Musings and Ousings around York - Part One - The City of York

The first in a series of Musings and Ousings around York and along the Yorkshire Ouse

York Minster from the city walls

Our most recent visits to York were in late November-early December 2017, while based at Thornton-le-Dale.  The Tuesday was dry, cool and bright am, then cloudy over. The Friday chilly, cloudy showers am. Both days feeling of light going very early (by about 2pm when cloudy), with sunset before 4pm.

The week before (24/11/17) the Ouse had spilled onto the quay above Lendal Bridge following heavy rain in the Pennines earlier that week which provoked the Swale to rise (also flood warnings on the Lune, Eden on the Wednesday-Thursday; and more briefly on the Greta at Keswick and Caldew in Carlisle). Guys hosing away the mud deposited on the quay left when the overflow receded. Then a switch to a drier, cold, northerly airstream bringing snow to NE England / NE coast;  including Thornton-le-Dale 30/11/17. Feeling very cold throughout that week.

Millennium Bridge

These are some notes made during the trip:

Tuesday 28th November 

Park and Ride, Grimston Bar, east at Hull road intersection.

Near the car park, Space Port BP garage, with daleks on roof of shop, Planet Wash, Inner Space Centre, Storm Trooper inside. Got off bus at Piccadilly, outside The Merchant's House; near Coppergate and main shopping area. Both a bit disorientated because of time gap and streets very busy. Xmas market in Coppergate area.

Made our way through streets to the Minster and walked the City Walls walk. Got up onto the wall at Botham Bar, the west gate opposite art gallery.  Botham Bar, with Minster behind, the subject of one of my father's paintings done in the 1980s. Walked clockwise round wall. Views of north side of Minster.

 Views of York Minster

Monks Gate model shop

Monks Gate - down to road to dodge "Richard III Experience inside on the upper floor of the gatehouse. In so doing, the Chief Chartered engineer got diverted into the model shop, especially planes.

We seemed to lose the wall when we got to the River Foss.  I think we should have carried on along the main road and not the river.  Presumably the mill chimney across the road was a listed structure, now standing alone amid modern superstore premises: Morrisons, Office Outlet . 

 The River Foss, east side of city

The path along the river petered out modern apartment blocks. We found ourselves back into city centre where we'd got off bus. Eventually found Clifford's Tower, Castle Museum. Crossed the Ouse at Skeldergate Bridge, rejoined wall there. Followed wall round to Lendal Bridge. A view of the Minster behind chimney pots on the south side of the wall. Railway and railway station.

Lendal Bridge

Quick packed lunch on bench by river near Lendal Bridge. Out of wind, in sun across river, so not too cold. Some muddy debris beneath benches: legacy from last week's input's from Swale (as mentioned later by other Waterstones cafe customers). Flow now fairly gentle. 

While here, noticed that the toilets at the foot of Museum Gardens had gone. As a sign of the times, replaced by a restaurant. Seems in this city, have to pay to pee now. Not funny when needs really must…

In the early afternoon, I strolled along the river to Clifton, walking along the left bank, underneath Scarborough railway bridge; past some playing fields; under Clifton Bridge; and up onto the big flood bank by the sluice at Clifton Ings. It was clouding over, but already (about half-one) the light was going; the sun dropping. Walked back, crossing Clifton Bridge to the right bank where willow trees with the last of their leaves drooped towards the water.

 Christmas decorations - Museum Gardens

Crossing back over Lendal Bridge, I went into Museum Gardens and did some very quick pencil sketches of the glitterball baubles hanging from one of the trees and reflecting the trees. These were among various large Christmas art installations here. The following day, a miserable wet and wintery Wednesday at Thornton-le-Dale, I made some other drawings from these and my photos. See my painting and sketching blog.

Friday 1^st December - Second visit, coming after a snowy day in the NE on Thursday.

Kings Staithe from Queens Staith

Arriving in the city centre on the Park & Ride as before, we walked along the Ouse between Skeldergate and the Millennium foot-cycle bridge, before lunching in a restaurant near Lendal Bridge. Though the river level had fallen, it had turned a paler, glummer shade of brown, a bit like weak tea. I’d say the sort of brown lots of people seem to give into clothing-wise come the winter; prominent among M&S’s cardigan range when I looked in there later. With memories coloured by the sunshine we’d had here this time in 2001, I’d hoped for more sun. Still showery when we got down to Skeldergate and it was chilly; but it then cleared; and reflecting the brighter sky, the river looked a better colour, too.  Turned left under Skeldergate Bridge and came across construction work to our left, associated with the Foss Flood Barrier ahead. Barrier gate to our left as we crossed the footbridge over the Foss near where it joins the Ouse. This work follows very floody problems here involving widespread flooding in York Boxing Day 2015 (see part 2).

 The junction of the Ouse and the Foss / Foss Barrier

Crossed over the Millennium Bridge and walked back into the city centre along the right bank. After Skeldergate Bridge, went away from the river along the streets for a while, then returned to the water’s edge at the cobbly Queen’s Staith. Fairly bright now, with light on the buildings across the water by the King’s Staithe. Among them was The King’s Arms. This is notorious as a pub that floods; but they are prepared for it. Though beer and banter maybe tricky when the flood is completely submerging the room during bigger floods. Otherwise, as far as I know, it’s usually business as usual very soon after the water recedes; though it helps not having fitted carpets or soft furnishings. I keep meaning to go in there again sometime soon, though in the summer months the premises and river bank are brimming over with people.

I took another stroll along the Ouse after our big lunch; this time to Lendal Bridge to compare water levels with Tuesday. They were down, the concrete quay which had been underwater now high and dry. People still hosing the mud from last week’s spillage around the benches in front of the Museum Gardens. Walked up to the footbridge alongside the Scarborough railway bridge and crossed over it to the right bank. On from there and across Skeldergate Bridge. Clifford’s Tower catching the setting sun (before 4pm) when I got there.

