The hidden valley

It seems as though the English summer is taking place this week.  Ever since the end of last week the weather has been good - not hot, like having temperatures of 30 or more (that's Celsius or centigrade or something, which means roughly 80+ in old money) but comfortable at the lower mid-20s.  Some afternoons there has been a bit of a breeze so I have had no difficulty in finding somewhere to walk the dog, who doesn't like it too warm.  Other days I have kept to the woods so that she has some shade.

Last Sunday was a very warm day and the ideal place for our post-lunch stroll would really have been Stanmer Woods.  But I knew that many families would be thinking the same as me and the woods would be heaving with people.  Just managing to park would have been quite a triumph.  Then I recalled another wooded area I have only once before visited.  The Boundary Path runs through a strip of woodland in a roughly northerly direction from the village of Falmer.  I assume the path has been so named as it runs along the boundary of the city of Brighton & Hove with Lewes District Council.  It also happens to run along the edge of the campus of the University of Sussex.

It was a real pleasure to walk through the woods.  I took great delight in stopping for a minute or two to watch one of my favourite birds, the tiny and hard to spot wren, as it hopped from twig to twig while keeping a wary eye on me.  After about a mile, the woodland opens up into a valley of the Downs - nothing very special, perhaps, but so peaceful and utterly typical of the South Downs these days.