The weather gods play fair

Today’s guest photograph comes from my brother Andrew. He was pursuing his hobby of photographing swans when he discovered that on this occasion, all his swans were geese

For many years, an eight mile New Year’s day run has been organised in Langholm on the basis of starting when you like but trying to time your finish to be at the Market Place at 11 o’clock. This avoids any organisational needs at the start and maximises the social gathering at the finish of the event. Walkers are encouraged to join in too, so I had resolved to have a go this year if the weather was fine. I was pleased to wake up to a frost free and dry day.

I left myself plenty of time to get round the course, so it was still quite gloomy when I walked up to the start in the Market Place, and a dog walker had his dogs’ lights switched on as I set off along Thomas Telford Road.

I was wearing a hi-viz waistcoat because the road beyond the town is rather gloomy and I didn’t want to start my walk by getting run over. However, the recent felling along the road side has made it much more open and less dangerous now . . .

. . . and there was no traffic anyway.

The weather brightened up quite a bit as I went along . . .

. . . past curious ponies and the racing stables . . .

. . . and although there were still some clouds clamped firmly on the top of some hills . . .

. . . there was even a hint of sunshine as I crossed the River Esk by the Burnfoot Bridge.

The better weather stayed to the north though . . .

. . . and the clouds descended as I headed up the hill towards the Gates of Eden and took the track back down to Potholm . . .

. . .where I was passed by three runners.

I had seen very few other people up to this point but when I got on to the Langfauld track, traffic got busier as the weather got gloomier.

I felt so perky at this point that I even broke into a kind of shuffling run myself from time to time. I say that I was running, but I don’t think I would have been disqualified by the judges at a walking race.

A skein of geese flew overhead.

As I approached the town, a light rain began to fall so I concentrated on walking and stopped taking pictures. I was aiming to get as close to two hours as possible for the 8.4 miles and as I managed to get round in 2 hours and 6 minutes, I was pretty pleased. Conditions could not have been much better, as it was almost windless.

More than thirty walkers and runners took part in the event so there was a good gathering at the Market Place to hear a group from the Town Band welcome the new year in with some rousing playing . .

. . . and applaud the presentation of prizes by Charlie and Mike, the previous organisers of this event, to the male and female winners.

This year, the organisation was done by Mike’s daughter Elizabeth. She did it well and has now probably got a job for life.

It was raining in a more serious way by this time, so I didn’t dilly dally but walked home to dry off.

I filled the feeders when I got home and spent some relaxing time watching birds. There were several siskins about again today

. .. at least two dunnocks were to be seen as well.

Jackdaws tend to hang around in pairs . . .

. . . but collared doves are more collegiate.

Our son Alistair used our new soup maker to make some very tasty soup for our lunch while I played a little recorder music with our granddaughter Matilda.

After lunch, our visitors went for a short walk in some very light rain and I put my feet up. Later on, Matilda and I set about a 200 piece jigsaw with some seriousness. With a little help from her father in the middle, we soon got it done.

Alistair cooked some delicious mushroom burgers for our evening meal, and they were followed by Mrs Tootlepedal’s celebrated sticky toffee pudding (Nigella’s recipe, highly recommended). This rounded off a very good start to 2023.

The flying bird of the day is a sparrow under the scrutiny of a siskin.

Footnote: I made a 30 second video recording of the Town Band marching into the Market Place. Those with time to spare can listen to it if they wish.