My Middle-Aged Gap Year
The second day of my middle-aged gap year began more calmly. The radio alarm, now fixed, woke me up at 6.27 and coincided with the sport news which almost always strikes a far more positive note than the 6.00 headlines other than when it covers Spurs loss to Brighton at the weekend.
The boys (excluding the eldest who is working whilst on his gap year) had more than enough time to get ready for school whilst surreptitiously digesting whatever important posts hit their snapchat or tik tok accounts overnight. We, my wife and I, have a near zero tolerance policy on phones before school due to the remarkable time stretching capability phones apply to any activity. A simple two-minute task will now take ten minutes. I describe our policy as near zero rather than zero because enforcement requires constant vigilance. The phone will miraculously disappear from its charging point and be discovered stashed in a pyjama'd pocket. Boys on their phones feels as inevitable as death and taxes.
Today I have to wait in for a package to be delivered. I have been helpfully informed the courier may arrive any time between dawn and after dusk so I have made no plans. But fortunately for all current readers of my blog (me + my wife) and future readers (me + my wife + possibly my boys but they have all said it sounds boring), I did actually manage to get out and about yesterday.
So whilst this post is thoughtfully entitled Day Two, it's actually describing events from Day One. I'm not sure if that's the accepted approach for blogs but you (as the reader) probably don't care.
Yesterday afternoon I headed over to RSPB's Fowlmere Nature Reserve. I had vague memories of visiting it many, many years ago whilst at school. I should clarify that I am not a bird watcher. Not that I have anything against bird watchers. In fact, I fully intend to try to watch some birds during my middle-aged gap year.
I probably should have mentioned this in the Day One post but I guess a key reason I wanted this year out was to try out new things and see if I could find something I really loved doing. I enjoy lots of things but I'd love to be one of those people who had a passion that started as a past time which they then figured out how to do as a job. To get paid to do something you love doing would be amazing!
I am a big fan of Springwatch (series on BBC with lots of cameras following wildlife in Spring). I grew up watching presenters, Michaela and Chris, on the Really Wild Show. I therefore thought Fowlmere was a good place to start.
Fowlmere is described by the RSPB as a wildlife oasis set within farmland. Reedbeds, fen and scrub provide a home to turtle doves, water rail, barn owls, reed buntings, bearded tits, bitterns, otters, brown trout and water voles etc. When I arrived there were even signs suggesting I might see a kingfisher, exciting!
I spent approximately two hours there and saw... pretty much nothing. Well I did see a heron, a mallard duck and moorhen. It was also lovely to walk around. The sound the wind made as it passed through the reeds was very... evocative?
Possibly I was a little underprepared. I spoke to a very nice retired gentleman in one hide who was all kitted out in brown/green camo. He had a kind of fancy looking telescope. I was relying on my eyesight (not as good as it used to be) and the zoom on my iphone.
After providing me with a little too much information on his various medical ailments, he did point me towards Cambridgeshire Bird Club, Wicken Fen for the short-eared owl and possibly kingfishers at Wrest Park. Fowlmere is also apparently home to a marsh harrier which would have been excellent to see. He suggested I get there early in the morning or in the evening to have a better chance of seeing the birds. I put that in the unlikely to do note-to-self given the car park really looked like the kind of place people might go dogging.
He also said he hadn't got out much since COVID what with his medical ailments or spoken to anyone in a while. Hopefully he enjoyed the conversation as much as I did.
So rather than putting me off, the failure to see anything of much interest has prompted one idea for the rest of my gap year. I will buy myself a 'nature spotters' book and see if I can tick off the whole lot before the end of the year. Subsequently, a quick search of Amazon has revealed that nature spotter guides all appear to be aimed at children under the age of 10. Some more thought required methinks.
If this post is too long, then good news, I am unlikely to have this much time on my hands tomorrow. If it's too short, then um... not good news. If you don't like posts about nature, firstly I wonder what sort of person doesn't like nature, but almost everyone is welcome here and there will be lots of posts not about nature.
RSPB Fowlmere Nature Reserve - photo taken by someone with no photography skills (me)
This photo is particularly impressive in that in this wide expanse of habitat, there does not appear to be a single bird in sight.
