Impressions on arrival

Back in Australia - in Brisbane at 8-00 am we emerge from customs and the airport, blinking like moles into the bright sunlight and I am struck by the smell of the tropics and the verdant growth of trees, shrubs and grass around the airport. The green is vivid, all encompassing and incredibly striking after winter in France. It is sunny and humid, you can smell and feel the growth happening. There has been very good rain and after a long time without, everything is a riot of growth - luxuriant, humid, tropical growth, it feels as though everything is a part of this growth, even the air which is heavy and growing itself.

The casualness and the space are immediately apparent, it is rush hour at 8-00 am and waiting in the sun for a train is a very relaxed process, the train arrives and there is plenty of time to stroll on and find a place. A little further on the train stops while a couple buy tickets from the stationmaster and after the purchase is complete and they board the train, the stationmaster emerges from the ticket office, glances up and down the track, blows his whistle and we move on - a far cry from taking the metro in Paris. The clothes people are wearing are casual in the extreme, sloppy at times - summer in Brisbane !!! and the pace of everything is relaxed. After a while it occurs to me that if someone from Paris arrived like this at this time they would think - " How does anything ever get done around here !!" Things do get done and the train and the bus run on time with a minimum of fuss and stress.

Overweight people - the number of overweight people is an immediate impression, very rare in France but disturbingly common here. One can see fast food being consumed and sold in the streets and the cafes - a big part of the problem ??

No smoking, very few people smoking and absolutely no smoking in public places.

After Paris and the north of France the space is overwhelming, space between people, between cars, between houses and as we leave Brisbane - between towns. The roads seem empty by comparison and the pace is slower, pressure is less - life slows and flows.

Mango trees with mangoes ripening, huge luxurious figs, tropical grasses bursting out of the ground and hiding fences, Bos Indicus cattle with humps and long ears, rivers with big beds and river banks and small flows, signs of recent flooding, eucalyptus trees and space.

At home, the peace and quiet, the type of peace that comes with hearing only bird sounds and the wind in the trees - a deep, deep peace !

There is however, within me a feeling of dislocation and a strong feeling of sadness after leaving Laruns and the Vallee d'Ossau. I feel we have travelled far and fast and not all of me has moved, there is a significant part of me still in the valley and the mountains. I find myself later looking up the Meteo site for a bulletin on the weather in Laruns and the condition of the snow in the surrounding mountains. I look for a boulangarie as we pass through the towns or a sign saying - Vente Fromage de Brebis.

Winter Trees

The trees have been almost as surprising as the colours in their winter beauty.

Leafless trees form clear distinct outlines against the sky, the mountains, the white snow and the brown fields. Loss of leaves reveals varied craggy shapes, twisted branches and filaments of twigs with buds already waiting - confident of the ever recurring cycles of nature. Should we tell the trees about Climate Change or perhaps if we listen they are telling us now !

The trees form a dominant presence and in many ways are emblematic for me of the winter landscape. Skeletons of trees dominate ridge lines, bare branches frame landscapes. In a forest without leaves the mossy trunks and lichen covered branches are the main features above the ground. The trees are powerful reminders of the regeneration process of winter as they stand dormant, but with tiny buds already swollen and prepared for warmer, sunnier times.

The bare branches make long lean shadows on the ground and individual trees form a screen through which glimpses of background can be discerned framed by brown and black twigs and branches. The shape of the tree, the colour of the trunk with its associated lichens and mosses are revealed for all the world to see - or for that part of the world that is prepared to brave the elements to see a world presented bare, cloaked by winter, occasionally by snow but always by the blanket of winter light - the result of a sun low in the sky, of cold moist air.

When the trees are covered in snow another type of beauty altogether appears - from a distance it is a white veil below which the shape and the colour of the trees can be seen. In the forest it is a magical world of white, branches hanging low with the weight, snow on every horizontal surface and piled up against the trunks, the trunks grey and black against the white, bursts of silver and white as a clump of snow falls and catches the sun.

Winter colours

The colours of autumn took us quite by surprise - the variation, richness and vibrancy combined with the ever changing nature of the season were awesome and filled each day with an appreciation of the wonder of the natural world. Winter has left me equally moved, the soft light and more muted colours, the overwhelming feeling of stillness and repose, of regeneration and rest. The colours, while soft and muted are incredibly striking, always harmonious.

In the distance grey cloud forever, below the grey - white ridges stark against dark timbered slopes, ridges and valleys deep in snow, white and pure above and alongside timbered slopes bluish in the afternoon light. In the mid distance the brown of dry grass and fern on the lower hills - dark green pines, greys, browns and black of the leafless lichen covered trees, bright white snow on the track, deep footprints casting shadows in the slanting winter sunlight, reddish, russet brown leaves on the ground and light brown grass on the near slope.

The colours are slightly muted and within a limited range of blues, dark green, brown, black and grey - all complimentary and cohesive - calmed by the soft light, powerful and and dangerous, blanketed with winter, stillness and cold.

Winter

Winter is coming fast and the beauty is awesome !!