Sun Power

As sunsets have got successively earlier during the last few weeks, it has been a struggle to manage the power of the sun sufficiently to enable the charging of batteries, WIFI and webcam operation. Following maintenance today, the WIFI is back on line and the BLOGs can recommence. In a few days time it will also be clear if there is sufficient energy to restart the cameras too. The solar array may need supplementing with extra panels or with a small wind turbine until the days begin to lengthen and I now also have the ability to recharge batteries using a portable petrol generator (allowing three gallons of fuel to use in emergencies).

Over the next few days new blogs will be interspersed with others prepared earlier but which were unable to be posted live.

Sunset, Thursday 5th December from the Exbury Egg.

Everyday Actions (Sleep)

By eleven the moon was sufficiently high for its cool beams to wash through my circular skylight and to transit across the bed. As the night progressed I was bathed in, and scanned by, its glow as I slept.

As the days have got shorter, I have been sleeping a lot longer. The lack of light entails cooking in the embers of the day at around 3.45, being in bed by 4.30 and then sleeping until dawn. I normally have about six hours sleep and I have been averaging thirteen hours for the last two weeks each night in the Egg. I feel finely tuned in to the circadian rhythms of moon and its tides, the shortening day and to the wider weekly, seasonal and annual rhythms of this particular place.

Redbreast

A pair of robins are following me all the time around the Bofors Gun emplacement. As I fuss about rearranging bags of charcoal, bottles of paraffin and meths stored there, they pick up the insects and seeds unwittingly disturbed and dislodged. It’s an unusual symbiotic relationship where the redbreast gives us huge pleasure and we in turn help enrich its diet. I am sure it would not take long for them to feed from my hand.

What a poorer place it would be without these commonplace creatures that are such a feature of the ordinary culture of our isles. It was magical at seven o’clock this morning, to sit with a cup of tea in the thicket, listening to all the calls and songs.

Night of the Full moon

Night of the full moon, Sunday 17th November, looking toward the Isle of Wight. 100% cloud.

Night Vision

At 23.15 orion lay to the south and the plough to the north east. The moon cast a silvery light through air and water from the western sky. Its cool shimmering, interrupted by the sodium glow from the Isle of Wight and a tiny LED brightness from a WIFI transmitter, sending this message out to the world.

First Frost

Leaves and grasses were firmer underfoot as I ventured out into the first frost of the year this morning. While the ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’* is with us still, it heralds the Winter that is not many more weeks away.

Outer Bank at 7.30am looking toward the Egg. Mists rising

* ‘To Autumn’, John Keats, 1819

Requiem for a Wren

During the build up to the invasion of Normandy in 1944, Nevil Shute spent a lot of time on and around the Beaulieu River at Exbury and the opening chapters of his book ‘Requiem for a Wren’ are based on this experience. Janet Prentice in Requiem is credited with shooting down a Junkers Ju 188 E-1 that in reality was brought down by gunners firing from the bofors gun position which still stands beside the Egg. The aircraft came down in the grounds of Exbury House (HMS Mastadon) and Shute was one of the first people on the scene. Many details of his experience of the house and its gardens as well as this Beadle’s watery parish are woven into the soul of the book.

‘Time is like a river of passing events, and its current is strong; no sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another takes its place, and this too will be swept away’ Marcus Aurelius

Three Wrens in an LCVP on the Beaulieu River. Janet Prentice in Requiem often travels in these craft. The LCVP carried one vehicle or 36 men and were fast. The crew was a Wren Petty Officer Coxswain and 2 Wrens.
http://www.nevilshute.org/PhotoLine/PLD-1941-1950/pl-1941-1950-02.php

Swing

Walking along the high water line toward the wooded edge of Exbury Gardens, I discovered the seat of a child’s swing which may have been strung from the overhanging bough of one of the many twisted oaks there ( N 50˙47.327′ W 001˙ 24.385′). Once driven by youthful energy out over the water and up toward the sky, it is now pulled back and forth by the tides. A small hardwood platform to contemplate the adventures of childhood unknown.

A Trip to the Outer Bank No.1 Tamarisk

I visited the outer bank on Thursday and was impressed by the Tamarisk trees. Their tiny leaves are folded close to the stem as can be seen in my microscope photograph. I will look forward to enjoying a much wider perspective in springtime when their tiny pink flowers will be framed and enhanced by the colour and light of the dawn sky.

They were probably planted to enhance the stability of the Outer Bank when the enclosed waters inside its sluice gates (removed) were used for concentrating sea salt for collection along toothed channels that can still be observed. It’s possible these trees or their forebears have been here since the late eighteenth century. They love being close to the sea and enjoy these salty soils.

High Water

Late on Sunday night the river surged in on a high spring tide made more potent by low pressure, heavy rain and strong southwesterly winds. Adjoining land was reduced to a mere two food wide strip around the small oak bush opposite my mooring. These feel like very powerful forces fingering the land. Next morning the tide mark clearly told the story of the night before.

PLEASE NOTE that this post was prepared on Monday 4.11.13 It could not be posted due to lack of power at the Egg. A backlog of posts will eventually be cleared .

The Exbury Egg

Stephen Turner's Exbury Egg is addressing the meaning of place at a time of great environmental change. In the guise of The Beaulieu Beadle, he will work on, in and around the Egg for twelve months from July 15th 2013 – July 14th 2014.

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