A Simple Life of Luxury

You have seen the results of Morgan’s photography, now here he is in action!

We had a lovely sunny autumnal day yesterday so Morgan and I headed off to the woods at Ynyshir overlooking the Dyfi Estuary on a ‘Fungi Foray’. I’m not too good with fungi identification so the plan was to take some photos of them rather than to collect them.

Morgan had Anna’s digital compact camera. I showed him how to switch it on and put it in auto mode and how to take a photo and then I left him to it. To be honest I was expecting lots of blurred shots of his feet or his thumb, but he was surprisingly good at photography. OK, it was just point and shoot photography, but he did have to choose his subject, compose the photo and take the photo. Almost all of his shots were of something in particular, all were in focus and well composed and the landscape shots and such-like were perfectly horizontal and surprisingly good… Here are the results. Not bad for a 3yr old without any help at all.

Taken from a moving car

Mushrooms

More Mushrooms

The Dyfi Estuary

Dad in the bird hide

Clouds over Dyfi Estuary

Bird Hide Interior

Ynys-Hir Bird Hide

Ferns

Autumnal Leaves

Mushrooms Again

I met Steve on Saturday and went for a mountain bike ride at Llandegla in North Wales. This was my second time around the trail. We took it relatively easy and had a good time albeit with one or two sketchy moments and a crash for Steve. (Follow link above for full report).

Afterwards we went into the visitor centre, had a browse around the bike shop and then settled down for a bacon and egg bap, some carrot cake and hot chocolate. According to the bumpf, the bacon baps have been voted the best in Britain and they were certainly nice so (seeing as I haven’t tried every bacon bap in Britain) I won’t argue with this.

I still think the centre is missing quite a bit though. First of all, there are no showers which means you have to drive home wet, muddy and smelly after a hard ride around the trails. Not the end of the world, but it would be nice of there were a few more facilities.

Secondly, we drive past Llandegla now and then, and now that I’ve tasted the bacon baps it would make an ideal place for us to stop off on our journey. However, this won’t be happening because in order to do so we would have to pay to park. I know they have to make some money and with the centre being aimed at mountain-bikers many of them wouldn’t spend any money there if it was free to park, but the parking charge would put us off visiting it as a family for a quick stop and a snack.

There also isn’t much there for children. It would be nice if they had a little playground. There are of course plenty of waymarked forest walks and if you’re going for the day then the parking charge is fine as the mountain-bike trails make it worth the cost although a few extra facilities would be nice

For passing trade a short-stay (free) car park and a playground would make it an ideal stopping off point for many people and would no doubt increase business in the cafe, esepecially seeing as they serve the best bacon baps in the Britain!.

Last weekend we took a little walk around a local nature reserve where they keep Water Buffalo. The buffalo seemed to be enjoying the wet, boggy conditions of the Dyfi Estuary and we had a pleasant little walk along the boardwalk… Although it was a shorter walk than we had expected.

Morgan was more interested in picking (and eating) blackberries than he was in the Water Buffalo.

We were going to go for a Fungi Foray afterwards but after a large Sunday lunch in the Black Lion at Derwenlas we decided to head home and have a relaxing afternoon instead.

Water Buffalo

Family walk in Wales

Water Buffalo in Wales

Grrrrrr…. that’s all I can say.

Usually living here on the beach in West Wales and working as a freelance website designer is perfect for me as it means I can pretty much go windsurfing whenever the wind blows. Unfortunately there has been very little wind for the last month or so, but all that has changed this week so I’ve been looking forward to some proper autumnal windsurfing conditions.

Sure enough the forecasts and charts were right and the wind filled in beautifully yesterday. I didn’t have much work on so by midday I was ready to go out and play on the sea. On went my wetsuit (not a simple task as it was the first time I’d worn my full winter suit for a while). I loaded up the wheelbarrow with my windsurf kit and walked across to the beach. I rigged my sail then went to fit the fin into the bottom of my board only to find that the thread on the nut had worn away and wouldn’t hold the fin in. So, I walked back home leaving my kit on the beach to find a spare. I vaguely remember giving a spare one to someone a while back after the same had happened to them and sure enough I couldn’t find a spare anywhere. I even had a sneaky look in the next door neighbours garage but they use different types of fins so they had nothing that would fit.

