Tag: covid vaccination

This last lockdown – a winter lockdown for those of us in the northern hemisphere – has been hard. I don’t know any that haven’t found it so. The cold weather, the limited activities feasible given the weather conditions, and, of course, the terrible loss of life and health as covid raged through our hospitals.

We were ready to welcome visitors at Christmas – and then disaster struck with a mutated and highly-infectious virus rampaging through London.  Planned visits from London family were cancelled. There were still Christmas celebrations at Seaview – and nature was as glorious as ever – but it didn’t quite feel the same …However, there was time for lots of Christmas music …This year the Christmas decorations were a feast of felties … Family presence was distinctly modern …Like so many others, for us it was a Zoom Christmas …The toilet roll Holy Family joined with my father’s Buddha and the Iranian prayer clothes to keep watch over us all …There was a surfeit of Christmas goodies when we got to January since we had not had the expected visitors …Warming food …Which was a good thing as there were chilly wintry sunrises … Icy wet fields …Floods threatened in Berwick …But there were still good walks. The Covid restrictions have driven us to explore our locality as never before. One fascinating walk took us to the old Scremerston mine buildings. Our walk started in Scremerston where a fine Victorian bridge crosses the old wagonway ..Down along the track …Which has been imaginatively customised for children …Still a bit wet in places …To the old buildings of the Scremerston mine …The old water tower is a magnificent affair!The entrance bolted tight shut …Then we walked back via Scremerston church, warmly benign in the wintery sunlight …And paid our respects to one John Harbottle who was accidentally killed at Scremerston Colliery on 2nd November 1865 aged only 45 …We picnicked in the churchyard …

Our route home took us past the local rugby club. It has a couple of old coal wagons on show  – a nice touch to remember how involved this area was with the colliery …And then we followed the wagonway back home down the Scremerston Incline. On a good day you can still make out the stones which would have supported the rails on which the coal wagons travelled down to Spittal docks …February brought me up with a jolt! We set out to walk down the track to explore Cargies limekilns, just north of Seahouse …The limekilns sit atop a ridge of rock right on the seashore …Magnificent buildings – still appearing to be in very good condition …But we hadn’t bargained on the low winter sun and the sliminess of the rocks we were clambering over. I slipped and fell, hitting the bridge of my nose hard on an upturned rock. A bloody nose and a real jarring shock to the system …Luckily we had cool bottles to help stem the nose bleed. (It’s always good to travel with a decent picnic) …Back at home, I surveyed the damage. Didn’t look too bad …But the next day I looked as though Stephen had beaten me up!Luckily I had no other injuries apart from a few bruises over the rest of my body. And the advantage of lockdown had to be that I wasn’t going anywhere – until the snow came …Hauntingly beautiful …
Lots of very hungry birds …My nose was healing, and I had new knits from my enforced days stuck inside …So we set out round the local fields …An extraordinarily fast-changing world …But I hadn’t reckoned on a loss of confidence from my fall. Just walking down the hill to the sea – a walk I do so often! – filled me with terror. So many people had walked down here in snowy lockdown, the snow had compacted and the track was icily treacherous …Later in February we walked from Norham churchyard and its enchanting snowdrops …Down to the very muddy Tweed  – the river in spate …Walking these muddy banks – slippery where the river had overflowed – was almost as scary as negotiating the ice …My beginning of March birthday was a disappointingly quiet affair, but the cats made a party of breakfast for me … And Stephen made a delicious Ras El-Hanout cake with lemon and rose petal icing for my birthday tea – yum!March saw us walking the old railway tracks from Cornhill again – a very familiar walk now, and this March was full of spring promise with primroses …Purple violets …And masses and masses of white ones too …Just a couple of weeks later, in the garden, the yellow exploded!  Daffodils (of course), primroses, cowslips, my yellow knits, some yellow very nice mice (an Ann Wood pattern) – and that’s our resident yellowhammer in the centre … March brought a different but very wonderful sign of hope with our first covid vaccinations …So although April’s Easter was again a visitor-free event for us – just cats! – life felt different, optimistic even  …What a winter! what a difficult chilly spring! Through all the upsets – and alas, there have been those – we have been sustained by warm contacts with family and friends through social media, our cats, books, knits – and walks.

We invested in a groundsheet when winter set in …And through the season we have picnicked every week bar two when the weather was too foul to even contemplate a walk. On two occasions we went out, but it was too wet or cold to think of sitting outside. So we sat in the car and contemplated the Cheviots in a little warmth …But there were many many occasions when – like here on Holy Island in November – we sat outside in balmy sun. How glorious Northumberland is …Here’s to better times then!

Of course, although England starts to relax its lockdown today with the reopening of many shops and facilities, we are not out of the woods yet. But I fervently hope that we are drawing to the beginning of the end of this very difficult time. There is optimism in the spring air. But stay safe.