20/09/2026
Top of Abbotsbury Hill - Drinking in the View - My Eyes Were the Lens
A glorious Sunny Sunday afternoon. Turning right at the top of Abbotsbury Hill, the other half & me went off together, but he wandered the Iron Age landscape with his binoculars, we didn’t always need to be doing the same, so I settled into my camping chair, facing the sea and letting my thoughts wander instead.
I had my coffee, my pale green fleece blanket and no real plan other than to sit and look or read, to relax and reset. However, reading was not going to be on the agenda, as there was sooooo much to see, I didn't want to take photographs., after taking one or two, instead I wanted my eyes to be the lens and my memory to be the photographs, so instead of reading, I took out my note pad and I started writing down everything I could see, hear, smell and feel.
The road below was busy, as it always is — motorbikes opening up their throttles, cars and vans whizzing past, campervans and motorhomes going both ways, the coastal bus rumbling along. Sounds of the vehicles, Drumming, buzzing, burring, whooshing and the occasional boom of an exhaust.
But I was looking beyond it. - Several hawks were flying quite close, soaring and diving, flapping their wings and then catching the air again. Their white bellies seemed to disappear against the white clouds. I kept thinking how easily the little creatures being hunted would miss the hawks if they looked up as they would be camouflaged against the white hazy clouds.
The Fleet was still and Chesil sea was calm with Chesil Beach stretching right towards Lyme Regis and across left towards Portland with St Catherine's Mount the Hill in Abbotsbury rising up above the Fleet with its little chapel ruin and across the sea the sunshine made this enormous band of liquid silver, sparkling like fairy dust. – I always find that light on the sea rather magical & spiritual.
The warm September breeze was blowing in from the sea and teased my hair all over the place. It was still surprisingly warm for the end of September, especially after someone seemed to have turned the Autumn switch on a couple of weeks ago.
Mind always full and busy, all around me there were things I might normally have walked straight past. - Gorse, with its spiky textured foliage, almost mirroring the silver spikes of the barbed wire beside it. Oak, fern, hawthorn with red berries, dandelions and dried grasses, soft and feathery, bobbing their heads in the breeze. Gorgeous pink heather, dried curling biscuit coloured ferns ends curled like ammonite shapes.
There's so much to see, maybe unnoticed Wooden posts. Metal gates. Stiles. Troughs for the animals. Grass worn away by walkers, showing the chalk and flint underneath. – The Ancient earth beneath modern feet, exposing chalk and flint pathways unearthed.
The hills behind me rolled away like a patchwork quilt, hedges stitching the fields together. There were fields of maize, grass, sheep, cows and goodness knows what else. Burial mounds on the hilltops, earthworks and trenches. Old stories sitting underneath the grass.
Far away, a pink castle, and standing needle-like and proud was Hardy's Monument tall on the far away landscape
There were walkers, dogs wagging tails, horse riders - People smiled and nodded as they passed, everyone happily doing their own thing …And I was doing mine & I realised how much I liked that. Not much chatting, just listening and looking at what was around and occurring in the moment. I think I needed that kind of afternoon more than I realised.
The last few days have made me think about how quickly things can change, and perhaps that's why I suddenly felt the need to stop rushing around.
I am always dashing somewhere / There is always something else to do /But sitting there, with the sea in front of me and the warm breeze on my face, I thought about all the summer light that is still here. There will be plenty of dark winter evenings soon enough to come like Wet days, Cold days, Grey days, so perhaps I need to get better at noticing the good ones while they're happening.
The sea has always been my calm place and maybe that's why I sat there for so long.
I wasn't really doing anything, I was just noticing: The hawks / The sea / The wind / The traffic / The chalk / The gorse / The people / The light /The ancient earth beneath my feet.
And for once, I wasn't rushing past it, I was there / Really there / Just my eyes & a head full of memories. Burial mounds on the hilltops, old earthworks and trenches, glacial scars, I could smell grass, wood, salt and earth. The breeze lifted my hair, the blanket kept me warm, and for a while there was nowhere else I needed to be.
I had gone for a walk, But really, I think I had gone to notice /To sit /To listen /To look – so drinking in that view was perfect for today.
