Rixton and Glazebrook

Swift, Rixton

Plans A to D had been scotched because I overslept, a mixture of a bad night's sleep and catching up after election night. A few more options, including nipping over to Sandbach to see if I could catch the Caspian tern on the flashes there, were scotched by train cancellations and I didn't fancy the Mersey Valley or Pennington Flash on a sunny Saturday afternoon. I wasn't going to waste a sunny afternoon so I put my boots on, opened the front door and it started pouring down. So I sulked in my cave for a bit, the sun came back out, I noticed one of the trains wasn't cancelled, I went out and got it.

There was a cold wind cutting through the warmth of the sunshine. I got on the Warrington train and wondered where I was going. Ordinarily I'd be getting off at Irlam for a walk across the mosses but I didn't fancy the walk over to Astley Road, I wanted instant countryside gratification, or at least not half a mile of suburban roads. Which ruled out getting off at Padgate and walking down to Woolston Eyes. I could always get off at Birchwood and wander over to Risley Moss…

So I got off at Glazebrook. I could walk up to Little Woolden Moss but then I'd be doing the walk across the mosses I'd already ruled out. I wandered up that way then turned onto Dam Head Lane, I've been wondering what sort of a walk this would be.

Along Dam Head Lane 

I was soon walking past fields of ripening barley and their attendant woodpigeons. Swifts swarmed high in the air above the fields and a few lesser black-backs cruised by. Chiffchaffs sang in the roadside trees and goldfinches twittered in the hedgerows. 

The old Irlam to Wigan railway

After a while the road turns sharply and goes over two railway bridges, one for the old Irlam to Wigan line that's just a commemorative ridge curving towards Culcheth, the second for the Manchester to Liverpool line.

That straight line to the trees on the horizon is the Manchester to Liverpool railway

By Dam Head Lane 

Over the bridges the landscape opened up, the barley fields coming to the roadside. The swifts over these fields were flying at head height. "You aren't going to spend quarter of an hour trying to get photos of swifts as they zip by you at speed are you?" I asked myself. "No I am not," I answered.

Third-calendar-year lesser black-back, Rixton

Dam Head Lane 

By Dam Lane, that footpath goes back into Glazebrook 

I followed the lane down to where it joins Dam Lane and walked down there to Hollins Green. A couple of magpies and some house sparrows at the farm on the corner provided a bit of variety but else it was woodpigeons, swifts and lesser black-backs. Which was fine, it was a very pleasant walk and I need to be reminded every so often that it's not all ticks and numbers.

Approaching Hollins Green 

I got to Hollins Green and the 100 bus was sitting at the bus stop ready to go in five minutes. It would have been rude not to so I got on. I'd had a bit of a walk, barely two miles, and I hadn't filled my notebook with records but there are worse things in this life than standing by a roadside on a sunny teatime as swifts whiz by your shoulders.