white_hart

No long walk this weekend, but I managed two shorter walks along the canal towpath.

T was out yesterday, and although the weather wasn't brilliant I thought it would do me good to get outside, so I decided to go for a walk along the canal to buy myself something for dinner. When I set off, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to walk to Sainsbury's in Kidlington or all the way to M&S in Summertown, but by the time I reached the bridge I'd need to cross to get into the nature reserve on the way to Sainsbury's I was enjoying walking far too much not to carry on to Summertown. The rain held off, and the gleams of sunshine filtering through the cloud cover and reflecting off the water gave everything a wonderfully moody, atmospheric look. Unfortunately, when I got to Wolvercote I discovered that the towpath was closed between there and Jericho for major works. It looked as though they were making it wider and flatter and gravelled, as it is nearer the centre of Oxford, rather than narrow and uneven and muddy as it is further north. I can see the point, as it is quite heavily used, by cyclists as well as walkers and runners, but the vegetation along the banks is so glorious in summer I hope they aren't planning to extend this any further north.

In any case, the closure meant that although I walked just under five miles, the last mile and a bit was on roads rather than towpath, and when it was sunny this morning I decided to go for another walk, to Sainsbury's this time.

The nature reserve was muddy but was rather lovely under blue skies. I bumped into my next-door neighbour bird-watching by the pond and she pointed out the heron I'd otherwise have mistaken for another tree-stump on the island in the middle, and told me all the different species of ducks she'd spotted through her binoculars. And I'm sure it's done me good to get a reasonable amount of time outdoors and mostly away from roads and houses this weekend.