Humpback

This was taken early this morning before the mists were burned off the low-lying ground. This is such an ordinary scene, a humpback bridge and two road signs to warn of it, and a solitary tree. The morning light and the mist transform the mundane into something more ethereal and mysterious.

It made me reflect after 3 days surrounded by the grandeur of the Cairngorm mountains just how difficult it is to do justice with a photograph to spectacular landscapes. Given the right light and weather conditions, a mundane scene in the lowlands can easily be a match for a mountain scene taken in average light.

I went home after this and went to bed. The legacy of sharing a tent with Brokenbanjo for 3 nights is that I now have a cold, and I was distinctly off colour this morning. The batteries were recharged this afternoon though, as I sat quietly in the afternoon sunshine in the garden. I discovered that our pair of dunnocks is in fact a threesome, perhaps two males and one female. Polyandry is a common phenomenon in dunnocks, here is an inconspicuous little brown bird with a fascinating love life. We also have a pair of robins in the garden, this could be the first time for several years that they breed with us - recently they have disappeared before the breeding season. I feared for the male though who was bravely singing from the top of the dawn redwood, an all too easy target for the sparrowhawk that I saw in the garden earlier in the afternoon.

Later this evening, we bumped into Arnside Simon. Poor Simon has a bad cut on his forehead after a collision with a concrete beam. Wifie has helped to patch him up, and we shall monitor his mending over the next couple of days.