In Waterstones, I bought a couple of water-related books: William Thomson – The Book of World Tides – published this year to his similarly covered The Book of Tides I bought in Rossiters bookshop in Ross-on-Wye last year. That one focused on the tides around Britain. The new one goes global.

Neil Sentence – Water and Sky – Voices from the Riverside. Illustrated by Jonathan Gibbs. Little Toller / Caught by the River.

courtyard much easier than it had been last night.

A walk through the Shambles and neighbouring streets after dark

York trips past

4th May 1979  - my very first trip, including a family photo by the Ouse at Skeldergate. A cold winter; and, judging from the leafless trees, a late spring. Visited the Minster and Shambles and Castle Museum. Even at the age of 11, the city made a last, postive impression on me. 

Late August 1983 – A two-night stopover at YHA York following the family holiday in Glencoe and Perthshire (my introduction to Scotland) ; again left a last positive impression), we broke the journey home in NE England: first as a family foursome at Durham; then, after Mum headed south by coach to get back to work, a further extension with Dad, staying at YHA York for two nights. Again we went into the Minster, which no doubt Dad would have stopped to at least sketch, if not do a much more detailed painting. We walked round the city walls and went to the Castle Museum. On the second evening, we walked along the River Ouse from the YHA near Clifton Bridge to Lendal Bridge. A pleasant summer’s evening with boats on the river. Dad sketched. The river tranquil and friendly in complete contrast to how it had been in the floods of early 1982; about which the news reports at the time painted a duly grim picture of what I remember as an unhappy dark, cold winter. During our walk, we saw flood defences (banks) being built up in alongside the field below Clifton Bridge. Coming down to the river walk via the slipway by Clifton Bridge: two flood marks painted as white lines on the brick wall to our left facing the river: late December (28^th?) 1978; above that 5^th January 1982. There would later be one higher still, for November 2000. After that, they weren’t added to and began to fade. By 2017 they were indiscernible from the background. 

There was another family holiday with my parents in 1987; then several solo trips based at YHA York, involving the River Ouse and trips to York's many varied museums, including the National Railway Museum, Castle Museum and Yorvik Viking Museum. 

I saw the June 2004 Transit of Venus from a telescope at an event in Museum Gardens, lucky to get a break in the cloud cover as my turn came in the queue. These are very rare events: two come eight years apart (as in 2004 and 2012) then nothing for over a century. The next transit won't be until 2117.

I also took a trip to the tidal Ouse at Selby and had a look at the Ouse just downstream of York at Naburn Lock. I'll say more about this some other time.

Today (2017) - Historic city centre much the same, though considerable growth / development in past 10-20 years: tourism (packed in high summer season), now pre-Xmas busyness; posh waterfront apartments; also retail parks / development around ring road, including Monks Cross, Grimston Bar B&Q etc. Not really aware of ring road / development until now as solo trips have been by coach or train. 

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Books and Websites

Ivan E. Broadhead - Portrait of the Yorkshire Ouse, Hale (1982) – bought secondhand in about 1983. Even after all this time, still a good read and appreciation of the river.

Yorkshire more generally: Richard Bell – Yorkshire Rock – A Journey through Time, Earthwise (2006) – geology across Yorkshire, early Mesozoic era to Quartenary.

Cool Geography  -   York Floods – causes, photos, recent floods  

York Stories – Why does York flood? http://yorkstories.co.uk/why-does-york-flood/

Flood Heights on the Ouse | York Civic Trust

http://yorkcivictrust.co.uk/heritage/civic-trust-plaques/flood-heights-on-the-ouse/

River Foss Barrier - Wikipedia

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_Foss_Barrier

York's Foss flood barrier: New pump to be installed - BBC News

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-37471060

The Great Storm 30 years On

Monday 16th October

 On this day 2017 Ex-Hurricane Ophelia lashes Ireland - Red suns and eerie skyglow - darkness in the balmy (barmey) early afternoon - Heatwave and wildfires on the continent

On this day (overnight 15th / 16th October)  30 years ago
 1987 - The Great Storm (Great Gale)

Links

Met.Office news release 11/10/17

Includes a video But what if it happened day? The same weather scenario but with the benefit of modern forecasting: though not technically a hurricane, red severe weather warnings out because of the real potential for strong, damaging winds. This big improvement is thanks to much higher resolution computer modelling for weather forecasting.

Met.Office Factfile – 1987 Great Storm

You Tube – the notorious Michael Fish forecast, 15^th October 1987

You Tube - BBC1 News -Great Storm

BBC Video – 30^th Anniversary of the Great Storm

My memories

Where was I on the night of the Great Storm, Thursday October 15^th – Friday October 16^th 1987?

 I was in my very very late teens, studying in Southampton, about a fortnight into my second year, living in halls. The autumn term had started unsettled, in weather and in mind. October began with a fine sunny day but then the weather became more changeable. My science degree course was stimulating and I was doing well, yet I felt anxious, apprehensive and down for much of the time. Even more so the following year, my final year. My outlook was invariably bleak, At the time, I thought this was typical student angst. I now know, I was living,completely unknowingly with autoimmune liver disease (AIH) – seeArtyTransplantee blog. Although I didn’t have any obvious physical symptoms, it was affecting my mood for the worse. Relief came partly through praised for doing well in course assignments, but mainy getting out during the weekends and university holidays either solo, with my parents, or as part of the university rambling and hillwalking group
.

Earlier on that Thursday night, I was at the P&B block (now relocated onto the main campus. I think it was a social evening for the freshers, like the one I’d been to at the beginning of my first year. Bored and not making much impression on the first years, I left early and headed back to Halls. It was raining and the wind was getting up, but that was nothing compared to what was to come during the early hours. I was completely unaware of the weather forecast.

