Madeira Day 3

On our 3rd day, we got up for Breakfast and CBC went to go and pick up the hire car.  We decided to make sandwiches from the buffet to take on our walk.  We got in the car and drove to do walks PR10 and PR11.

The first walk was a mere 3km total called Vereda dis Balcoes. It was super easy and accessible on a wide path that was pretty flat. 

It led to a viewing platform with wonderful views of the mountains around. We soon noticed people feeding chaffinches from their hands. Clearly The Madeiran Chaffinches love a Picnic. 

It didn't take long for me to lure my own chaffinches with a bit of sandwich. A few of them are from my hand whilst fluttering and the more audacious and greedy ones sat on my finger hoovering up every morsel. 

Despite them being comfortable if anyone with food held out a hand, it felt very special to have a tiny bird on the hand. 

Once we'd stayed here a little while, we walked back to start of the route. There was another route in the village. Pr10 which was longer.  Around 11km. It went along the Levada Do Furado.  It is one of the oldest public levadas, acquired by the state to irrigate the agricultural fields of Porta da Cruz.

Many of the walking routes follow the Levada, historic water ways. The routes can be quite narrow in areas and you will be next to a sheer drop but they have metal railing erected. 

The walk was pleasantly shady as it was overhanging with trees, however, the walk did not feel particularly varied as the view was hard to spot, there was little variation in ups and downs. 

A highlight of the journey was reaching a waterfall with a mesmerising clear pool. A man was swimming in there and we were tempted to go in too. In retrospect, we regret not doing this. 

Levadas. The walks are very safe as they have railings. However, a lot of the walk was the same.

Possibly the most exciting part of the walk was walking through the rock face!

The final 1.5km of the walk was downhill (finally some variation!) We ate our picnic lunch in some lovely shade before the descent.  It ended at the Portela belvedere in the municipality of Machico.

The views were beautiful from there.

We found a yellow taxi waiting there at the who drove us back to the car in Ribiero Frio! We were very thankful he was there!

Once we got back to the car, we decided to drive to Santana to have a look around. It was said to have examples of a typical Madeiran traditional house.

There were a few of them.

In one of them, they had a small shop selling a few things including ice-lollies from a natural company.  CBC had a pineapple and mint one.  I had a Strawberry and chocolate lolly. It was covered in a thin layer of crispy dark chocolate and had a fruity inner of real frozen strawberry pulp.  It was really tasty. We stopped for a cool drink in a nice cafe/restaurant. I had a non-alcoholic version of Poncha (punch with passionfruit and orange) and CBC had a bear.

As we sat there, I was admiring the beautiful archictecture of the hospital

We decided to have Dinner in Santana and there was a  Pizza restaurant with a very noisy parrot near the car. CBC had a pizza and I had some sort of tasty steak with fries and a beautiful rainbow salad.

In the car on the way back, we passed through many tunnels, long ones at that! We got back around 9pm so I decided to go for a swim FINALLY in the hotel pool. It was very pleasant. I then booked for the next morning.  They told me it had to be before 9am as they had swimming lessons then which seemed a bit annoying but I was happy to book for 8.30am.

Feed the birds- Tuppence a bag

 My Mum has always had a special affinity with animals.  The family always had pets when she was young and she used to be able to get them to do all sorts of things.  She became a vet nurse when we were children and indeed, a lot of my Saturday afternoons and school holidays as a child were spent at the Vet's surgery.  I always enjoyed watching operations.  However, this is not where I am going with this post.

Mum has taken to feeding the numerous wildlife which frequent her garden.  CBC is green with envy at the amount of Goldfinches which visit her feeders.

She's recently started to  grow very fond of a particular dove/pigeon hybrid who she calls Speckles who visits her garden and is incredibly pretty.  Speckles enjoys tightrope walking and swinging on Mum's washing line.  She sent me various videos and pictures of how she has got the birds to come and feed in shapes- hearts, circles and various other shapes- the birds seem to segregate themselves into different colours and breeds. I thought you'd enjoy the photos!

A hole in the brickwork

 I was waiting with our last pupil from  our Treasure Island rehearsal on Tuesday night and we were standing on the slope outside the school office/main entrance. All of a sudden, I heard a clamour of tiny high-pitched tweets. I listened and tried to follow the direction of the sounds and noticed a small hole in the brickwork further up the wall. I realised that there was probably a nest there with babies being fed by a mother/father. I told the pupil what I suspected and suggested we watch the hole to see if a parent-bird came in our out. At that moment, a sparrow flew out and we looked delightedly at each other.  The babies quieted down and I told the pupil they were probably doing that to stay safe whilst the parent wasn't there  We watched and the parent returned and the noise increased again.  She stared at me with wide eyes and said, "Birds are really clever!".  It was a really special moment for both of us to see and hear the tiny family.  I told her to look out as she came in each morning and she left smiling.

