Finally, here are some works of #art that people have made by balancing #rocks and #pebbles on top of each other.

Like in all wild areas, #life, #growth, #death, and #decay are often intermingled and you can’t have one without all the others. Here’s a rotting tree trunk which has been hollowed out by various living things, some of which are still growing on it.

I try to watch where I’m stepping, though it’s not easy if the ground gets too rough and irregular. Here, I avoided the impressive #beetle which was minding its own business.

A bit further along, some of the pine trees which have been cut down are piled up. Counting the rings, it seems that they were around 25 years old.

Here I am standing in this group of #trees.

These #PineTrees are grown for #softwood #timber. They have been planted in a regular array, producing an interesting geometrical effect. They’re about 25-30 m tall.

Some barely living trees had become very oddly shaped in their later years.

By the side, there were #stumps of several felled #trees which had been left to #rot and #decay. They make a #habitat for #ferns, #lichens and #fungi.

Some #paths are little more than #mudtracks and as it had rained heavily on the previous day, #puddles remained and the ground was quite muddy… Part of the fun of #hiking, I find, is getting a bit dirty in the process.

#PublicFootpaths often go through #farmland but also sometimes through #farmyards. Walking through one of the latter, we spotted these #chickens. The #hens started to retreat to their #barn as they spotted us approaching while the #cock remained outside just to make sure we weren’t going to try anything.