I didn’t sleep well on the best of nights (the liver thing probably). That one, though, I woke up in the early hours. I’m wasn’t sure if it was still raining, but the big thing was the roaring wind, like nothing I’d encountered before. The gusts came and went in quick succession, threatening to blow in the aluminium framed window of my fourth floor room. I looked out of the window to the courtyard; leaves and litter swirling in a vortex as the wind howled round it. The lamppost swayed. I think the lights stayed on most of the time, but did go off at least once. I don’t remember seeing or hearing any other people, outside or inside. I think I was awake all through the early hours, listening to the wind outside and cogitating on the highs and lows of the summer.

The wind began dying down just before dawn. With the power still on in my hall, I put the radio on, the Radio 4 Today Programme and news “The whole of the southeast has been devastated…trees down; many roads blocked; vehicles and buildings hit by falling trees; power cuts…walls of roofs ripped off buildings”… The local news said “Don’t ring in to say there’s a tree down, we are being swamped with calls”. No mention of river flooding anywhere, it was all the wind, gusting to over 80 miles per hour in places, including London.

Over breakfast, expressions of shock among my flatmates, otherwise business as usual. I headed off (on foot) to my lectures, on time as if nothing had happened. I don’t remember any trees down (though my walk was through a built-up area) or any other obstructions. I don’t think I felt much more of it until the evening. The only thing was, the trains were still disrupted when I headed off out with the walking group on the Saturday morning. I nearly got left behind on the train at Southampton as no one sure there what was going on; Parkstone misheard by the railway staff as Pokesdown. But we got to Poole Harbour. I think then, we took the Purbeck Ferry to Studland and walked up onto the Purbeck chalk ridge. From there, a view over Poole Harbour, in bright sunshine.

It didn’t occur to me to phone or even write home to tell my parents and grandparents that I was OK, or check up on them. True, phoning home from uni’ was hassly back then: long queues for the one and only payphone in a block of upwards of fifty people; no mobiles / smartphones, texts or email; but the post was fine and I could have written home. I regularly did, with whacky letters, and got them back, eg the Pink Paper Brigade in my first year, to which my father responded to with drawings of our pet golden Labrador unravelling metres of pink loo roll, au Andrex. But not on this occasion. Nothing until a couple of postcards: one from Mum saying “What a wind!”; and one from Grandad asking if I was OK “your mother being particularly anxious”.

Sheltered from the open sea and some way up the Itchen estuary from Southampton Water and the Solent, this part of Southampton had escaped the worst effects of the storm. It was worst over Surrey, Sussex and Kent. Though I saw the pictures on the TV news and in the papers, I didn’t appreciate the wider extent and impacts until I headed out further afield. In early November I went to Arundel – warnings of loose roof tiles; bare patches in the hillside near the Black Rabbit, where trees had come down; and a big branch of the arbutus tree by the bridge had been torn off. Distinctive for its red bark, it subsequently came down in a storm in autumn 2000; then replaced with a cutting from a similar tree at Kew. It was closer to home in woody Surrey where it was particularly noticeable: the local woods and (Farnham Park) where we walked the dog and played as younger children. Large swathes laid bare of trees at Puttenham Common (Cutmill) and Leith Hill, both along the very wooded ridge of Lower Greensand. “Spring will be a bit blighted this year”, my Dad said one day early in 1988 at Puttenham Common. One of the worst affected areas on the South Downs was Chanctonbury Ring, to the north of Worthing. During a half-term South Downs Way YHA based ramble in the early 1980s, this had been a thick rounded clump of trees, similar to Norfolk Clump, above and east of Arundel now. Blowing in from the SW, the Great Storm brought down most of the trees on the south and western sides, and in the centre. Though the trees have since been replanted and regrown, the evidence was still there when we last looked in 2014; the trees on the north and east sides being much taller.

On the night of the storm, my Dad slept through it all, but not Mum. During the build-up at bedtime, she’d had the feeling that it would “not be a normal wind”. Like me, she lay awake for much of the night, hearing the wind roaring. I don’t think the big tree close to the front of the house and garage dcame down, but the apple tree in the back garden did. I think they were able to replant it, but anchored to the ground for a while. On the Friday evening, they mentioned a difficult journey to and from Guildford along the A31, which runs along the Hogs Back, the narrow chalk ridge at the western end of the North Downs.

In the aftermath of the meteorologal storm, a media storm. Blowing in after the notorious Michael Fish BBC TV forecast before the storm hit on the Thursday, the Met. Office came under fire for failing to forecast it. I was annoyed at lack of understanding here about the complexity of weather forecasting. As the Met.Office say in their recent new release and factfile, though, this prompted an overhaul of how they present weather forecasts / weather warnings to the media and the public. Thirty years on, thanks to big improvements in the resolution of weather modelling by super-computers, forecasts are much more accurate. Compare and contrast Michael Fish’s forecast with the mock forecast, under the same conditions in the video attached to attached to their news release (11^th October 2017). There seemed to be a phase during the 1990s through to about the early 2000s, when a storm would be forecast, and probably talked up by the media, only for a What was all that about? moment afterwards when it turned out to be not that bad really. Whenever they’ve said storm / heatwave / snow and ice are coming during the 2010s,  they’ve meant it.

Debate, too – was it wasn’t a hurricane? Technically it wasn’t: the sea surface temperatures in the north Atlantic are too cold for that. Hurricanes are tropical storms. It was a common-or-garden low pressure system (like Ex-Ophelia, Storm Desmond etc). Nonetheless, it was a deep one – the central pressure was just 951 millibars according to the Met. Office. Deeper than Ex-Ophelia (963mb, though not as deep as the Christmas 2013 storm which was around 936mb). Deep enough to generate very damaging winds, certainly hurricane force.

