At the bottom of the Avon Gorge, as well as the river itself, there run a major road known as the Portway and two railway lines, one on either side of the river. It was a very stormy day on Friday, but I went for a long circular walk along the stretch of land squeezed between the road and the railway line known as Bennett's Patch and White's Paddock, which is now a nature reserve. Between heavy showers the sun shone brightly, and brought a certain twinkly magic to the scene.
Beyond Bennett's Patch you can pass through another nature reserve, cross the Portway between bursts of traffic, and emerge down by the river itself. I have to say, I find the mud of the river-bed when the tide is out both fascinating and terrifying. In places, the riverside path is no more than three feet across, with no railing and a steep twenty foot drop into who knows how many feet of grey gloop. For some reason the words "Friday the thirteenth" kept going through my mind...
It's funny, but the more I come to regard photo-collage as my main creative expression -- for now, anyway -- the less I police the photographs I take with that puritanical eye that rejects simple visual pleasures as unambitious and probably kitschy. Even backlit "twinkly magic"? Hey, why not...
2 comments:
Estuary and river mud flats and channels exposed by falling tides are fascinating - I have a large selection of photos showing the patterns in the mud of the river Hull following a short walk along the river bank once at low tide.
Gavin,
I don't know the Hull, but the weird thing about the Avon (unlike the Test or the Itchen) is that mud and water are very difficult to distinguish -- often a mudbank looks like a stretch of extremely agitated water until you're right on top of it. I think it's to do with the colour and the acute slope of the channel sides, compared to an estuary -- you easily lose your sense of what's up and what's down. This is also probably what is a bit scary about it...
Mike
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