All of this meant I’d been wandering around in my wetsuit for about an hour with the wind blowing perfectly, but I had no choice but to walk back across to the beach, pack everything up and head back home without getting out on the water. Worse still, the wind was due to increase over the next few days and there was nowhere that I could buy a replacement.

So, I’m sat here again today with the wind howling, the weather station here is recording 40 knots at the moment, unable to get out on the sea. Thankfully a friend is hopefully bringing a spare with him this afternoon so I might be able to get out tomorrow but at the moment I’m sat here being tortured by the wind. Conditions are wild, the sea is only a hundred yards or so away, I have time on my hands but I can’t get out because of one silly little nut! Grrrrrrrr….

It has taken a while but it seems that summer has finally arrived and we made the most of it this weekend.

Blackberry picking and mountain-biking in Artists Valley on Saturday, followed by a quick wash in the river.

Then an early morning mountain-bike ride at Nant-yr-Arian on Sunday. Early enough to watch the sunrise from the top of the hill, followed by a rare chance for a little adventure in our inflatable canoe. We didn’t go anywhere too exctiting and Morgan fell asleep on the journey. We did see quite a few dolphins before we set off but they had gone by the time we were on the water

Looking at the forecast it looks set to stay fairly summery for a while too… An Indian summer at last maybe? Could be, but there are some fairly distinct rules for what constitutes an Indian Summer.

An Indian Summer is characterised by a period of unusually warm summery weather in autumn. It can persist for a few days or extend to a week or more during September, October or November (in the Northern hemisphere).

The official definition is a period of seven days or more occurring after the autumnal equinox where the temperature reaches 21°C (70°F) or more. In some places it can only be considered an ‘Indian Summer’ if a ground frost has occurred before the period of warmer weather… Not quite an official Indian summer here yet then but now that the autumnal equinox has passed it is a possibility. The weather station has only recorded a Maximum Temperature of 18.3ºC so far today so we only need a few more degrees to get us off to the beginnings of an Indian Summer. No doubt that has been achieved inland already.

Just came across a little web app that attempts to put a value on your website. Not particularly useful but nice all the same. It looks as though it simply bases the value it gives on various stats (that are probably gathered from alexa?) and then gives you a value based on your alexa ranking.

Apparently ‘A Simple Life of Luxury’ is currently worth just over $5000. If only it made me that much money!

The site also gives you a little ‘badge’ as seen here that you can place on your website to show its value. If you want to see how much your site is worth check it out here: Website Outlook.

Jennie has posted some more photos from the weekend in facebook so here they are (without the one where I look stupid!)

It’s always nice to see the number of bird species we get in the garden increase and the latest addition to the list is the Willow Warbler (Phylloscopus trochilus). At least, I’m pretty sure they are Willow Warblers. There was a little family of them eating insect from various plants in the garden.

A little smaller than a sparrow with a pale browny-grey back and pale yellowish tinged breast. The most distinguishing thing was a fairly distinct white stripe above the eye (the supercilium). They are a little difficult to tell apart from a chiff-chaff, but they had quite pale legs which I think helps to tell them apart. Apparently the best way to tell them apart is their song, but I’m not too good with my bird songs

Good to see them though, especially seeing as they are in decline and on the ‘Amber List‘ of species, unfortunately I’ve yet been able to photograph them, but if they return I shall do my best.

Believe it or not, our sleepy seaside town of Borth is home to a music festival. Complete with 6 stages, 60 bands and up to 3000 people. If that many people do attend, than could more than triple the population for a day or two.

The Square Festival as its known is on the 26th and 27th July at Ynys Fergi Farm in the middle of Borth. As well as the  stages with a wide range of music there will of course be plenty of arts and crafts stalls, food stalls and plenty of cider too!

I’ve taken a look at the line-up and have to admit that I haven’t heard of a single one of the bands. I’m not sure if thats a reflection on the line-up itself or (as is more likely) a reflection of the fact that I’m not as young and ‘with it’ as I used to be. The big names are ‘Pendulum’ on the 26th and ‘Alabama 3′ on the 27th.

I won’t go into the hows and whys, but I’ve just got myself a couple of free tickets.

Lets hope it all runs smoothly, everyone has a good time and the locals aren’t disturbed too much.