Aug 03 Nescliffe to Shrewsbury

 Most of the walk today was horrendously dull road walking.  Then there was the part through fields, certainly better except for the stile that was blocked by about five feet of thorns, thistles, branches and other impediments.  Thank God I had a knife with me.  I had to hack through the thorny branches, a job more suited to Max than me. Then I used my poles the push down the debris enough so that I could stand on it. There were a number of other stiles that were blocked by overgrowth but were, at least, manageable.  I don't think many people walk the Nescliffe-Shrewsbury stage. After about 11 miles, the walking, mostly along the Severn, was quite pleasant, the only difficulty being the humidity, which kind of takes it out of you.

We start by crossing a bridge:

Competition:  which will prevail, the clouds or the sun?

A different kind of recycling

Hey...hay! (Rather majestic looking, in a certain way):

Who is the fairest of them all?

A rare (for today) patch of flowers

Let's see if we can parse this:

Darwin was born in Shrewsbury, just not HERE in Shrewsbury.

The father of evolution, Charles Darwin was born in Shrewsbury on 12th February 1809 at Mount House. Before attending Edinburgh and Cambridge University and sailing on the HMS Beagle, Darwin fished for newts in the Dingle and studied rocks in the Quarry Park.

Darwin went to school in Shrewsbury; he did not like it:

Darwin attends Shrewsbury School as a boarder. He hates the school, describing it as "narrow and classical". Darwin is removed from school, being deemed unsuccessful, and spends the summer accompanying his father on his doctor's rounds.

Darwin's house is not his house:

In fat, there is no house there.  Just a door.  Locked.

But Darwin's Town House is the name of a hotel, and I am staying there, which is really here not there.

Don't even bother to try reading this.  I don't for a minute believe that "this" was Darwin's childhood garden because it was on a super steep hill.  Anyway, there was no access.

On to less controversial matters, like these triplet weeping willows

Kayak lesson:

I normally have an aversion to pithy sayings and such, but this little blurb, on a blackboard outside a restaurant, struck me as sweet

This afternoon I stopped by the train station.  Outside, is the lift to platform 3.  Inside, there is an arrow to platforms 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.  There happened to be an attendant on the premises, on a Sunday, yet, so I asked her, "Where are gates 1 and 2?? (Because all I need is to get to the station on Tuesday to discover that my train leaves from platform 1 and it is nowhere to be found!) She, with great astonishment, answered, "There are no gates 1 and 2," as if who did not know that?  "Oh," I replied.  "Yes, there haven't been for years."  Such is the way of things sometimes!