A tiny moment but a precious moment when you can be tired, melancholic and a little lost.

Look for the small moments in life. The small details, the tiny joys for they are the joyous moments that make your heart glad.

x

Southend Pier

Two weekends ago, my sister and her boyfriend came to stay.  We decided to head to Southend-on-Sea for the afternoon and take a trip on the pier train!

Southend pier is the largest pleasure pier in the world and extends 1.34 miles into the Thames estuary.

The Victorian era was a great time for the rise of the seaside holiday so many visitors to the coast, so relatively near to London created a demand for infastructure.

It first opened to the public in 1889 (in its current form) and the pier train opened in the early 1890's.  It was the first pier train in the country.

The pier train has played an important part of Southend's history.

In both World wars, it played a part. In WW1, ships which container German PoW's were moored on the end of it. In WW2, it was commandeered by the Navy and was closed to the public. After that time, it received many visitors from the late 40's onwards. In the 70's, there was some structural issues and there was a threat of closer, only stopped by protests. Grants were awarded and the pier was renovated with a new pier train in the 1980's.

It costs a minimum of £1 to walk on the pier. If you want the train, a one way ticket is £5.70 per adult. If you're feeling lazy or infirm, you can get a return ticket for £6.20.

We decided to take the train there and then walk back.

As we left, my musical era was delighted by the regular ostinato (repeated pattern) rhythm the train made.  The train moves fairly slowly so you can take photos as you go. I enjoyed looking at the underside of the pier at this height.

Here's the only shot I took inside. It was quite busy!

The train is a jolly green colour. Does it seem like it's smiling to you?

When you reach the other end of the pier, you can see some of the older trains including the royal carriage (the red one)

 I enjoyed the BR sign!

The seagulls were enjoying something edible on the railway line!

You can see Adventure Island behind.

It was a glorious day and this was a great activity for a sunny winter day.

At the end of the pier, there are quite a few facilities including Jamie's Italian. There are various kiosks which were all shut but I imagine, in the Summer, they house souvenirs and ice-creams.

Above, is a view from the end of the pier.

There is an RNLI centre and launchpoint at the end of the pier.  We saw one of the RNLI boats coming back in and got to watch it being winched back in.

Behind the lifeboat station, there is a great point to sit and look out to see with a large bell. Sadly, we couldn't really get to the end as there was a large amount of Twitchers/Birders who were all patiently there with vast cameras and binoculars as a Winter White Diver (or something like that) had been spotted there 2 days prior.

Lifeboat spam detailed below.

We noticed this great postbox cosy on the skinny little postbox!

Alas, we couldn't stay too long as we had to get some lunch before driving into London for a show (me and sister- Frozen. Boyfriend an CBC- De Peche mode.

I loved these three birds enjoying the halcyon day!

I recommend a visit to the pier.  It's easy to get to from Liverpool Street via the C2C or the Abellio Greater Anglia line.

I recommend a visit to Utopia cafe if you don't fancy the pier fare. It's a really quirky independent business. And if you want Fish and Chips, you are spoilt for choice!

x

Music about birds

I love birds! I've been fascinated with Bird Song for quite a few years, more so since I started teaching some bird song lesson as part of my Year 2 Music curriculum.  There are about 14 birds whose song I can recognise easily.  

Back in 2000, I went to Iceland for a 3-4 day trip. It was the most jam-packed wonderful holiday.  My Mum has an Icelandic penpal, Erla, and she worked at the Reyjavik radio station and she got tickets for us to go and see the Iceland symphony orchestra on the night we arrived in Iceland. 

It was a fantastic concert to see because it was all based on Bird Song and also included a flute concerto by Haukur Tomasson, which was brilliant for me to see as a flautist.  

Many composers, throughout the years have been fascinated by Birdsong and incorporated it into their music, as well as those I saw in that concert and I thought it would be an intriguing blog post to share some examples of less familiar, as well as more familiar music inspired by Bird song.  Some composers have used it in a stylised way, others in a more precise way, carefully transcribing and translating bird song onto instruments, others, it is a descriptive influence rather than something tangibly recognisable.

Here is a piece of music about Bird song by the Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara entitled Cantus Arcticus.  This piece is interesting because it has instruments imitating birds from the Arctic countries but it ALSO has recordings of these birds that play at the same time as you perform. You hear SO many different birds singing.  Rautavaara travelled very far north to Liminka in Northern Finland to record bird song in the marshlands.  This piece was in that Iceland Symphony orchestra concert and since I couldn't read the Icelandic programme, I had no idea that there would be sections of recorded birdsong where the orchestra was silent.  I was most perplexed when I heard the peeping begin.  I play this piece to my Year 2's.

