Last Saturday afternoon with Fiona and the lads I went off to Richmond to walk around Billy Banks Wood . Because Fiona was feeling a bit dizzy and washed out I dropped the lads off in the centre of Richmond and they did a three-quarter circle walk and they were to meet Fiona and I at the Round Howe car park a couple of hours later.

Fiona and I drove down to the car park and we did a very small walk around Round Howe and then a little way on the middle path up the banks of the River Swale. Because we were walking very slowly I noticed the large amount of birds making a lot of twittering sounds as they were dancing to and fro in the afternoon spring light no doubt with mating on their minds. We got about 300 m along the path and Fiona noticed a movement on her right and it was a Roe Deer just 50 m away up the bank in the trees. It hadn't seen , smelt, or heard us so we could watch it for a while as it moved between the trees. We walked off to the left and the Deer was walking and browsing parallel to us and then it just disappeared in the Woods. We knew it could not go to the top of the bank 100 m up and it would not break cover where we were so we expected it to just follow us on a parallel path.

Which it did and we got some great views of this Roe Deer but best of all was that it just stopped had a good look around and then sat down wriggled around a bit, got comfortable and just sat there. Totally priceless. I doubt whether I will see that behaviour ever again in my life unless I particularly specialised in going out to see Roe Deer of course. Just after it did this I looked up to the wispy white and blue sky above and a huge Buzzard was gliding a long way up over the Dale and that was brilliant as well.

I had a minor false alarm because I thought I saw a Red Squirrel but all it was, was a red patch on the trunk of a tree quite high up and a branch from another tree was rubbing against it colouring it red and the movement of the branch over the red patch I interpreted as a Red Squirrel. No chance they are not in the Richmond area.

We proceeded on to encircle Round Howe and the path we were on was actually the pre-glacial riverbed now nicely covered over with glacial till. The last glaciation cut a new path for the River right in the middle of the Dale at the lowest point and it has left what is in effect an oxbow lake but the lake has become filled with glacial till which we were walking on . The name of the hill we were strolling around , Round Howe just means round Hill. It always fascinates me how geology defines the landscape for the fauna and flora to grow on.

Fiona had biscuit break about halfway up Billy Banks Wood bank and there were many Tits of all sorts. We started to walk a short way up the Swaledale Valley but then cut down to the path that runs alongside the River. Just down from where we stopped there was a Gooseander all on its own but this was really good because I know it is there to mate having seen a whole family of them on that stretch of the River a few years back. Really nice!

When we got back to the car the boys were sat around a table having a good conversation about Lord of the Rings. A nice afternoon out and until Fiona is better these are the type of walks that we will be doing. It is not so bad because had we not gone very slowly, stopped several times and just looking and listening to the Woods we would not have seen the Roe Deer, the buzzard, heard the great variety of bird sounds or the Gooseander. We also had a good look at the plants and both of us have vowed to get our knowledge of botany up to scratch. There is always something to do and understand. Thank goodness for that!