The natural Navigation: The Right Course, Naturally

Day in, day out, paths experience a different life to that of their verges.

Very often there is undergrowth on each side of a path, sheltering one side of them from the sun’s drying rays, but their exposure to and shelter from wind also sets them apart. This can be seen most clearly when snow or frost is thawing. The path will either thaw first, or, as in this picture which I took about ten days ago, they hold onto their snow for longer.

As I mention in the book, this is something that can be of value when walking at night. If the path is big, bold and broad like this one (an old Roman road) then no help is needed in following a path at night, but if you are following one of those less clearly defined snakes in the grass then all help will be welcome.…

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The heat seems to have abated a little, but the sun has left its great big footprints all over the countryside. The baked earth is cracked and fissures run along paths and the edges of the fields, more on the northern side than the southern.

The grass of our garden lawn is doing its best to betray both the sun’s arc and the motion of the trees’ shadows during the course of the day. The lawn is a patchwork of varying shades of green and brown, but it is not random and tells a story of heat and shade that is rooted in the direction of the sun.

The last course stirred up some healthy discussion about the difference between the sun’s summer and winter arcs in the sky. The arcs are actually very similar, because they are parallel, but in our winter the arc is displaced to the south. However, the effect this has on shadows is more interesting and beguiling. The arc traced by shadows over the year are not parallel, but change quite significantly from summer to winter. This is because the sun rises north of us in summer and south of us in winter. The effect this has on shadows is quite counter-intuitive, but no less fascinating for it. The chalk line in this photo shows how the shadow from the edge of a flower tub moved this morning. In the summer it would have curved the other way and closer to the pot.