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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/nov/21/high-dorset-heath-wind-rattles-heather
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| High on a Dorset heath, where wind rattles the heather High on a Dorset heath, where wind rattles the heather | |
| (12 days later) | |
| Old Bottom, as the Marshwood Vale was once called, has filled with autumn rain. Walking means slogging, ankle deep or more, through cold, claggy clay, navigating puddles of yellow water overhung with dripping trees. Time to escape the woods for higher, drier ground. | Old Bottom, as the Marshwood Vale was once called, has filled with autumn rain. Walking means slogging, ankle deep or more, through cold, claggy clay, navigating puddles of yellow water overhung with dripping trees. Time to escape the woods for higher, drier ground. |
| Hardown Hill is one of a circle of hills and forts ringing the vale. Steep sides of deciduous woodland and gaps of rough pasture run up to a flat top of heath where nightjars call in summer. The summit is open, unfenced common land, home to sand lizards and occasionally Dartford warblers. Villagers used to cut the heath for fuel. Gorse was particularly prized in bread ovens because it burned quick and hot before disintegrating into an insignificant pile of fine ash. In Dorset dialect, gorse was furze, pronounced “vurze”, just as fox was “varx”. | Hardown Hill is one of a circle of hills and forts ringing the vale. Steep sides of deciduous woodland and gaps of rough pasture run up to a flat top of heath where nightjars call in summer. The summit is open, unfenced common land, home to sand lizards and occasionally Dartford warblers. Villagers used to cut the heath for fuel. Gorse was particularly prized in bread ovens because it burned quick and hot before disintegrating into an insignificant pile of fine ash. In Dorset dialect, gorse was furze, pronounced “vurze”, just as fox was “varx”. |
| I walk clockwise into the low sun shining sharp across the heath. Long wires of purple moor grass gleam metallically and the last few gold leaves on a silver birch flutter like tinsel against the hard blue sky. It’s raining in Devon out to the west, and the far hills are smoky purple under cloud shadow. North east lies Rogue Male country, where the unnamed hero of Geoffrey Household’s classic thriller literally went to ground, burying himself in the damp tree roots of an old hollow way. | I walk clockwise into the low sun shining sharp across the heath. Long wires of purple moor grass gleam metallically and the last few gold leaves on a silver birch flutter like tinsel against the hard blue sky. It’s raining in Devon out to the west, and the far hills are smoky purple under cloud shadow. North east lies Rogue Male country, where the unnamed hero of Geoffrey Household’s classic thriller literally went to ground, burying himself in the damp tree roots of an old hollow way. |
| I skirt the old quarry workings, swamped in spring with bluebells and now swathed with rusty bracken. A last cricket chirps slowly like a smoke alarm with a near exhausted battery. The sea dazzles through a sudden gap and the sea-swell sound of traffic on the A35 washes up from below. Due east, the long, thin wedge of Portland floats impossibly high on the horizon. | I skirt the old quarry workings, swamped in spring with bluebells and now swathed with rusty bracken. A last cricket chirps slowly like a smoke alarm with a near exhausted battery. The sea dazzles through a sudden gap and the sea-swell sound of traffic on the A35 washes up from below. Due east, the long, thin wedge of Portland floats impossibly high on the horizon. |
| Heading back west over the crest of the hill, I face the brunt of the wind, which rattles the heather. Three species grow here: ling (Calluna vulgaris), bell heather (Erica cinerea) and cross-leaved heath (Erica tetralix.) The rain has caught up with me and a rainbow appears, arcing over the hill. I turn away and walk on; when I look back it’s gone, switched off abruptly as the shower moves east. | Heading back west over the crest of the hill, I face the brunt of the wind, which rattles the heather. Three species grow here: ling (Calluna vulgaris), bell heather (Erica cinerea) and cross-leaved heath (Erica tetralix.) The rain has caught up with me and a rainbow appears, arcing over the hill. I turn away and walk on; when I look back it’s gone, switched off abruptly as the shower moves east. |
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