I'm determined to do more walking this year than I did last year and
have decided not to be so fussy about where I go. There are lots of
local places which are easy to get to, don't need lots of planning and
provide decent walks.
This morning's walk was to Hilbre Island which is the biggest of three
islands in the Dee estuary about a mile off the Wirral peninsula. The
islands are cut off by the tide twice a day, so I checked the tide
tables and found that a 9 o'clock start would give me ample time to
walk to the island, have a look round then make it back to the
mainland before the mid-afternoon high tide.
I wore my walking boots and had no problems on the walk out. It was a
mix of hard dry sand, soft squidgy sand and pools of water. It would
have been a good idea to wear my gaiters, to stop the wet sand
splashing down the top of my boots but I didn't want to make too much
of an expedition out of it!
The Wirral Country Park Rangers advise allowing an hour to get out to
Hilbre but it took me about 45 minutes. Unfortunately, I seem to have
ignored their advice about keeping Little Hilbre/Middle Eye to my left
and I started to realise that I was going to miss the easy route onto
Hilbre. Time for a bit of scrambling over the seaweed-covered rocks.
I'm not a confident walker on wet rocks but the trick was to choose
the rocks which had the thick weed on them and keep off the ones with
just a thin coat of slimey stuff.
I ended up walking up the slipway by the old Telegraph Station. It
was closed, as expected, but I know they do open days and I'm
interested in all that olde worlde high-tech comms stuff, so I think
I'll go back sometime.
We used to occasionally go to Hilbre when I was a kid ..... and it was
much bigger then! There was obviously not going to be a lot of
walking to do. I went down the derelict slipway at the far end of the
island and tried to find the seals which are always to be seen in the
area. I couldn't see any but I could hear something which sounded
like them. I then realised that the black blobs, on a sand bank out
towards Wales, were seals and not birds as I had originally thought.
It was handy having my monocular with me; it was quite a misty day and
it was good to be able to pick things out on the Wirral and Wales
coastlines.
From leaving the car, to having reached the end of the island had
taken an hour. What shall I do now? I know ..... packed lunch! I had
a cuppa and some malt loaf and just watched the birds and the sea. A
couple of micro-lights flew over; I waved but they seemed to ignore
me.
The weather had been quite bright when I set off but it was starting
to get a bit grey out to sea and I was half hoping for a downpour but
the rain didn't come until I was back in the car, and it soon passed.
By the time I left Hilbre there were a few other people on the island.
They seemed to be a mix of dog walkers and bird watchers. The Dee
estuary is an important stopping-off place for migrating seabirds but
I wouldn't know an albatross from a sandpiper. I had meant to take my
Observer book of birds .... but forgot.
I must've been back at the car by 11:30ish and West Kirby was now a
lot busier than at 9am. There were sailing dinghies on the Marine
Lake and families out for a stroll and an ice cream. I resisted the
temptation and finished my flask of tea before heading home.
Time walking: About 2.5 hours (including rests!)
Total mileage: About 4.5 miles.
Total ascent: About 20 feet.
Some pictures are in the Outdoors/Hilbre folder at
http://hometown.aol.com/goofif
Judith