“The worst storms in living memory!” screamed a letter from someone near the River Swale at Richmond, Yorkshire; read out on Radio 4 a few days afterwards. “Why does everyone take the south to be the centre of the universe?”. She went on to remind them of the March 1968 storm which had struck Glasgow. I was too young to remember that one, but by all accounts that was bad. There was also flooding in Carlisle. The flow on the Eden peaked at around 1200 cumecs (NRFA: http://nrfa.ceh.ac.uk/data/station/info/76007), prompting the building of flood defences which held until overtopped by an even bigger flood in January 2005. Nevertheless, I think anyone living and knowing SE England well would agree on the severity of the storm in terms of the tree toll and damage to property. Certainly for me, it’s had a lasting, even if delayed, emotional impact.

In the years after 1987, I was nervous when high winds forecast or heard, eg during a storm in late October 2000 when we had a power cut. We were living in NE Hampshire then. Before our move there, we rented a flat in a multi-storey block in Petersfield. Though the weather while we were there was generally quiet, any wind there was whistled round the courtyard, unsettling me. All the more so with our aluminium window frames reminiscent of  my student hall.

A few days after the 1987 storm, Monday 19^th October, though totally unconnected, came the“Black Monday” stockmarket crash.

The stockmarket soon recovered, but not long after the Great Storm, my  suspicions that something was up with the weather and climate (global warming) mounted. Though extreme weather is nothing new (Storms in 1703; cold and flood in winter 1947 etc) but my perception is that it has been getting more common, worldwide. Before the Great Storm, there was major flooding in SE England in mid-September 1968 and the notoriously long hot summer and drought of 1976. Less than three years later was the Burns’ Day Storm, January 1990. As the strong winds hit during the daytime, when more people were out and about, more people were injured and the Europe-wide death toll was about 98 (Wikipedia).
Subsequent notable wind / rain events include: autumn 2000 – there was the windy night of the power cut, but it was mostly notorious for the flooding affecting large parts of Britain, most notably York and the Severn valley. They were the worst floods in SE England since 1968. The Record Flood Level for 7^th November still stands on the Arun at Amberley Castle.  Summer 2007 flooding – the Severn again, and the Avon around Tewkesbury; also northern England. The southeast’s again turn in December 2013 (see notes from the time), with gales on 23^rd December and flooding along the Mole, Wey, Arun amongst others on Xmas Eve. Even worse in Cumbria / northern Britain, with the  floods in  2005, 2009 and Storm Desmond in 2015.

Ian Currie et al, Frosted Earth Publications – photos in the aftermath

Memories of the The Great Storm haunted me two years later as I fought, and eventually, but only just pulled through my own internal storms. I left uni’ with a very good degree, yet my mood and outlook were lower and bleaker than I’d ever known. Getting out and about into the countryside and along the rivers of Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire continued to give me some relief from this. It was a fine, warm summer and the woodland was slowly but surely recovering from the storm. Trees had been replanted and were regrowing.  In July 1989, though, I began to feel more definitely unwell. Come September, I was in hospital. I won’t repeat the details here (more in my ArtyTransplantee blog) but I was diagnosed at King’s College Hospital with autoimmune hepatitis (AIH, then called Chronic Active Hepatitis, CAH). Completely unrelated to alcohol, my body had been producing autoantibodies attacking my own lover. In early October, I received some heavy news at my bedside (as did my mother) that the AIH had advanced to the point the damage to my liver was irreparable and irreversible. My only hope was a transplant. As the doctor spoke to me, images from the night of the Great Gale came into my mind (the swaying lamp post at; the bare hillsides in the months afterwards, likened to the scar tissue of my damaged live). I felt as if I’d been struck my own devastating hurricane.

I must have been very near, or at the very top of the waiting list as within hours of being put on it, I got my transplant. Unlike most other people, no time to think about it; I just did what everyone told me to do in preparation (the pre-med) and got on with it. After a massive, ten hour long operation (knocked out and completely oblivious) I woke up in ICU (the transplant room), “It’s all over now.”, was the first thing I heard (from a doctor) when I came round. I couldn’t immediately see, but I was on a ventilator and wired up to lots of drips and tubes. In due course over the next few hours and days, most of these removed, but after such a massive operation, I knew I was in for a long haul. I was lucky to recover quickly, with no complications; but there were risks (infection nd rejection). All told I was in hospital for ten weeks: five before the TP, five afterwards. Coincidentally, I got my TP a few days before the second anniversary of the Great Storm. As I’d been warned beforehand, there were highs and lows. One of the blips came on the night of 15^th / 16^th October. I had a fever of about 38.9^oC, and I felt myself overheating. My suspicion that this was rejection were right, but it subsequenty calmed down / was brought under control by taking more steroids. I was reassured by one of the junior doctors, before drifting off to sleep. I can’t have been asleep for more than about an hour, but in that time, a burst of short but very vivid dreams. My brain translated the fever into images of a stampede in Marks & Spencer, followed by a images of a a tower looking a bit like the Oxo Tower by Thames in London, transplanted to a garage I must have vaguely remembered from childhood holidays in the Forest of Dean; the feeling of overheating / something shooting up and up and about to blow. I woke up just before it did, but I was physically and mentally disorientated. It must have been post-op muscle weakness and exhaustion, through ac of sleep, maybe lingering effects of all the drugs I was on, but I couldn’t move. I thought the nurse watching over me was writing a report about me (the kind of report people tend to write after someone causing trouble) but it was just a letter home to a friend Down Under. I thought I’d been out for much longer – days. When the daylight came, I asked one of the nurses, “Is it Monday the 16^th today?”. I thought right, but had to ask. No clocks or calendars visible from the bedside, it was easy to get confused. As the day went on, I felt more alert and re-orientated.

