Walltown with the sheep

Sunsets on the Wall.

At this time of the year the days are short, sometimes it's overcast all day then an hour before the sun is due to set it clears.

So it was the other night and I grabbed my gear for a trip to Walltown.

I got to the parking area at the foot of Walltown Crags just as everyone else was heading home, still a lot of people enjoying days out here in Northumberland.

I wanted to go up to Mucklebank Crag so I walked along the farm track that passes Walltown Farm.

The collies didn't run out to greet me as they normally do so they must have been out working with William the farmer.

Just past the farm I turn left up the watery track and over the stile.

I paused for a moment to enjoy the view to King Arthur's Well, the two trees on top are colouring up nicely and a few wispy clouds in the background had me clicking the shutter button.

Fungi are beginning to show, we get lots of brightly coloured waxcaps on Hadrian's Wall and I tried to take photo's on a particularly nice orange specimen using my 17-55mm lens. Couldn't quite get the focus but it made a nice record shot and I'll go out again with a macro lens when we get a good day.

Onward and upward, the stone path that climbs Mucklebank is brilliant, I used to dread the slipping and sliding on my bottom that seemed to accompany every trip up or down before the path went in.

The sun at the moment is directly in line with Hadrians Wall at Walltown and the cloud had disappeared meaning every photograph I took was filled with those little flare circles.

I decided to wait until the sun got further down and a little less bright and wandered away to the other side of Mucklebank Crag.

The views here are lovely, to the east you look towards Cawfield Crags and to the south across the North Pennines ( as shown in the picture with the sheep). One day I'm going up there with a flask of coffee to just sit and enjoy the views, a great way to lift the spirits I imagine.There are always sheep on this crag and I wanted to get a shot with them in the foreground. They played 'lets show the photographer our bottoms' and eventually we both gave up and I wandered back to the setting sun.

Not the blazing sunset I'd have liked but hey, it was just nice to get out in the fresh air and clamber about where not only Roman soldiers walked before, but King Arthur and his knights gathered.

We have sunshine at the moment but metcheck is showing horrible weather for the next week, let's hope they've got it wrong.

Catch you later.

Joan