Definitely autumn

Every day there's another sign of autumn: by now we've stopped remarking how dark the evenings are, and we've turned on the heating. The burglar alarms sound constantly as the returning students move into their new homes, the trees are changing colour and the hedges are heavy with fruit.

We went out walking yesterday, equipped with plastic bags and boxes ready for any good things we might find. We left the car on the edge of Shincliffe and walked past the Hall and along the Wear. The sunshine was bright, and though at first we found the wind fresh, by the time we started climbing up through the woods away from the river, we were stopping to remove pullovers. We passed the farm at High Butterby, pausing to admire the goats, and not much further on paused again to pick some sloes; I still don't know why it is that you'll pass great stretches of blackthorn hedge with never a berry, and then a small number of bushes - sometimes just one - that are heavy with fruit.

Somewhere beyond Croxdale Hall we went wrong: the plan had been to cut down from the field edge path into the woodland and onto the path that ran beside the stream to Hett Mill, but we never saw the path into the woods, and plodded along instead round what felt like interminable fields. If there'd ever been a path round the field edge, it had been ploughed out, and while the walking wasn't really difficult, it was uneven and tiring - or perhaps I was just ready (and as this went on, more than ready) for a lunch break. Eventually we came out onto the lane, and, as we still couldn't find anywhere really comfortable to lunch, perched on a grassy corner and ate our sandwiches.

The lane ran down to the road near High Shincliffe. By now I was feeling weary - I don't know why, we hadn't walked an exceptional distance, or done anything particularly difficult; the scenery hadn't been dramatic but the hills and fields and woodlands were all very easy on the eye, but I looked at the elderberries gleaming in the sun and thought "If I pick some of those, it'll just be another thing to cook when we get home..." So when our route took us right past J's door, we knoxhed and demanded that she stop what she was doing and make us a cup of tea - and she didn't seem to mind doing that. So instead of completing the circuit with a loop through Shincliffe woods to see whether there were any chestnuts (only in exceptional years, but worth looking), I stayed and chatted to J while durham_rambler went on his own to fetch the car.

But I did then revive enough for a trip to Lidl (to buy gin, for the sloes) and to gather another boxful of brambles in the garden.