While my parents were visiting a few days later, we talked with one of the other nurses remembering the night of the storm. She’d been on night duty. That October (1989) a windy night a night or two later. It didn’t help that one of the windows in the side room I was in was in a state of repair and taped up, but the nurse looking after me was anxious. She called someone in to check the window. No problems, though like now (2017) a very mild autumn, the high one day that October was 19^oC. Heating on in the hospital on October, whatever. Though the fever had gone, I still felt hot all the time.

Strange Skies

Monday 16th October 2017

Ex-Hurricane Ophelia lashes Ireland - Red suns and eerie skyglow - darkness in the balmy (barmey) early afternoon - Heatwave and wildfires on the continent

On this day, 30 years ago, 1987 - The Great Storm

October 15th / 16th

I started writing all this just before 2.00pm on Monday afternoon; blissfully unaware of the infernal car trouble my other half was involved in up the A3. Thankfully he was OK, but I'm glad I didn't know about it at the time. Meanwhile a sketching friend of  got out and about solo for the first time in a long while as his confidence began rising again a prolonged low earlier in the year.

Outside, the sky has been darkening over the past couple of hours. It’s dark enough now to feel more like dusk in November.. This follows the “red sun” around midday. After a cloudy, misty morning with some sunshine coming through, I noticed around midday, the sunlight coming into the artroom was weak and pink. The feel of light at sunset on a calm, misty midwinter day. Outside a pale pink sun shining through a hazy sky.  I have all the lights on downstairs. Ireland and Northern Ireland have been bearing the brunt of Ex-Ophelia today.

 This started off as Hurricane Ophelia in the Azores. It weakened into an “ordinary” low pressure system as it moved north into the cooler north Atlantic waters around the British Isles; but still the potential for very strong winds. The track of the storm is to the west of the British Isles. The Met.Office have an amber warning out over Northern Ireland, Galloway, north and west Wales; and a yellow warning throughout western Britain up to Loch Linnhe at the SE end of the Great Glen. Subject to refinements, the yellow warning has been there since the weekend. 

Being well east of the storm's track and outside the warning areas, I  wasn’t expecting much to happen here; just breezy-to-blowy; wind speeds in the Southampton area  to be around 20mph,  gusting to upto 37mph – noticeable, but not exceptional or damaging); and continuing very mild. A high of 20^oC forecast for Southampton today. 

According to BBC News, the red sun has been seen around large parts of England: they say mainly the north and west. Photos from various places initially northern and western parts of England, later the south coast and London. One from Portsmouth, with the Spinnaker Tower against a dark sky with a hint of yellow glow "I promise, no filters".  Apparently, as Ex-Ophelia has tracked north, it’s picked up dust from the Sahara and debris from forest fires in Spain and Portugal. The dust in the air scatters the blue light, making the sun appear red.

14.10 – sky cloudy, still grey but brightening again

My other half meanwhile has hopped across The Channel for work, where  There it’s 25C. Yet again, like last autumn and the one before that, continental Europe is stuck under high pressure and western Europe, certainly very dry. Though weather forecasting has come on in great strides compared to 30 years ago, they still can’t be sure what the weather over the winter would be like. It could go either way. At the moment I’m concerned simultaneously about another floody winter in the north, which we could all do without; and the Loire amongst other rivers in western Europe continuing to be afflicted by chronic drought. For three or four successive autumns and winters now, western Europe has been stuck under high pressure for months on end. Last winter, as noted in my earlier blogs, it persisted over the UK, too. Thanks to rain during the summer and early autumn, the water outlook in the UK has improved in the short term, though for the most part, the track of the jetstream has been carrying the low pressures mainly over northern and western areas, missing the SE and the western continental Europe. It has also been very mild. From a river perspective, then, the further north the better. During our Scottish Borders stay last month, the Tweed was running well. Likewise the Greta and the Derwent around Keswick. Last week (10th - 11th October), there was a flood warning on the Cocker after heavy rain in Cumbria, along with flood alerts throughout Cumbria and the north Pennines. As usual for these rivers, they dropped back quickly after the rain stopped and I didn't hear of any flood related problems. The soils in the area, however are saturated / close to saturattion, meaning the rivers are responsive to any further rain. In southern England, flows on the Itchen and Test have stabilised, though as I suspected from trips to Salisbury over the summer, the Avon is still quite low. In the Canterbury area, the Great Stour has been bumping along the bottom. Groundwater levels in the Chalk have still been falling. Recharge this season will be from a low base.

Links

BBC News – Red Sun

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-41635906

Met. Office

Ex-Hurricane Ophelia impacts the UK, includes and explains the red sun thing

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/releases/2017/ex-hurricane-ophelia-impacts-the-uk

UK Met. Office - weather news releases - Ex-Hurricane Ophelia

Meteo France

River Flows / Water Resources

Environment Agency - Monthly and weekly national and regional water situation reports for England

River and sea levels in England

River and sea levels in Wales (Cyfoeth Naturiol Cymru)

River and sea levels in Scotland

Centre for Ecology and Hydrology monthly hydrological summaries for the UK

UK National River Flow Archive / flow gauge data

Eaufrance - water situation in France

Vigicrues - map of France with links to French flow data

Highs and Lows on Hampshire Chalk Streams

The Meon, Itchen and Test, 2010 onwards

Highs and Lows - River Lavant

My photos of changing water levels along the River Lavant from 2010 onwards

High Life and Low Life Compared - Watery Pics 2009 - 2017

Work in progress...

