Carrot and Coals…

*

…Wen seems intent on punishing herself again.

I know. I know she probably has little choice but personally speaking I would be more than happy if we never went back to Bar-Brook-One… Ever! That  is not going to happen but given the inevitability of this eventuality, I have come to see it as something of a duty to prevaricate Bar-Brook-One at any and every opportunity I get.

These days I get plenty of opportunity.

Given that we drive past Rowan Cranny Falls at least twice a month on our way to and from Lodge Meetings it could only have been a matter of time and time, as we now know, does not actually exist.

“I nearly got up at four this morning and headed out there alone,” says Wen pensively over breakfast.

I glance out of the window at the howling wind and lashing rain, “You couldn’t have picked a finer or more appropriate day.”…

*

…Thankfully the course of the stream, or, more accurately perhaps, the brook, does afford us some protection from the elements.

In fact, it is quite pleasant down here.

The avenue of stones which Wen pointed out last time, and which I was not totally convinced by is, when observed from this angle, undoubtedly and without question, precisely that, and we spot an enormous Mark Stone which, when we take a closer look, proves not to be all that huge after all.

This is something else we will need to address.

The well-established physics of the material world do not seem to hold sway at these sites.

In fact, they seem to be reversed.

Distant stones look big and the same stones up close look tiny.

That is not supposed to be the way it works.

“Perspective,” yells Wen and moves back off up the brook ignoring a perfectly safe and feasible crossing point which I take, gratefully, if not gleefully, my spirits lifted by the rushing and gurgling sound of the water.

We move in tandem now each of us on one side of the brook and without thinking too much about the symbolism of this, it does feel exactly right.

We might be tracking some legendary beast to its lair and in another time and in another place, perhaps, we are.

It would probably have to be a questing beast…

“I have to cross at a particular point,” yells Wen, “in line with the barrow.”

My gaze follows her outstretched arm to the raised hump of the barrow, which shines as if lit on the horizon of the moor, and when my focus returns, Wen has crossed the brook and is heading up Rowan Cranny Falls at an alarming rate of knots.

We skip like mountain goats now crisscrossing the falls and fancying they are our home environment, until Wen settles at her spot and I carry on a little higher, roll an offering to the spirits of the place and commence picking out faces in the rocks behind the falling water…

*