I've been fortunate enough to perform this twice, which was fun as it starts with flute solos!  There are three sections

The next piece we heard in that concert was A flock descends into the Pentagonal garden by Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu. The composer had a vision of a single black bird leading a flock of white birds into a beautiful Japanese garden.  He was influenced by an American composer called John Cage and the piece also features pentatonic melodies- pentatonic music uses only 5 pitches.  Takemitsu is hugely influenced by nature and lots of his pieces have really evocative titles.  Perhaps this piece isn't particularly easy listening for you but there are some wonderful imaginative sounds in it.

Aside from the flute concerto, the final piece in that concert was Olivier Messiaen's Oiseaux Exotiques.  This French composer was utterly fascinated by Birdsong and he wrote many, many pieces based on Birdsong which he went out and transcribed from more common birds to the more exotic ones.  Oiseaux Exotiques features a solo piano as well as various wind instruments.  

I played this piece in my second year at university and played that screechy piccolo part! I remember my friend Ian playing the e flat clarinet part and he accidentally turned over 2 pages in the concert.  Luckily, I was tacet at that time and realised, so I calmly turned his page over and pointed to where we were.

Here is another  piece by the French composer, Oliver Messiaen, called Le Merle Noir- this means The Blackbird and it COPIES the song of the Blackbird , my favourite bird who actually sings LOTS of different patterns. It is for solo flute and piano and features solo sections of very fast jagged music played just by the flute and really does resemble the Blackbird.  I performed this for my 2nd year recital at university.

Onto the less modern music, easier listening perhaps.

Another French composer, Camille Saint-Saens wrote a piece about an AVIARY- this is a big cage/enclosure where lots of different birds are kept so it is supposed to sound like lots of birds twittering and singing together:   This is part of his Carnival of the animals and is very fun and fast. I performed this for the first time with my orchestra for a children's concert 2 years ago.

A relatively new composer to me, Herman Beeftink,  also wrote a piece for 3 flutes called Birds.  These are utterly charming pieces and I really can't wait to buy these to try!

The famous German composer Beethoven wrote a symphony for orchestra called The Pastoral symphony and  in one part, he gets the wind instruments (instruments you blow) to imitate bird song such as the Cuckoo and the Nightingale.  Here is the little section featuring the bird song.  This is one of the loveliest flute solos to play in the orchestral repertoire and I've been fortunate to perform it several times. You will also hear the oboe and clarinet joining in.

A Baroque composer called Gliucelli Respighi wrote a piece called The Birds for orchestra.  It is a proud sounding piece of Baroque music but listen out for the cuckoo and other birds in the music.

Another early piece of piano music is called The Cuckoo by Louis-Claude Daquin.  Can you hear the 'Cu-ckoo' repeated lots at the start?  I learnt this as a child and it is a really fun, not-too-hard piece to learn.

A modern composer from Britain called Johnathon Harvey wrote a piece called Bird concerto with Piano song which  is very clever as it uses the piano AND electronic instruments as well as a small orchestra AND 40 different recorded birdsongs.

The patriotic-sounding Romantic composer from England called Edward Elgar, beloved of the Last Night of the Proms, wrote a piece called Owls which is SUNG by a choir.  Listen out for when the choir sing, "Nothing," as this sounds like the hooting of an owl!

Perhaps one of the more famous Bird-inspired pieces is by the famous English composer, Ralph Vaughn-Williams, who wrote a piece for solo violin and orchestra called the Lark Ascending, which was supposed to imitate the sound and idea of a Lark flying free in the clear air.  Here's the opening section for solo violin- where the bird takes flight.

Finally, we are nothing without the real life musicians, our birds.  Here are some common birds and their songs- can you imitate them?

There are lots more pieces about bird song , but I thought this might be a pleasant introduction to some listening for you.

I hope you had a lovely day.

xx

A cheeky message from CBC

 Last Friday, I had gone to bed too late.  I then struggled to sleep. CBC, on the other hand, had conked out asleep on the sofa at around 9pm.  He had had a lot a sleep.

Utterly despicably and unexpectedly early on the Saturday morning, CBC was awake, making noise and turning the light on, watching annoying videos on his phone.  He was disgustingly chipper.

In my desperate tired state with headache, I SHUSHED him very loudly in bed. I couldn't engage in dialogue because that might make me too wide awake and fail to get back to sleep.  He laughed and poked me and I shushed him all the more and kicked him for good measure.

Later, I went out to meet my friend for a walk by the sea front and CBC sent me this message.  It's a picture from our calendar- well, it used to be a calendar in 2019 but we liked the bird pictures so much that we cut off the date boxes and kept it as a rotating art piece for the year.

