High on a Dorset heath, where wind rattles the heather

Hardown Hill, Dorset I skirt the old quarry workings, swamped in spring with bluebells and now swathed with rusty brackenOld Bottom, as the Marshwood Vale was once called, has filled with autumn rain. Walking means slogging, ankle deep or more, through cold, claggy clay, navigating puddles of yellow water overhung with dripping trees. Time to escape the woods for higher, drier ground. Hardown Hill is one of a circle of hills and forts ringing the vale. Steep sides of deciduous woodland and gaps