Lonely shepherd

From this quarry edge near Llanelli, we looked across at the Sugar Loaf, the river Usk, Abergavenny, Crickhowell & down to the canal at Gilwern, our point of departure.

J - shown here by The Lonely Shepherd: a disconcertingly dominant finger of limestone - & I did not talk much, being out of puff.

My Merlin app clocked buzzards, nuthatches, stonechats, tree-creepers. We met a runner with one prosthetic leg &
a dozen pensioners with Palestinian flags doing a sponsored bike ride for Gaza.

The ridge we ascended has elements of picturesque farming valley, but it's animated & charged by the Industrial revolution: the canal, the limestone quarries, the overgrown spoil heaps.

A speaking landscape.