Riverside commute

One of the aspects of living where we do that I really appreciate is our proximity to the river. In order to get to the train station (or into town at all) I have to walk along the river bank for about half a mile. This particular bit of river is, for half of its length, a channel off the main river, which has a weir and a lock at the point the channel forks away. A really very big weir, as it happens, but anyway, I digress. The other bank of the spur has a path which crosses over the top of the weir towards the lock, and there's a bridge across the channel at the near end of the spur (furthest away from the main channel). Just by the bridge, on the edge of the water, on my side of the channel, a pair of swans have nested, the female has been on her nest for a long time now, and we'll call her Swan 1. On the other side of the channel, most of the way along, nearly to the main channel, another pair of swans have nested. The female's nest is protected from the people and dogs on the path by plywood boards on three sides (the clear side is the river side, unsurprisngly). We'll call her Swan 2, and she has to put up with well-intentioned people dumping bags filled with stale chunks of bread on her head.

• 24.5.2004, 7.55
• File under: river, Reading, Thames, commuting, spring, water fowl, swans, Great Crested Grebes