Indigo hour

a lone walk in search of my muse...

One lucky evening in May 2022…

Sunday morning…

I creep around the house trying not to wake the still sleeping men, gathering necessary items into my backpack; my stick, camera, lenses, water. I throw the sack over my shoulder and leave, cringing as I ease the creaky locks from the door.

Sunlight is still hiding behind the hill at this hour of the day, the mist in the valley floating tantalisingly over the river, it will be gone quickly though, it doesn't matter, for once I am not chasing mist. Outside is fresh, too fresh for June but the birds have begun their morning chorus anyway, oblivious to temperature or humidity, they sing their little heads off, a sweet sound I love even more at this early hour unadulterated by the crickets and grasshoppers.

I’m bundled up with what I soon realise to be too many clothes, despite the air feeling fresh, cold even with the wind blowing from the North, I already feel too hot as I begin a route I have trodden many hundreds of times before; a walk I know so well I could I could do it blindfolded! Every undulation, every pit hole in the ground known by heart, every barbed wire fence and tree, this hill is as familiar to me as my own garden and definitely as wild…

The long grass in the meadows is drenched after recent rain and even though I am wearing long boots, my jeans are soaking within minutes, covered in seeds and broken stems, they hamper my stride as they stick cold and clammy to my legs. I wonder, briefly, when the farmer is going to cut his hay, he is later than usual this year. As I continue, slowly, each step feeling heavier than the one before, I ask myself what foolishness persuaded me to leave my comfortable bed so early on a Sunday morning?

Perhaps I should turn back, this is really hard going!

I try to breathe in time with my steps as I continue the steep climb to the top of the hill, my breath leaving my body in visible gasps of millions of tiny droplets, they disperse into the air as fast as they arrive. The swishing of my footsteps through the sodden grass, the only sound.  The further I progress the more daylight appears far in the distance, the indigo sky metamorphic as dawn says hello to the day in waiting. I want to stop and catch my breath but I’ll miss the sunrise if I do.

I carry on, there is less than one hundred meters to go. I can do this!

I reach the outcrop of stone just slightly below the highest point, where once stood five magnificent silver birch — now only two remain, the others sad victims of man and machine. They sway in the cool breeze, dark silhouettes against the gathering luminescence of the first rays of the sun.  I sit down on the damp stones just as a light is turned on in the courtyard at the chateau across the fields a little to the south of me, the farmer beginning his daily chores no doubt. I hear a door open as he lets out his dogs and their barks of excitement, the harsh noise shattering the silence so deftly, so completely. I look North, beyond the sleepy town in the valley where not a sound can be heard, a mass of seemingly random lights twinkling inconsistently below me.  I see the wind generators on the furthest hills, their red lights flashing on giant metal wings as they turn in indigo light, they appear alien, lights attached to nothing simply hovering in strange formation.

Beyond those, nothing at all, the morning sky has yet to arrive there.

Villages on far hills at dawn…

The sun is beginning to rise, the sky turning from deepest midnight blue to myriad layers of pink and creamy peach light. The horizon reveals itself as if filmed in slow motion;  The outlines of villages materialise on the top of the hills surrounding me - all are taking shape as night finally explodes into a blood orange dawn; a spectacle I have seen many hundreds of times before.

And yet I still pick up my camera, reluctant to leave without at least one image to remind me of this particular day and moment.

“Sunrise

What is the name
of the deep breath I would take
over and over
for all of us? Call it

whatever you want, it is
happiness, it is another one
of the ways to enter
fire.”

―Mary Oliver

I have sat here now for 15 minutes, I have to move before my damp clothes set — it’s light enough to do so now anyway.  I almost tumble as numbed feet now tingling with the familiar sting of pins and needles, touch the ground again. As I re-balance, albeit slowly and cautiously, I see movement from the corner of the field in front of the chateau, I wait as my eyes adjust to the changing light, expecting to see the farmers dogs bounding after some unsuspecting creature but these creatures are not dogs. Their movements are not that of anything canine, they are slow and somehow more jerky - lower to the ground and I see, eventually, that the shapes are not doglike but piglike, wild boar… the one creature I am fearful of.