Further to my recent ramblings along low or absentee rivers in southern England, there now follows a series of entries comparing some of my recent photos of the Lavant, Meon and Salisbury Rivers with those I took during the more abundant years, including the floody winters of 2012/13 and 2013/14. They go to show the variability of the British weather which has seemed particularly pronounced during recent years, even if the highs and lows on the shorter timescales have reflected blocked weather patterns lasting weeks or month on end. The weather flows can be divided up into phases as follows

Winter 2009/10 - Summer 2010 - Fairly typical

Winter 2010/11 - March 2012 - The Low Life

The Abundant Times / The High Life  - April 2012 - Winter 2015/16

Ongoing new lows - Autumn 2016 onwards

Earlier High and Low Life (with Reference to Frosted Earth's Weather Books for Surrey, Hampshire and Sussex published during the 1990s)

The Long Low 1988 - 92

The River That Roared (River Lavant in Flood, January 1994)

The above were followed by the Millennial Sog - 1998 - 2001 - predominantly wet, especially over the winters, most notoriously so autumn - early winter 2000.

The Early C21 Dry 2002 - 2006

Summery Low Notes

Further to my rambles in valleys of absentee rivers, here are some of my watery notes from the first half of July, from Hampshire and around.

The Rising Tide of Plastic - Warsash Shore, 1st July

This is a sketch I did on Warsash Quay: media - marker pen, gouache and Neocolor pastels, the latter softening and breaking up as the sun came through and the weather warmed during the early afternoon. A change of support medium: pages of the All at Sea yachting newspaper picked up as left the nearby Rising Sun after a coffee. This sketch looking down the Hamble from the Quay, towards Southampton Water, pontoon in the foreground. Behind the sketch, an a piece about a young yachtswoman doing her bit to Turn the Rising Tide of Plastic. Having seen a report in The Guardian a few days before, that the "unstoppable rising tide of plastic waste in theoceans could be as big a threat to humankind as climate change", I let the part of this headline show through the gouache wash / pastel. 

Which brings me on to Summer Rant Number One:

Everytime I walk along our local coast, I'm acutely aware of this messy plastic tide. In my experience, the shores of Southampton Water are the most littered in Britain. It's mainly, though not exclusively plastic (also scrap metal, fabiric). The plastic is not just the plastic drink bottles, the focus of the above report, but plastic bottles and plastic stuff of all sorts - tangled fishing tackle, pieces of plastic bags and boxes. Of course, the plastic gets broken up into smaller and smaller pieces by wave action - making more likely to ingested by birds and marine wildlife. Potential for entanglement in all of the tackle, too. The rubbish washes in with every double high tide, and is left high and dry on the strandline when the tide ebbs. I can only think that much of it is carelessly thrown off boats of various sizes. 

For the past couple of years, the concrete WW2 structure at the mouth of the Hamble has displayed, in prominent grafitti lettering, Take Your Rubbish Home. Blatantly ignored, seafarers and landlubbers alike. By the latter, I mean picnic and barbecue-goers attracted outdoors in the sunny weather and warm summer evenings . A discarded shopping trolley containing empty beer / lager bottles and cans; and two or three overflowing bags of rubbish. On the landward side of the wall, out of the wind, yes, but clearly left there with the assumption that someone else (a park ranger / the council / local volunteers) would clear up their mess. Though the above news report emphasised broader measures, including well known drink manufacturers needing to take more responsibility and increased recycling, the bottom line should be Take Your Litter Home. This is something I was brought up to do and should be a given, without a second thought. 

Low Life along the Avon in Salisbury, 2nd July - Summer Rant Number Two. 

Crane Bridge

Fsherton Bridge, looking downstream

The following day, Sunday, I went to Salisbury. As I'd expected, the Avon and Nadder were running low. In some places, the water looked was very shallow and and devoid of vegetation. With nowhere to hide, the fish were visible, particularly near the footbridge over the Nadder between Queen Elizabeth Gardens and the path to Harnham. I think the water levels were lowest I've seen them here this summer, though everything did get low during the last drought, autumn 2011 / early 2012. As with the Lavant, I will compare photographs. What bothered me even more - flowing from from the day before - was yet more plastic and litter, including plastic bottles caught in a large clump of waterweed on the far side of the Avon near where the Nadder joined in QE Gardens - Normally, as the Avon is a relatively fast river, such detritus is wisked away, to the Solent if not picked up and binned, to join the trash in the oceans. Being clear running, litter below the surface of these sort of rivers (chalk streams) is more noticeable than in deeper / more turbid rivers. Though I wish there were more public rights of way along England's rivers (chalk streams particularly lacking here), litter hardly helps this case. 

At Harnham Mill, I took my usual reference photo for water levels on the southside of the mill, on the layby where anglers sometimes park. Lots of children paddling in the water, the green along the river busy with  people picnic-ing and sunbathing. 

As usual, though, I headed straight for the shade.As the general vibe - low water levels, Cathedral view across the river at the end of the green blocked by trees / plants - hard lighting in the midday midsummer sunshine - wasn't conducive to sketching views, I did some doodling in the pocket sketchbook I'd taken into a city centre cafe earlier in the day, and a page in the Sunday supplement I had on me.  My doodles (see above and below) protested at my rubbish weekend; and, if for anyone who doesn't like to be told that we're now in a new geological period, the  Anthropocene, how about the Garb-Age?

Upper Meon Running Dry, 9th July

West Meon

Amid more hot weather and strong burning sunshine in the first week of July, another hot few days, it was a relief to walk along the generally shaded route of the former Meon valley railway from West Meon and onto Old Winchester Hill, where the breeze took the edge off the sunshine. Dropped off around 8.30am on the West-East Meon road at the beginning of my walk by my Cycling Man, I crossed the upper River Meon as I joined the footpath. Leaving East Meon, the Meon flows through the grounds of Westbury House, where there is a millpond, then alongside the road to West Meon, before turning south. I'd seen it low here before during the summer. 

