It's Only Me!! Back Again!! Oh, what a time I've had!

Hello dear bloggies :)

My absence has been longer than anticipated, much, much longer. More things have happened in the past month than I care to list here. Suffice to say, absolutely EVERYTHING in my world is in the process of massive change. Massive change. It's exciting and terrifying all at once. I don't want to go into detail, but I will say that at this period of transition I'm sure to be blogging a bit less than I used to.

Have a mooch on over to Twitter, I gibber randomly on there pretty much daily. http://twitter.com/hen4

~

So... I went to the Pyrenees for 2 & a half weeks and it was MIND BLOWING!!!!! My 5th time EVER abroad & my first time abroad in 8yrs!! Gulp, what have I been missing!!!???

The Snowline Production lot and I stayed with Paul Deegan in his beautiful house, Maison Willert. There's a website about it here aplaceinlescun.com - it's available for holiday rentals and I cannot recommend it highly enough!!! :0)

I took a million pictures and have put a selection of them into these categories on Flikr...

Wild Flowers & little creatures - So many of them. Orchids! Follow the link to see some of my wildflower photos on Flikr.

Swallowtail Butterfly

Bee Orchid growing on the Chemin de la Mature

Snowline Productions - Lots of filming was done, follow the link to see some photies on Flikr.

Al Boardman (camera), Paul Deegan (presenter) & Elliott Forge (audio)

Mountains & Climbing Follow the link to see some photies of the INCREDIBLE scenery in the area of Lescun and the Chemin de la Mature.

The view from the loo over Lescun

The Chemin de la Mature. Possible the best place I have EVER been to in my life. More wildflowers than I could imagine, incredible landscape, oh I could go on & on & on!!!

I'll be back very very soon with an update!!!!

Huge warm hugs,

hen
xx

A call to the Mountains

These pictures are from a trip to Scotland I went on, a year and a half ago.  We packed our rucksacks with 2 weeks worth of food and walked into Knoydart, we then took a trip to Glen Nevis.

It's at about this time of year that I get an uncontrollable urge to get out into the mountains. 

 

The air is so fresh and after being in the house a lot over winter it can be just what I need to shake myself up a bit.

Waking up to this view, well, there really isn't much better.

It makes us all ridiculously happy when we're out and about in the mountains.  

Especially when we find the best wild camping spot in the world, ever, ever, ever.

When you have everything you need on your back or around you and you walk off into a valley like this, knowing you're going to be out of civilisation for a couple of weeks, the sense of freedom makes you forget how much weight your carrying.

We didn't camp here, but I will next time I go.  It's about as perfect a place as I've ever been in my life.

As I said, our packs were heavy, but we were free and we were happy.

This is Scotland.  All of these pictures are Scotland.  It is a breathtaking place and it is where I grew up.  Well, maybe not anywhere that looks like these photos!

As you can imagine Willow comes into her own in the mountains.  She never sits with us when we are at camp.  She always finds a spot a hundred metres or so above us, lies down and keeps look out.

This is our second best wild camp in the world ever, ever, ever.  When you're trying to find a wild camp there's a few things you need.  Somewhere relatively flat to put your tent or bivvy, a clean and fresh water source, ideally out of the wind and sensitively placed.  What I mean by sensitively placed is that you should be aware of others that might be nearby or who might see you sticking out like a sore thumb in the view.

This is a view from Ladhar Bheinn over to the Isle of Skye.

We stopped at this mountain stream to refill our bottles and have a good drink.  It was the best water I have ever had.  I could feel life pouring into me when I drank.  A special place.

There are not too many areas with native trees in Scotland.  I wont go deeply into the reasons why, suffice to say Scotland was invaded by England and Scotland lost.  Then the trees lost.

Knoydart is now largely owned by the natives and they are fencing off many areas of land from the deer population.  This is encouraging the regeneration of native habitat and ultimately trees.  Yippee!

I love walking with a big heavy pack on, up and down mountains.  With Willow at my heel (yeah right!) and the wind in my face, I could keep walking the hills of Scotland for the rest of my life.

Instead, I'm planning a trip to the Cairngorms later this year.  Wahoooooey!

hen

xx