A beach and countryside walk

It's been a funny week. Warm and overcast a bit. 

It's Friday as I'm composing this post and it's pouring rain.

(The river needs it as the last picture will show)

On Wednesday I decided a beach walk might clear a fuzzy head.

I headed east and parked up at Mossyard beach car park.

(I need to go back and find the ring marked rocks, Castle Wilkie and the Standing Stones of Newton, don't ask why I didn't have my map with me ! ))

It was very quiet as I walked east across the rocks and sand.

This fella seemed to be looking for lunch.

There were a lot of oyster-catchers around.

I kept my eye open for anything worth photographing.

This stretch of coastline from Auchenlarie to Gatehouse of Fleet is very popular with holidaymakers.

Cabins and caravan sites thrive in the summer and although there was no activity on the beach I could see plenty of people either setting up camp or doing maintenance on their mobile homes.

Standing over a rock pool, it wasn't my intention to take a 'selfie', but when I saw it in the LCD screen.......................

...................I decided to take another.

Shoreline and rock-pool plants.

Leaving the shoreline I took a short walk through the Cardoness-Estate-Holiday-Park. Here there are 182 owner occupied holiday homes, 38 chalets and lodges and half a dozen sites for tourers. As you drive pass the entrance on the A75, you can't see any of this. It really is a hidden gem.

Alongside and to the west was a path through the woods marked as a nature trail.

I decided to take a walk through for my return to Mossyard. 

Here's a Meadow Brown.

By far the most widespread in Galloway is the Ringlet.

As I climbed up a an incline I came to a bench with a view and a memorial plaque.

I've touched up the photograph of the name plaque, the paint is flaking off.

Apparently Geoffrey was a skilled surgeon and died within ten weeks of Rosemary's passing.

This is the view they enjoyed in the 40+ years they came up here.

Now to get back to the beach. I headed inland until I could identify whether the cattle I saw were bulls or otherwise.

This is a view of Newton Farm with the hill Mill Knock behind.

When I got close I saw they were inquisitive young ladies.

Across another field there were lots of gulls looking for easy pickings behind a ploughing tractor.

Back at Mossyard I saw this female blackbird trying to drum up lunch.

From Mossyard I now took short walk west to White Bay where I had a bite to eat and watched as a couple of youngsters fished off the rocks.

My book says this is a field digger wasp.

So ended my beach walk.

On Thursday I took a walk up to Glenamour.

There's a lot of lillies on the smaller Glengarren Loch

Here's a parasol mushroom and a welsh poppy.

Two pictures together of Glenamour Loch almost creating an optical illusion.

Lots of water lillies on Glenamour loch too.

Back in Newton Stewart the river is low. Normal levels will be resumed after today's downpour.

At least the weather forecast for our group's walk tomorrow looks good.  

A hill recce, a sunset, a moon and a stroll. June 2013

I meant to post some of these pictures last week, but the good weather's had me outside.

It's raining today.

The first set of pictures were taken during a recce I did with the 'Teacher' and 'Spike' up to Cairnsmore (also called Blackcraig) of  Dee.

We started the walk at the car park opposite Clatteringshaws dam on the Black Water of Dee.

The above picture is part of the 'Art in the Forest' project and is called the Labyrinth.

Forest road for the first couple of kilometres. 

Scotland's beef and dairy farmers are very meticulous about health and hygiene rules and young calves aren't long in getting ear tags.

  

Reaching Laggan O' Dee we came upon these deer.

The herd's stag had a wary eye on us.

It's a tough climb up Blackcraig of Dee, but there's plenty interesting stuff growing. This is Butterwort.

Fir Clubmoss ? and Cotton Grass

Can't remember what this is.

Cairnsmore of Dee summit.

A long zoom to Earlstoun Loch.

From the top of Cairnsmore of Dee we descended down to the Nick of Benniguinea before climbing to the mast on the hill of the same name.

Nest building ? It doesn't look like a worm.

A well deserved lunch break.

View to Craignell

Clatteringshaws dam.

The descent to the car park via the drystone wall from the summit of Benniguinea is best to be avoided. My previous climb down here was when the ground was frozen. Tussocks, bogs, deep holes and channels were plentiful. We'll come down by road and forest track on walk day. 

End of recce pictures

A couple of days after the summer solstice I took this from my back garden......................

.................the next night, the moon, at 10.50 pm.

Wednesday the 26th June

A walk up to Glenamour Loch.

After the extended winter it's amazing how summer has caught up...........the grass is high.

Rhododendron blooms are almost past their best

The lily pads are ripe

Damsel flies are everywhere

I can't seem to get a really sharp close up

But of course I have a lens problem

I changed settings and somehow managed to take the picture below of the scratch on my outer lens.

I did have a go at buffing this scratch out but after a short while I noticed I was taking a tinted coat off, so that wont work. Just had a reply from the camera workshop that Canon will only supply the complete optical unit. £160 plus VAT comes to £192. Guess who's on the lookout for a new camera.

I'm still getting good pictures when I zoom through and beyond the scratch. 

It's a great day for taking photographs

This was the closest I could get to this dragonfly without falling in the loch

There are lots of Water Lilies

A close up shows they all have some small creature busily collecting the pollen or resting

Glenamour Loch is a most peaceful place on a warm summer's day