West Meon

It was now either dry, or down to a trickle. If things (drier weather / dry winters / rising water demand) go on as they are, I fear the Meon, at least its upper reaches could become a winterbourne just like the Lavant. On the back on the east side side of Old Winchester Hill, walking to East Meon, I crossed the fishing ponds at Meon springs. 

West Meon

Superficially they looked healthy - saw some fished as I passed by and it looked as if they'd cleared the green algal scum near the north side of the lane. The ground underfoot everywhere was baked dry, the chalk like hard rock. Compare and contrast with some winters when it has been very muddy at the foot of the hill on the east side (chalky mud churned up by cattle) . Near the seaward end of the Meon, the Titchfield Canal (effectively the westerly channel of the Meon between Titchfield and Titchfield Haven) was low back in May (7th). Invariably,  this is a notoriously muddy / waterlogged path - invariably impassable in anything other heavy duty wellies. I've written off walking along it in winter now. After the warm dry April, though, absolutely no such problem, the soil again bone dry. More the problem was biting insects, or at least my itchy sensitive skin perceiving them. 

West Meon

Summer Ramble in the Valley of the Absentee River

The Lavant valley - Saturday 24th June

From Chichester, a circular walk to East Dean, via  East Lavant, The Trundle via Chalkpit Lane, Goodwood Road, Monarch’s Way down to East Dean. Back along the Lavant valley to Charlton and Singleton. Up the hill from Singleton church. Back via Hayes Down and the Centurion Way.

In a change from last week's heatwave, the day started with drizzle, light rain on the way out of Chichester to East Lavant. The Trundle foggy, with low cloud, and no view at all from the top. After coming down the west side of the hill and crossing Goodwood Road, the stretch of road walking near / past the racecourse, a bit of an obstacle course. There was a high-class do on in the posh grandstand reception area, but the large areas cordononed off opposite the grandstands was most likely in preparation for the Festival Speed next weekend. Essentially that takes over the whole area, leading to widespread, lengthy traffic queues. If not going to the event, the whole West Sussex area best avoided by road while it's on. Given the jams, the festival has always seemed ironically named.

My main issue now was, something I’d forgotten about amid of the dry weather: feet / trouser bottoms wet, thanks to wet long grass, even if soil very dry and much of the grass browning. Worse than usual as feet and socks wet through, thanks to trainers well on their way out and overdue for replacement. 

Followed Monarch's Way along road east to where it turned left off the road to go down the north side of the ridge to through the woods to East Dean. The last bit out of the woods near the foot of the hill to the lane down to East Dean, over stile very overgrown, long grass alongside barley field.

East Dean pond

Lunch on the village green, by East Dean pond. There was still water in it, though very meagre, with bare soil around the sides. The River Lavant, which rises here, Needlesstosay, dry everywhere.

Began the return leg of the walk along the valley of the absentee river to Singleton. Along the road to Charlton, most of the traffic seemingly bound for, parked by what a took to be the Charlton gastro pub. From Charlton, left off road, through field to Singleton. Path overgrown where it left the field at the western end at end. Very long grass, though by now dried out, hill clear now, too. Uphill from Singleton church to Trundle. 

Back down to Chichester via Hayes Down, sat over looking the view across the valley below West Dean. Of all the views along the South Downs, this is the one I've probably sketched the most times, upteen times during the past eight years. In winter, usually water in the stream running across a large field below the main road, crossed at the southern end by the Centurion Way cycle path coming down from the road before turning south. Before following this path back into the city centre, I had a quick, closer look down there. Compare and contrast photos of the dry riverbed now with the same view during the ages of abundance, which began with the unusually wet, recharging spring and summer of 2012; and included winters 2012/13 and 2013/14. Groundwater flooding on the road in East Dean, pumps at Singleton. 

 Dry river bed of the Lavant below West Dean

Then and now photos from winters 2012/13, 2013-14 Groundwater flooding around East Dean. 

Along the Centurion Way above Mid Lavant

  During the hour+ walk back into the city centre, I contemplated the missing  / missed River Lavant. A misfit stream in a misfit climate; and misfit theories attempting to explain them. As noted by Ken Newbury in his book on the Lavant published in the 1980s (revised 2000 to include pictures of the 1994 floods), the theory goes (back to about 10Ma BP), that the proto-Lavant would have run from south to north, like the Arun, draining off the Wealden anticline. As that eroded, the South Downs chalk escarpment (and the Hangers escarpment to the W, the N Downs escarpment to the north) would have pushed back, exposing the Gault Clay below, and below that Lower Greensand. Once the latter was exposed, a proto-Rother (probably starting off flowing into the Arun east of Midhurst) cut back westwards through the sandy layers and captured the upper reaches and headwaters of the proto-Lavant. The East Dean – Singleton stretch of the now Lavant would have been a tributary to the larger river. As the BGS maps show, the now upper Lavant exploits a fold – a syncline, Singleton Anticline to the north, with Levin Down. The only thing is, the gradient north of the escarpment at Cocking is now in the wrong direction. The brook fed by springs at the Chalk-Gault Clay line, Costers Brook, flows north to the Rother. Can’t see any other way through the Downs other than where the A286 now goes through. Leaving Singleton to head north, that immediately goes up hill. Maybe surface topography / local gradient has changed through erosion. The beds dip south.

