A Walk on the Misty Heath

Yesterday, it was late afternoon before the sun peered out from behind low, grey clouds.
I left Whisper Dog at home and set off for a brisker walk around the heath. Some hawthorns and silver birches have shed their leaves now, their twigs and branches dark against the sky.

Into the misty distance, I looked across open Forest towards the Avon Valley and the west.

I scrambled downhill along a muddy path, through rust yellow bracken.

Bramble leaves were reddening beside a dew pond where ponies and cattle come to drink.

In the valley bottom, I found Fudge, the young grey mare who used to be a fudge coloured dun when she was a foal. She was grazing green shoots among dry brown grasses and heather plants.

Climbing the next hill, I watched the sun coming and going between clouds, as the moor grew darker and mistier.

On my way back, I walked through gorse and bracken, to the edge of the woods on the hill.

 Wood ivy stems had been left beside the path.

There were rich gold and russet beech trees bordering a field.........

....as I passed into the dark holly tunnel down the lane that leads towards home.