Monthly Report, December 2020

Apologies - page formatting on the phone view is messed up, am trying to disentangle it.


December was a case of grabbing the opportunity - specifically the opportunity to have a quick trip up to Shetland, between one lockdown and the next (correctly) anticipated lockdown.

  • Reporting Days: 31
  • Location: Oxford & Shetland
  • Miles Walked: 104
  • Miles Driven: 1350
  • Gardens Tended: 0 (unless you can count filling bird feeders as gardening)
  • Puffins Seen: None - but I did see guillemots
  • Photographs Taken: Thousands (mostly waves)

The fix of fresh air and sea spray on Shetland was a much needed restorative to the inland views around Oxford - and hopefully the next fix of Shetland will be a bit longer than was possible this month.

Low winter sunshine on Scatness


Low winter sunshine on Scatness


Rolling waves on Quendale Bay


Sunset on Quendale Bay


Guillemots at Sumburgh Head





Blue skies at the Lye Valley

High water in Mesopotamia

Lye Valley Boardwalk

Monthly Report, November 2020

 That's was November, that was.

  • Reporting Days: 30
  • Location: Almost entirely Oxford
  • Miles Walked: 104
  • Miles Driven: 330
  • Gardens Tended: 2 (Oxford and Surrey - total of 5 gardening days)
  • Puffins Seen: None
  • Photographs Taken: Dozens (mostly trees)
  • Online Meetings attended: None

I didn't really enjoy November.  I've not much liked LockDown 2. It's mix of we've been here before, alongside the expectation that we'll be here again early in the New Year - combined with the perception that an awful lot of people seem to be treating LockDown as a negotiating position (not helped by the sometimes contradictory slew of 'rules' and 'advice' offered by both the Scottish and UK governments).  I'm pretty sure that the definition of 'essential' has never before been quite so flexible.

The shortened days have also been a challenge.  Getting outside is always easier when there is either lots of sunshine (and daylight around) or better yet combined with a coastline within reach.  Oxfordshire offered neither in November.  

It did however offer plenty of woodland within easy reach - and I did manage a woodland walk almost every day (except when I gave myself a day off by spending the day in the garden) - and as well as clocking up another 100 walking miles,  I've also clocked up another 30 pictures of the day (I did wonder about rebranding this to tree-of-the-day or wood-of-the-day on a couple of occasions). 

A significant number of the pictures of the day were taken in the C S Lewis Nature Reserve and the almost adjacent Shotover Country Park - for the purpose of this LockDown at least, I'm considering these two areas to be my 'local patch'.

Bury Knowle Park

Green Lane, Shotover

Shotover Country Park

Shotover Country Park

Shotover Plain

Bury Knowle Park