There are three of them, probably shotes, last years youngsters roaming in the search of mud holes to wallow in, they stay very close to the edge of the field though. I peer into the ever increasing light, scanning closer to the chateau praying that I don’t see the glint of gun barrels. Although hunting season is over I know from past experiences that often at this time of day land owners, (who all seem to have an obsessional hatred of boar), could still be sitting in wait for unsuspecting prey. This morning I am alone on the hill though, thank goodness and the small troop of boar continue to wherever it is they are heading to, alert but fearless — just as they should be.

Although it is not the boar I am here to see I watch them until they disappear into the woodland their continual grunting still just audible.  As much as I abhor the hunting of these very numerous and dangerous creatures I would still rather not be wandering in the same field!

---

I walk to where I think I have more than a small chance of seeing the hare that I have watched all year, the one with the dark coat of brindle fur quite unlike any of the others; my ‘this years’ muse - last year’s was the even more elusive Golden Oriel which I glimpsed just once! In my defence though they are migratory birds and I do only have a 2/3 month slot in order to see them… I scan the top of the hill first in the vague hope of seeing anything that might resemble black tipped long ears. Nothing, not even a stray rabbit catches my eye. Meaning I have to crawl under the barbed wire fence by one of only two Scots Pine that grow here and make my way carefully down the steepest part of the slope. 

I rarely take this route; it is dangerously steep, littered with natural traps — brambles trip me up often, boar and rabbit scrapes make me lose my footing and today it is slippery with cow dung which wasn’t there a week ago. Great! I search for the cattle but they are elsewhere, there isn’t a brown flank or horned head in sight, for this small mercy I am thankful. The ladies are curious, friendly even if I don’t have my little dog with me, — which I don’t — but the bull is not my friend, I can tell just by looking at his eyes! As always on this descent I’m moving too quickly and although I’ve never fallen — I don’t intend to this morning either — I stumble more times than I’d like in my sticky jeans and slippery boots but manage too vociferously, to stay upright.

I am the epitome of everything a wildlife photographer shouldn’t be! Noisy, clad in bright yellow rubber boots and now so breathless that I’m sure my face must show up for miles!

Near to the bottom though I am able to slow my pace, I can just see the glint of water in the lake through the birch trees at the edge of the field. I often see him here; this wide open space, allows him good visibility, at the slightest movement, at the slightest sign of danger he hides in hollows in the scrubby grass laying low and motionless until I almost step on him — then he bolts… usually frightening me into complete motionless when he does. 

I stop walking and peer through the meadow, in the hope of seeing the twitching of ears.  I wait for five minutes, soaking in the now quickly warming morning light, only partially hidden by an old water trough. I am unlucky though, not surprisingly he has already gone, hiding in a hollow on another part of the hill away from the prying lens of camera, curiosity and especially the crazy old girl that just crashed like a cannon ball down the hill!

I continue, hop over the fence through the whispering leaves of the birch trees and on to the lake. I am disappointed but only mildly. I spend a few minutes watching fish, perch probably, rising to the surface of the water and disappearing again.  A heron glides in, sees me and swoops off again…

I decide to walk back home via the lane to the back of the hill, the morning is still too young and beautiful to ignore. Regardless of my failed sighting and my over zealous descent I still feel a sense of peace and calm, as if I am a small fragment of this glorious morning, gregarious and light, playful and ready for the day ahead.

In less than forty minutes I am home again, the sun shines in the kitchen window, a faint but heady scent of Tilieul Lime flowers and roses follow me in and it is still early enough to begin Sunday again with my family. If indeed they have even risen.

Which they haven’t!

If you have enjoyed this or any other of my letters, I would love for you to consider sharing them with anyone who may enjoy them too.

Thank you for reading

Susie Mawhinney - A hill and I

wishing you a glorious week. x