Flashy rivers respond to a brief early summer pick-up in flows

June 2017 - in this watery context , flashy means responsive up-down, on-off flows along rivers draining largely impermeable basins; not bling or strutting funky stuff. The impermeability come naturally - a hard rock basin with crystalline rock (the English Lake District), or older compacted sedimentary rock (the Pennines), clay in lowland areas, notably Wealden Clay in SE England on which the Mole, Medway, Arun and other south flowing Sussex rivers rise- or hard urbanisation involving paving, tarmac, concrete and culverting. Such rivers rise quickly (in under 12 hours) after rain, then drop back quickly once the rain stops, as seen in northern England this spring. 

Usually people only notice that they are in a flashy catchment when rivers rise up and flood. Usually during the winter half of the year when the surface soils are more likely to be saturated. As it was in northern Britain in December 2015, and southern England and the English Midlands two years earlier. On such rivers, less intense summer rain can make a difference. Monday 5th June was one of the wetter days of the summer so far, with heavy rain southern England overnight 5th /6th June. Tuesday 6th was showery on the south coast, though there may have been more rain inland. On the Tuesday, I walked along the coast between Langstone and Emsworth. As when I visited this area at the beginning of May, the fresher, cloudier weather was a relief, punctuating otherwise prevailing dry weather. As I sketched on the shore, I reveled in the busy, fast moving skies, as showers passed over Portsmouth and Hayling Island, but just missed me. Clear skies and sunshine contrasted with dark clouds.

The following day, 7th June,  I went to the Box Hill area, taking the train up the Arun valley to Horsham, then across the West Sussex watershed to Dorking, Denbies Vineyard and the Mole beneath Box Hill. With the tide picking up after the neaps, the Arun looked livelier than it had done from the train to London the previous weekend. I was surprised to see the current still strong at Pulborough; the effect of the rainfall on top of the tide, perhaps. The corresponding EA Rivers and Sea Levels page did indeed show a rise superimposed on the tidal curve for the gauged river levels at Pulborough. 

The Mole at Castle Mill, Dorking, meanwhile showed a seemingly modest but significant rise, from almost bumping along the bottom at around 10cm deep to a peak of 39cm deep on the Wednesday morning. Enough to cover the Stepping Stones beneath Box Hill and turn the water a turbid brown. Normally in the summer it is shallow and fairly clear running here. By the time I headed home, though, the flow was quickly dropping back, the weather dry all day on Wednesday. The CEH / National River Flow Archive hydrographs for Dorking and further upstream at Kinnersley Manor show a perpetually rollercostering line. However, particularly when low, effluent makes up a high proportion of this flow. The Mole is among the most flashy rivers in England, naturally in part due to the impermeable Weald Clay near its source, but also because its upper catchment is very urbanised, with Crawley and Gatwick Airport. As well as rapid run-off from tarmac etc, urbanisation means more people, more people mean more effluent. Mostly treated sewage effluent, including the sewage works  beneath on the SW side of Box Hill. During the 1990s, there water were pollution problems from run-off at Gatwick, where the Mole is banished in a culvert beneath the runway. I believe this has improved now and the water quality along the Mole is generally good (or at least it was 8 years ago, according to the most recently available data from the EA). According to one website I came across, at least one wild river swimmer was happy to swim in the lower reaches of the Mole in 2015. As far as I know and despite some very dry spells since, the last time the Mole ran dry was during the hot, dry summer of 1976 which hit rivers throughout Britain and Europe. I suspect the effluent contributions account for that.

This time of year in 2012, during the wet early summer, both the Mole and the Arun flooded. After the 2013 Christmas storm (called Dirk on the Continent, I think), the Mole was one of the first rivers to react to the heavy rain which came with the gales. On Christmas Eve and through to Christmas morning, the EA had a Severe Flood Warning (Danger to Life) at Leatherhead. Upstream, Burford Bridge Hotel beneath Box Hill was flooded. This involved about 75mm rain in 24 hours. Much less than in Cumbria during Storm Desmond two years later (over 300mm in 24 hours at Honister Pass), but this was more than enough to cause the worst flooding along the Mole for 45 years. The photos from Burford Bridge and around show the river totally out of its usual gentle character, with bridges damaged, cars overturned. There was further, though less damaging flooding in January and early February 2014. By then the ground was well saturated, prompting flooding even after more modest rainfall totals (40mm and under). As this year, though spring came early and it was largely dry and very warm. Unlike now, groundwater levels were high after the soggy winter. Being so flashy, though, the Mole was very quick to fall back. I recall the CEH said that its flow was "Notably Low" during March (monthly hydrological summary, March 2014). Around the same time, some parts of Hampshire still had groundwater flooding.

This time round (June 2017) responsive rivers in northern England responded to the rainfall. The Severn, as always slower to respond, picked up during the following week.

The middle part of June was very hot, particularly 19th-21st June. June 21st was the hottest June day in Britain since June 1976. My energy levels fell with the river levels, all the more with warm nights and the heat building through the day. The heatwave broke on 22nd June. Thankfully then cooler. More rain in Hampshire on 27th - 28th. The grey skies were a relief for my light-sensitive eyes, though admittedly a downer a mood otherwise. The changing weather, as always reflects the changing course of the jetstream, which has been meandering again quite a bit lately.

More information on the Mole

Environment Agency (EA)
River levels, Dorking
Water quality data

CEH / NRFA
Mole, Castle Mill, Dorking

Wild Swimming blog

http://outdoorswimmer.com/blogs/why-finding-a-snake-in-your-open-water-swimming-spot-is-a-good-thing

Reigate Grammar School - Flooding on the River Mole, with lots of other interesting stuff about the river more generally

https://rgsweather.com/2014/01/04/flooding-on-the-river-mole-surrey-causes-and-management/

My River Mole blogs 2013-14

Christmas Storms and Floods in the South, December 2013

Art and Plenty of Water - February 2014

Notes from the Surrey Hills, April 2014

Trees along the River Mole, May 2014

Sketches September 2014, including Norbury Park and Leatherhead