Bangor and Birds by Bike

The brief excitement of winter in the hills had all washed away down the rivers by this morning, so with the mountains looking gloomy and sodden, we set off downhill, by bike to Bangor. It's only a half hour ride down to the Menai Straits on the cycle track and soon we were by the sea. It was overcast and dry, but not exactly picnic on the beach weather.

A short ride east, took us to the wildlife reserve called 'The Spinnys'. Here we locked up the bikes and quietly tiptoed into the bird hide to see what we could see. There were loads of blue tits, robins, chaffinches and other little ones that we didn't know, as well as a big Heron, keeping lookout, hunched over the water, looking a bit cold. The couple in the hide already, said they had been watching a Kingfisher, but he didn't re-appear for us.

There was a good tally of recent 'spots' on the whiteboard inside the hide, but to be honest, our best encounter had been on the cycle ride. While on the old railway track, we were coasting along side by side, when we disturbed a huge Buzzard, who was sitting in the undergrowth, about a metre away from the edge of the cycle track. Having been interrupted by us, it took off and slowly launched right in front of us. We slammed on the brakes, to avoid hitting it, but also to stop and stare. Instead of flying away, it gracefully swooped up onto the drystone wall and sat there looking at us. It was a real close up encounter. Amazing. The stare-off continued in silence for a few minutes, until we quietly rolled away leaving it to return to its business.

On the route back from the Spinny, we took a slight de-tour on a small back road, that turned out to have a ford crossing! After some hesitation, regarding estimations of depth and water speed, we made the crossing with (more or less) dry feet!

Intentions of stopping off at a cafe we swapped for heading back to The Cottage as time was ticking on and we wanted to be back before dark. A few spots of rain amounted to nothing as we peddled our way happily home.