An intriguing day...

Madron Holy Well...

...and this is my swansong for painting on black velvet.

J and I visited this well many many years ago, quite by accident on our part.

We were wandering round Cornwall very early morning, at dawn. Our destination was the Merry Maidens stone circle. We parked the car in a layby and went into this field which was next to the main road.

The gate was locked but that didn't stop J (who was 20 years my senior) who vaulted it. Some very undignified scrabbling on my part, and finally I got over the gate. By this time J had taken his shoes off and was walking widdershins round the outside of the Merry Maidens stone circle.

I reached him and took my shoes and socks off too. I love walking barefoot in dewdropped grass anyway.

But I looked up and there was a farmer (?) with a shotgun standing by the gate, leaning on it.

I tried to get J's attention, but he waved me away while he carries on with whatever it/ritual it is he is doing.

Me, I am keeping an eye on the man with the shotgun.

J finishes, and we walk back to the gate, with J all the while saying to me that we all have the right to access these stone circles and ancient monuments etc.

We get to the gate and J vaults the gate again. He says nothing. However, the man with the shotgun swings the gate open for me, and I give him my sweetest smile and say 'Thank you'.

We drive off. I decide to take the country route to wherever we were going. J wanted to take the main roads for quickness because we did have a lot we wanted to fit in that day, but as I am the driver of the car I go the way I want...

We are on this very narrow bendy single track road with high hedges each side. Suddenly, just before a bend in the road, these blue tits begin dive bombing my windscreen. Instinctively I knew they were warning me of something and I instantly drove into the ditch into the hedge.

J looked at me shocked at my behaviour, but in that instant a large red 4x4 came round the bend like a bat out of hell and shot past us.

'You clever girl,' said J, 'how did you know that? That would have been very serious for us.'

'The blue tits dive bombing the windscreen,' I replied.

'What blue tits?' he said.

I am sure that man was in a total world of his own most of the time oblivious to anything.

Anyway we got the car out of the ditch, and I carefully went round that blind bend in the road. And guess what, those blue tits appeared again. They flew in front of me, one at a time as if they were leading the way. Then the blue tit leading me veered off, and another blue tit came in from the side and this one led the way. This carried on for a short while, and J did see the blue tits this time!

Then suddenly the blue tits vanished, and I stopped the car. There was an area of grass to my right where we could park out of the way from any mad 4x4's hurtling along country roads at the speed of light. So I parked the car and got out, and when J got out I locked it.

As I said, this was many many years ago. There was no sign posting. We didn't know where we were. And there appeared to be a small muddy pathway through some overgrown thorn bushes. J protested saying he only had sandals on, but I ignored him. I mean, this was the man who had quite happily taken his sandals and socks off a short while before to walk in a muddy field round some stones.

The path was muddy and J wanted to go back. He was protesting a lot. But then the blue tits appeared again and were leading the way down the path. I looked at J and with seeing the blue tits, he agreed to carry on walking but only for a short while.

Then we started seeing bits of torn and cut cloth hanging from the hawthorn and blackthorn trees. It was misty by this time and had a very mysterious atmosphere. I had my camera and was taking photographs (I have dozens of print photos from that day).

J becomes intrigued by now and tells me we must be in some holy place...

First of all we came across a flooded pool on our left. There seemed to be some stones in it that were covered by water, and if you read some links I will post here, apparently that one is called a wishing well (this is on the left of my velvet painting between two trees) I didn't know that at the time. We didn't have the internet to find out all this stuff at that time. But it was pretty obvious that it was regarded as some sort of holy place. The gnarled, lichened, mossy green thorn trees were absolutely festooned in all kinds of torn cloths, baubles, small children's soft toys, and even a few white voodoo type hand made dolls. It was rather spooky.

J turned to go back. I didn't want to, but there was no real obvious path at this point. It was a total mud bath and we didn't have appropriate footgear.

It was at this point the blue tits appeared again. I called J back, and the blue tits were flying up one of two (remotely) possible paths. So we followed the blue tits again. Then they vanished again as suddenly as they had appeared. The path was looking more like a path now, and the mists faded away.

We carried on walking, and came to an ancient roofless stone building.

In my velvet painting to the left is a stone slab kind of seat. I used it as a seat! But I am assuming this was the altar. It had a bit of an indentation in the middle of the stone slab.

Then there was this enclosed walled shallow pool which you could step into, fed by a gentle water trickle. (You can see this on the right of my velvet painting.)

There were abundant ferns growing everywhere. In the chapel were some bound straw pieces and crosses, and other things.

freespiral
https://www.blipfoto.com/entry/2273469897319120976
https://www.blipfoto.com/entry/2274602615360717621
is running her International Holy Well Month #IHWM17 this month. Since I set myself the challenge of doing a painting/drawing a day for each day of this year I asked her if a painting would be okay. She said yes :)

So this is my final black velvet painting. I have no more velvet left and I have no intention of buying any more.

The way I have done this painting is a new departure for me. Always I have done a painting as the whole picture as you actually see it. I have never taken component parts of a real situation and put them into one painting. I have seen others do it, but I have never been able to do it myself. So, the black velvet, those mysterious thorns trees, and the wells wove their magic in order for me to produce this.

This is my painting for today for a pic every day in 20017.

Merry Maidens link http://www.historic-cornwall.org.uk/a2m/bronze_age/stone_circle/merry_maidens/merry_maidens.htm

Madron Holy Well links
https://www.cornwalls.co.uk/history/sites/madron_well.htm
http://www.britainexpress.com/counties/cornwall/ancient/madron.htm
http://www.goodisplanetearth.org/projects/natural-water/29-madron-wishing-well-celtic-chapel-sw-446-328
http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/england/cornwall/ancient-sites/madron-holy-well.html