They say all good things come to an end - well fortunately so do colds - my sniffles had dried up. Mind you we went round to some friends for dinner last night and by 11pm I could barely stay awake - must be a sign I am getting old. The weather continues to fluctuate from snow to rain and back again. Today looked as if it was going to be a rainy day and relatively warm - 5C. I was definitely feeling better as that was not going to put me off - I just wanted to get out for a ride.
Although it was cloudy there was some sun peeping out as well so the skies were fairly dramatic. I really need to cycle on some different routes, now the evenings are getting noticeably lighter I should venture further afield and get some pictures of something other than the Wicken Fen area - but that ride was not going to be today.
Mind you when you take the same route frequently you do notice the changes. On my way through White Fen I noticed that a whole bunch of green plastic tubes had been planted - either with trees or some sort of shrub. No doubt I will find out in the fullness of time. I wonder why they chose this patch out of the whole field. Perhaps to provide a windbreak for one of the ponds. just behind me when taking the picture.
There is a lot of drainage around here because the land is so low-lying - not much above sea-level. This is a picture of Commissioner's Drain, which I reached by dropping down from the nearby crossroads, at 1m, and descending through the 0m contour line before reaching the drain. Apparently the lowest part of the Fen is Holme Fen at 2.75m below sea level.
The same drain looking on the other side of the road - this time into the sun - to the west. Which is why there are blue and green blobs of light in the middle of the picture - they are caused by internal refraction in the lens. (I think!)
The consequence of living on low-lying land is that it needs a lot of drainage to make it farm-able. The drainage means lots of water channels - which need to be maintained as they have gradually found themselves above the fields around them. The land sinks partly because of soil shrinkage as it dries and partly because it blows away as dust when there are no crops growing and it is dry. This is Burwell Lode looking towards Burwell - you can see the repair work has been taking place here - most of the Lodes/ditches I cross seems to have been having some repair work over this winter.
The same picture taken with a wider angle. You can just about see the digger as a yellow streak.
One Fen I pass often but have not yet explored or Blogged about - Tubney Fen. It must be another sign of getting old - I stop and read the information boards that you see dotted around the countryside. I think they are great and they since the sort of people who like to vandalise stuff don't really get out this far they seem to remain untouched. A hide has also been built just up the path and to the right.
The last picture had a long exposure as it was really getting quite dark. This shot is more what it was like. A lovely orange streak in the sky silhouetting the pylons marching across to the electricity sub-station at Burwell. The building to the right is the hide I mentioned, it look out over a patch of water.
The same shot - but this time using 7 different exposures to make everything appear visible. That way you can see the orange sky, green grass and wooden hide.
The only downside of cycling through Wicken Fen at the moment is that some of the cycle routes are really chewed up by the movement of vehicles being used to repair other parts of the Fen. There are signs that warn cyclists and apologise for the problems. The other downside is that on Sundays you get quite a lot of people walking dogs, but not on leads. The path is quite small and next to some water (New River) - so you end up stopping and starting as varying degrees of dog control are demonstrated. Most are ok - some people really do need lessons on how to control a dog though.
You can tell it is warmer - my feet were not blocks of ice when I got home - and there were heart-shaped fridge cakes in the err fridge - yummy good cycling nosh.
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