On the north bank of the meandering River Severn

The thick fog lifted slowly around lunchtime, as predicted in the weather forecast. I decided to go for a jaunt and divert to the River Severn on my way to the Gloucester tofu supplier, where I was eventually heading. I crossed over the Sharpness canal at one of the remote bridges a few miles south of the city and stopped to take a few long shots along the northbound section of the canal. By then the fog had become a general mist but the sun could be see thinly through the clouds.

I drove on beyond the canal to Epney, where the road meets the banks of the River Severn for a few hundred yards, before returning inland to meander through hamlets and the fields of the old farmsteads in the low lying lands of the Severn Vale. There is a pub at the place where the footpath continues north towards Gloucester where I parked and stood in the garden overlooking the wide meandering River Severn.

I enjoyed the quiet from being beside the river without any breeze at all. I looked at the reeds on the embankment and across to the sandbanks revealed by the low tide. A few birds were bobbing about on the water in the distance but there wasn't the songs of the summer visitors, the martins, swallows and warblers which I have come to expect when visiting this area.

I started to film the occasional birds flying inches above the water, gulls mostly, although at one point a kestrel flew straight down the middle of the river. I don't know what type of gull this one is, but it was larger than most. I like the way the wings are reflected when the fly low. In the background ia large meander beyond which about three miles due south is the Slimbridge Wildlife and Wetland centre which I must visit soon on another beautiful day like this.