Alex, the farmer at Higher Aunemouth

While sipping my second coffee of the morning, outside our tent, alex walked across the field towards us to pick up our payment for camping on his land. He has lived in this landscape since his father moved his family here to a new farm when Alex was very young. He explained a bit of the history of the farm and how the valley works., as well as some of his own story. He was always a keen surfer, as well as becoming a professional photographer, most often combining the two ways of life.

He mentioned his year long project that he had undertaken some years ago to film the views of the valley from the farm looking towards the sea from the farm house which is sited lower down the hillside, below this field. I mentioned Blipfoto to him as I thought it might be a suitable place to show all of the images together. He said he would look at the site, so he may see this picture, since I asked him if I could take a portrait of him for my Blip today.

We spent the rest of the day quite quietly sitting around the campsite doing a lot of reading and relaxing. Late in the day we went down to the beach again at Bentham, but the weather had turned and it was dull and even started to rain. So we took ourselves earlier than anticipated back to the pub, where we intended to eat anyway, as it was my birthday. We had an arrangement o also meet up with a friend of mine who I hadn't met since the early 1980s, who i had discovered was now living in the neighbouring village to Bantham.

In fact when we arrived at the pub, Martin was already at the bar recovering from his week long adventures at a music festival in Surrey, from which he had just returned. So we spent several hours catching up again, as well as eating good food and drinking good ale. I think I rather overdid the food and drink but managed to sleep well despite it all. Helena looked after me well all day, and we had birthday cake she had cooked last week as well as giving me presents, with some particularly good books to read. she is brilliant at knowing what i would like! Thank you very much, Woody XXX