Out and About

Now that Ian is getting far steadier on his feet, and because people have been querying over on Deviant Art why no new stock has been added to my account in a while, we decided to make the most of the lovely weather on Sunday and headed out into the countryside to see what we could find.

Originally we started off looking for Mother Ludlam's Caves which is situated just along from the ruins of Waverley Abbey in Farnham. Mother Ludlam was said to be the White Witch of Waverley who lived in the cave during the middle ages, and as a a very impressionable Brownie, I can remember being taken out on a 'midnight ramble' up to the caves where a group of us, all nervous giggles, were served hot chocolate by candlelight from a big 'cauldron' some enterprising Guider had rigged up right there in the caves. Great stuff. Nowadays with Health and Safety coming into play, the entrance to the cave has been sealed up preventing anyone from entering but it hasn't stopped a multitude of ramblers and hikers wandering around the area, all of whom seemed to have congregated there last Sunday which meant my plans to photograph the caves went right out the window. Until I can get back there, this etching from 1773 will have to suffice;



I did however, manage to take a couple of photos of the surrounding countryside;



which as you can see, rather lends itself to all kinds of imaginary worlds, which I hope some enterprising photo manipulator can take proper advantage of despite the light blur to the left of the photo.

Not to be entirely deterred we then drove around for a bit before ending up at a beautiful little church tucked down a country lane not far from the village of Dunsfold. I have a 'thing' about hunting down Yew Trees and pagan artefacts in churches and wasn't disappointed when we came across this ancient beauty;



who's hollow trunk would make a perfect entrance into some fairytale home;



as would this tunnelled tangle of branches which encompassed the path leading up to the church itself;



And what about this, wonderfully quirky umm, whatyamacallit;



can you not just imagine some grumpy troll or goblin waddling out of his domed abode, disgruntled at the strange woman enthusiastically taking photos for all she's worth?

More seriously, the graveyard itself was wonderfully serene with area's such as this;



swathed in a sea of wild daisys; whilst ancient lichen covered stone,



and ivy clad brick sarcophagus' (if that is indeed the right word?)



weathered the elements alongside this unusual wooden marker;



left as a rather lovely memorial to a woman who died in 1947...