His message said, "Look! You are in our calendar!"

Utter rat!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Journey to the river

Last Saturday, a week ago, I suggested to CBC that we go for a long walk.  The weather was lovely and both of us had failed to get ANY exercise the previous Monday to Friday (I may have had a walk on Monday but I'm not sure) and we needed to get some.

He acquiesced and so we set off from our front door.

The first part of the walk was not interesting as it was along the main road until we reached the first part of the Roach Valley way.  We walked up to the beautiful Minster church (which I didn't photograph but you saw it in a previous post of walking)

After about 3 miles, we turned off roads into a field path.  All of a sudden, we were completely alone. To be honest, for most of the three miles, we had been but now, goodbye all civilisation.

The vast open spaces filled my heart with utter joy and we could see in all directions.  All at once, again, like I have been every time I've walked in lockdown, I have been awed and blessed and thankful for where we live- to have such open spaces. I imagine my feeling of positivity throughout all this would be very different if I were cramped in a one bedroom flat in the city.

We could hear Curlews and other birds and it was gloriously easy to walk.

I found myself much taken by the swishing ostinato of the long grasses. We continued on for a mile and a half. CBC told me we were going to try and find the river and it seemed like we never would.

Then all of a sudden, we saw this...

"Is that the river?!" I asked eagerly.

"No," he replied, "That's the flood defences"* (*or something of that ilk)

I stopped to admire every beautiful difference.

We climbed up a steep slope and then...

The River at last!

I was utterly spellbound.

There was a hushed awe to the air of the feeling where you cannot quite believe how fortunate you are.

I stepped down easily to the 'sea wall'

To me, the mud looked like a beach, one that I could easily walk across and swim.

CBC was more skeptical about this but was equally delighted with the sight.

I begged to stop for our picnic here (we'd brought sandwiches, crisps and fruit, as we'd set out around lunchtime, stupidly, only to be eaten where there was no one else).

Here's a little video of the expanse.

He disagreed and said we should continue walking for a while.

I didn't tire of the sights or the utter feeling of euphoria on how we could possibly have this in walking distance from our house! CBC could never moan about where we live again!

Views across to the other side were interesting. We spied the odd train of the sparse branch line that runs on that side of the river.

The path was easy to walk on.

We didn't see a soul for at least 4 miles.

We continued walking on, reaching salt marshes which are a sanctuary for birds. There are nature reserves for the Essex Wildlife trust here.

A delightful stretch of Cow Parsley was an interesting difference.

I did keep seeing plants that were shockingly like Swiss Chard. I even stopped to pick some. Anyone got any idea what it might be?

Abandoned or just resting?

After a few miles, we saw signs of habitation on the right.

But the mud beaches stretched in never ending line, along the margin of a bay!

A most incongruous sign was Sheep in Essex!  But sharing the love.

 I particularly loved this stretch where the contours and colours made a beautiful layer cake.

I spied a lonesome Borage plant. Just the one.

Finally, after my feet were starting to hurt and it was at least 4 o clock, CBC agreed to stop for lunch.

We stepped down onto the sea wall, I discovered the mud wasn't so nice to stand on. The Bladderwrack was useful for stepping back.

No illegal non-social distancing here.

And that was my view for my Brie sandwich and crisps.

We continued along the path.  I kept asking CBC when we were going to turn round as my feet were starting to hurt (at this point, I had no idea how far we'd walked)

He said that would almost reach Wallasea Island and then we would have to take  right footpart. It seemed interminable and his hips started to hurt. Still, there was much beauty to make up for it.

As well as seeing a variety of wader birds including Oyster Catchers, we were flanked by the sound of a most persistent cuckoo for what seemed like miles.

I captured a bit of it here (turn your sound up)

At this point, my camera died and I had to continue walking.

As the sun set, we walked across fields and fields and it became harder and harder to walk.  Still, the rewards of perseverance were the glorious pink skies.

We walked into town and ordered some Chinese Takeaway (the restaurant had opened to takeaways 2 days ago) as a reward since it was already 8.15pm and we were so tired, it would be futile to cook.

They told us it would be 50minutes to wait so we limped home, via Sainsbury's Local which was empty and arrived home around 8.45pm, ready to drive back to the Chinese to pick it up.

That food was most welcome!

As we eagerly ploughed our way through the food, CBC looked at his OS maps and worked out our final mileage.  

We had walked.....15.3miles!  No wonder I could barely walk!  It certainly made up for the lack of exercise for the whole working week and the visual sights and soul food made it worthy.  It was a great exercise in gratitude as we kept repeating how lucky we are to live here all along the way.

I am aware how fortunate I am in these times, I have not faced hardship financially, mentally or in terms of space but it has been a time for learning the joy of what you have for me.

Onto the next!