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 Mist flowing south down the Lyth Valley and out into Morecambe Bay A bright moon last night with clear skies so a hard frost lingered in shadows through Sunday. I wrapped up warm against the winter chill and shed garments up on Scout Scar to sit in the sun contemplating a sea of mist. The quality of light was different, with a strong sun from early in the morning, Toward Morecambe Bay, Arnside Knott rose dark above dazzling white mist.
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 Burnbarrow Scar (left) with White Scar, Whitbarrow emerging to the right A golden dawn with sunlit mist over the River Kent. There was frost on vegetation. The moment I set out for Scout Scar the fog descended. Seeing mist lingering in valleys, I learnt from someone coming off Scout Scar that the Lyth Valley was filled with mist ' like a lake.' Sun will quickly burn off mist, so I hurried to the escarpment to find some of my neighbours standing in awe and looking out upon a sea of mist. 'You feel you could walk over it.' The mist hangs over frosty pastures down in the valley and rolls right out over the sea at Morecambe Bay.
 Selenehelion on Scout Scar ‘ There were shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. Luke 2. 8
A celestial scene little changed through two thousand years. Shepherds beneath starlit skies at lambing time. The Star of Bethlehem might have been a comet or a supernova, cosmic and of natural beauty. Looking up at the night sky in 2021, ‘we could soon see as many satellites as real stars. Disastrous for astronomers’. Says Professor Catherine Heymans, Scotland’s Astronomer Royal. Disaster: counterfeit stars, space debris and communication satellites’  Fresh snow on the fells to the north of Scout Scar Fresh snow gleams on the distant fells. Such beauty should dispel the rubbish thoughts that dominate. Today, I could not shake off 'The Today Programme.' Where did the money come from to refurbish a Downing Street flat? Parties whilst the rest of us are in lock-down. Pets taking precedence over refugees in flights from Afghanistan. When the law doesn’t suit, ride over it rough-shod.
Is this the stuff of Government, in a pandemic?  Reed beds and winter trees sunlit What's special at Leighton Moss in December?
White frost glistens at our feet, sunlight illuminates the reed beds, like a winter flowering. We walk to the causeway hide beneath a sky of intense blue shading to icy pallor. All this and birds too. The hide frames our gaze, our focus on the freshwater pool where Ice reaches from the reed beds, slowing the flow. The blue sky is mirrored in the pool until the gleam fades and we look up to see a breath-taking pattern of flowing cumulus, white on blue. |
AuthorJan Wiltshire is a nature writer living in Cumbria. She also explores islands and coast and the wildlife experience. (See Home and My Books.) Archives
December 2021
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