Exits and Entrances

Here we come a-wassailing/Among the leaves so green/Here we come a-wandering/So fair to be seen.

With family staying at the Corner House over the New Year break I persuaded them into celebrating the seasonal horticultural spirit, seeing out the old to usher in the new. After supper on NYE we got noisy with saucepans and wooden spoons around the Arthur Turner, the oldest and largest of our apple trees, carousing it with a wassailing song in ragged harmony.

Emily (10) poured a libation of cider round the roots before brother Harry (13) discharged a few pellets from the air rifle through the bare branches to see off any lurking evil spirits. Yours truly, in a mask I’d once worn in a production of The Tempest many moons ago, brandished the airgun for good measure while chanting a scatter rhyme to close proceedings. We all loved the impromptu fun in reconnecting, however haphazardly, with that most ancient of traditions – placating the gods to ensure good harvests in the year to come.

The mild spell of weather allowed us to enjoy successive evenings socialising on the deck round the fire pit, with a variety of rugs and cushions for warmth and comfort. Dried logs and briquettes fuelled the mesmerising flames, captured and reflected in the steel drum. In following days I tipped the residual wood ash around some of the cordoned apples out front, raking the grey matter into the damp soil. A good source of potassium, it may yet prove a more scientific boost to productivity than our turn of the year ritualistic carryings on!

Elsewhere in the garden the wildlife ponds are full to the brim from weeks of rain. During a recent cold snap, in lifting one of the larger edge stones, a frog dived for cover under the film of ice. As noted here before, this year’s newtlets are in there too, hiding out from frogs and other predators like diving beetles or dragon fly larvae in the mass of oxygenating weed.In the new and much deeper pond the watercress has become well established, and is still putting out fresh green leaves, above tangles of floating white roots. It really is the most useful cover and shelter for so many aquatic animals and insects. 

Nearby, underneath the blackthorn and oak in the copse, I lifted the lid of one of the old compost bin tops, placed there for animal shelter years back, to delightedly discover it has a resident this winter. A great round mass of leaves, grass stalks and other plant matter with a clear trail in and out. Not sure if that indicates a hedgehog in residence or a rodent of some kind…Must keep an eye on it over the weeks to come.

Enjoyed a family outing along a favourite section of Hadrian’s Wall. We chose not to take the more rugged and scenic right turn from Steel Rigg. That leads walkers eastwards to the gap which no longer features the sycamore that bears its name, notoriously felled in a devastating act of vandalism earlier in 2023. Simply cannot yet bring ourselves to see the sorry sight of a boxed off tree stump.

Instead we took the path less travelled by, gradually ascending westwards to the highest point along the wall at Winshields, which also happens to be the midway point on the original 73 mile long northern frontier of the Roman Empire, from sea to sea. Particularly struck by the section just below the trig point where the ridge’s field boundary wall, running along the exposed foundations of the Roman structure, meets the original wall and once again resumes its wide onward stride.

The atmospheric panorama presented us was a winter best, with distant rolling mists alongside clear sun lit patches, harmonic shades splayed across the fells subtly changing under a diffuse wash of pale light – a water colourist’s dream!

Back where we had parked at The Sill, the National Park’s visitor centre, a good post walk lunch was enjoyed in the upstairs café. The gift shop here stocks a good selection of items produced or sourced from within the park’s boundaries (including Kim’s books!) The amount of merchandise – from post cards and posters to book covers and beer bottle labels – that feature the iconic lone sycamore only adds greater poignancy to the collective sense of loss.

The visitor centre has a display of people’s handwritten posts and pictures that mark its tragic demise, which we viewed as we left. A reminder of how much that singularly graceful tree has been missed and mourned by so many hereabouts and indeed everywhere else.

Bidding the family farewell on New Year’s Day we noted a splash of colour by the yard gate. A hellebore, emerged from the humus rich soil of the copse. With no flowering rival in sight this beautiful ‘Winter Rose’ really is the most cheering of company and a symbol of hope and renewal for the year to come.