
To the right of the path could be seen evidence of cliff falls to which some brick buildings and sections of gardens had clearly been lost.
We hadn’t realised until we reached the top that one of the buildings so near the edge was the terrace on the end of which is Sails Coffee Shop. These are some of the properties that must once have included longer gardens, perhaps evidenced by their shifted footpaths.
The family returned home to Emsworth after our multiple choice dinner. I enjoyed Becky’s penne Bolognese, Lidl’s lasagne, and Jackie’s savoury salad. That is, I had a little of everything. For dessert I opted for Jackie’s apple crumble and custard. Custard tarts, ice cream, fruit salad and various flans were other choices. Ian drank Hoegaarden. The rest of us abstained.
Petra Wouldn’t Chance It
Earlier in the year, along with all her other plants, Jackie potted a couple of clematises. They seemed to be doing pretty well until they were, literally as it turned out, cut off in their prime. Each one had been snipped just above the ground. This proved a mystery until one afternoon Jackie watched a tiny mouse slipping between the bricks on which stand the invader proof fence. At each corner, exactly where the clematises have been positioned, there is just enough room for a ‘waffer thin’ rodent to squeeze through. The stems that got in his way were easily dealt with.
But one of the climbers has survived. It came into bloom when we were out yesterday. The aptly named Clematis Polish spirit showed all the qualities of that oft-beleaguered nation and regenerated itself.
The story of yesterday’s rider on the lawn is that the young lady on horseback had won a prize and the not quite so young photographer was performing on behalf of a local newspaper. We are still no wiser about why our particular lawn was chosen for the photoshoot.
I played hide and seek with light showers on my early evening walk in which I further explored Minstead’s public footpaths. The sound of clopping equine footsteps determined that I turned up Seamans Lane. I just missed the young woman who lives there and has several horses and carts. Continuing on I took the footpath from Bull Lane to the houses opposite the Trusty Servant Inn. This takes us between hedges separating fields with livestock in them. 
There is at each end a gate that can be easily opened.
Crossing the road at the end, I walked up to All Saints Church and down the footpath alongside it. This again is accessed by two simple gates, one at the top and the other at the bottom of the slope.
The path comes out near The Splash, where I crossed the road and walked up towards Furzey Gardens past the study centre. The footpath on the right hand side of this road about halfway up leads down to Audrey Saunders’s ponies’ field. It requires the negotiation of a rather rickety style held together with wire. It is in climbing stiles that I have realised that post hip replacement my left knee is not quite as flexible as it was. 
When I straddle these crossing places I need to grasp my left foot and force a greater genuflection than comes naturally. If, as with this one, the structure wobbles a bit one feels a certain measure of insecurity.
For some reason, this all reminds me of walking with the dogs. The dogs in this case were Jessica’s Collie/Labrador cross, Paddy, and Ali and Steve’s Golden Retriever, Petra. We had to pass through a gate alongside a river or canal in a place I disremember where. Paddy, as usual, squeezed and wriggled her way through, wet-nosing anything that hindered her. Petra, equally as usual, wouldn’t chance it. She stood, head down, sheepishly waiting for someone either to widen the gateway, or to lift her up.
The most stable stile today was the one that leads back onto the road through Minstead from Primrose and Champion’s field.
After the walk I was fed by Jackie with succulent sausage casserole and ratatouille; sausages courtesy of Helen and Bill, and courgettes courtesy of Heather and Brian. I drank a couple of glasses of Vinsobres Cotes du Rhone 2011. It is a great pity Jackie can’t remember where she bought the wine, because it is excellent.
That’s What Wellies Are For
David and Jen also gave us wine and stilton for Christmas this year. It was therefore appropriate that their box should take the tie overflow (see yesterday’s post). But who wears ties these days?
Once again we were waterlogged. Knowing, when I set out to walk the Emery Down loop via Mill Lane, that I would encounter an otherwise impassable road and some pretty soggy footpaths, I wore my Wellington boots. These, as we shall see, came in handy.
Sporting yellow-rimmed dark glasses, Audrey was gamely trying to ensure that her ponies, Primrose and Champion, enjoyed a feed of dry hay. When I passed them on my return, a little over two hours later, Primrose was stuffing the last of it inside her. Champion, who was now showing little interest was probably already stuffed.
The pool that was Lyndhurst Road at the point at which I had once, un-wellied, turned back, was full to spraying. Some vehicles slowed down to a snail’s pace, others went tearing through showering all about them. I wonder whether a snail could actually have made it through.
As I neared the highest part of Mill Lane, a trail of bobbing antlers glided silently past, just beneath the brow of the hillside slope. On the far side of the field they gathered into seminar formation. 
I became quite excited when, changing my angle of vision, I realised that the course facilitator of this stag party was the legendary white one. I rather blew it when I got a bit too close and they elegantly pranced off with the poise of Kate Moss on the catwalk.
Walking past the Mill Pool I encountered a young man pushing a wheelbarrow down the muddy track towards me. Once I had realised that this was not Robert (see 17th February), I carried on a conversation with Barry, who had been given the night off by his wife. Barry was not surprised that the brief respite we had had from the rain ended as we stopped to speak. You see, his wheelbarrow contained his fishing gear and his tent, so, of course it was bound to rain. There must be worse ways of spending a night, but offhand I can’t think of one.
As I neared Emery Down I rather rashly took a diversion onto a footpath. Well, if truth be told, I needed a pee, and reckoned no-one else would be daft enough to venture onto it on such a day. There I saw a sign which gave me some insight into the farmer’s perspective on the availability of ramblers’ footpaths controversy.
Throughout my walk I found myself seeking out the puddles on the road, so that I could walk through them and clean off some of the mud from the more cloying footpaths. I began to feel like a three year old trying out his new footwear and stamping in the pools sending up his equivalent of the car spray mentioned earlier. Many a time have I offered a remonstrating parent the opinion that ‘that’s what wellies are for’.
On my return I decanted a few more items into the garage, then rang the Apple Help Line. This required two calls of approximately an hour’s duration, one of which required me to spend some time listening to music which I completely failed to categorise. I expect it is up to the minute. I was guided to downloading the relevant software. James and Joseph, the two young advisers could not have been more helpful. Unfortunately the problem, even after half an hour’s downloading, remains. I expect I will have to talk to Epson, who make the scanner. Another day.
This evening we both ate more delicious Chilli con carne; I drank more zinfandel, and Jackie abstained.