Two amazing new music Kickstarter campaigns - Peter Mulvey & Carrie Elkin

Two of my favourite singer-songwriters, Peter Mulvey and Carrie Elkin, emailed a couple of days apart this week to let me know they have launched Kickstarter campaigns for their new albums. Their music is different, but I love them both! I have (hopefully) embedded their Kickstarter videos into this post although they might be a little slow to load. Click through to the campaign pages for more information and to pledge...

Peter Mulvey is raising $17,000 for Are You Listening which he recorded at Ani di Franco's studio in New Orleans. He says "2016 was tough, people. And 2017 is turning out to be tougher. I have been launching little paper boats of whatever art, wit, beauty and tenderness I can muster onto the waters of this life for a long time, and I work to keep the faith that they make a difference. I'm doing my best and I thank you deeply for supporting my efforts."

Are You Listening?

Carrie Elkin has a target of $30,000 for The Penny Collector. This album is named for her father's hobby and it promises to be an emotional work. Carrie says "This year has been a profound one. As some of you may know, I lost my sweet papa 18 months ago. And then I had a baby four months ago. So it’s been a year book-ended by the most intense of human experiences. I wrote most of the songs on this record soon after my dad died, and right when I found out I was pregnant. At this intersection of joy and grief, I locked myself in a cabin in the mountains of New Mexico and wrote these tunes. The coming together of these emotions brought about a visual landscape in the songs that I would not have otherwise been able to write about. It was one of the most beautiful and telling times of my life."

Carrie Elkin | New Solo Record


If you haven't heard Peter's or Carrie's music before I hope these little Kickstarter videos tempt you to listen further. If you're already a fan, please get pledging!

We overdo our 13 mile moor walk and recover with Festival Of The Spoken Nerd

So, that Festival Of The Spoken Nerd download I mentioned a post or so

Steve Mould gazes dreamily into a nerdy campfire
#distractinglysexy
(Photo by Kitty Walker) 

ago actually took six hours in the end. Our poor Osprey needed a good rest after all that effort and I was so relieved when the opening credits fired up successfully on Dave's laptop. The show was well worth the wait. @FOTSN got into the campsite spirit by tweeting me this photo of a 'nerdy campfire' from the show which will actually become a tricoloured fire tornado! More about that later and it's probably not a good idea to try it at home - not in your own home anyway.

Having ignored our own advice from the day before not to attempt a

thirteen mile walk on a stupidly hot day, yesterday we attempted a thirteen mile walk on a stupidly hot day. If you're following from home, Dave has, nerdily, plotted the route on this gmap so you can see more-or-less exactly where we walked. Footpaths did unexpectedly multiply and then randomly peter out, and several of their signs had bleached to invisible-arrow-white, so we strayed 'slightly' from the original plan, but Dave had chosen such a beautiful area of riverbank and then moorland that it really didn't matter. We set out from our pitch at 11am, returned at 6pm and covered about 13 1/3 miles with 45 minutes over two stops for a picnic lunch and a mid-afternoon apple.

The River Breamish burbled alongside us for the first half hour or so and,

These Christmas trees are too big for Bailey 

as other bloggers are posting Christmas In July at the moment, I'll join in with this Christmas Tree plantation we passed. A brief road walk, uphill of course, then a couple of minutes on a private road which allowed us to ogle a cottage with an incredible garden - veg plots, flower beds, greenhouse and sun room. It wasn't for sale! We continued ascending up a green wooded track on to the Harehope Estate whose sign welcomed us as long as we stayed on footpaths and didn't light fires. Fair enough! The sheep here were particularly ebullient and a couple even followed us inquisitively. Everywhere else they have just scarpered so this behaviour was a little unnerving. The woods faded to grass with bracken and then to bracken with heather. The moorland area resembles a large shallow bowl and we planned to walk a large circle around it before returning the way we had come.

Blawearie was our first landmark. The abandoned farm is now almost

Looking towards Blawearie 

totally derelict and only inhabited by sheep. Looping round towards it, we were plagued by flies, but the views were fabulous. Our exciting wildlife spot of the day was an adder. I didn't see it a first, blithely stomping straight past, but my footsteps must have woken it because Dave then noticed its movement just in time before he trod on it. We watched it for a few seconds before it disappeared into heather. Other sightings included swallows and skylarks, butterflies and bees, and a pale brown bird of prey which looked interesting but resolutely refused to fly close enough to give us any chance at identification.

Isolated on the moorland was this memorial to a Douglas Brown who

Douglas Brown memorial 

died in 2003. I haven't been able to learn anything about him, and we wondered if he had worked on this land or particularly enjoyed walking here. Another unusual sighting was five Other Walkers in the distance. We are so used to having Northumberland to ourselves that we were surprised and a little disgruntled to see them! Misanthropic? Us? By the time we could see Blawearie again we were getting weary ourselves. The ascents weren't distressingly strenuous on this walk and we carried lots of water including an iced thermos, but this probably was too much walk for us in this heat. We are both still suffering today so didn't mind being kept indoors by a torrential downpour this morning.

Fortunately we had a lazy post-walk evening lined up watching my aforementioned download of the Festival Of The Spoken Nerd show Full Frontal Nerdity. I haven't seen FOTSN since I went to Pi Curious at The Blind Tiger in 2012. Despite its suggestive title, Full Frontal Nerdity has less nudity than Pi Curious (i.e. none at all) but the trio are still very Very funny. I am more towards the 'ooh fire' end of the nerd spectrum so was chuffed to actually get some of the Real Science jokes and Matt's manually conditionally formatting a huge spreadsheet reminded me of creating endless audit templates at one of my old jobs. Excel wasn't made for that either! I still love Helen Arney's punning lyrics - she was the first of the Nerds I ever saw - and I giggled almost continuously throughout the show last night, only ceasing to gawp in wonderment at things I never knew. How far away is a safe distance from a hat-swiping smoke ring? Should I replace our awning light with a gherkin? Are we really all made out of spreadsheets? You'll need to watch Full Frontal Nerdity to find out!

Full Frontal Nerdity is available on DVD or as a download directly from

the Festival Of The Spoken Nerd shop. It's the perfect gift for your inner nerd, or the special nerd in your life and, as a reward for having read right to the end of this post, I will let you know that during July 2015 you can get two whole pounds off the DVD price by using the discount code KICKSTARTER during checkout. How can you possibly resist?!

A ten mile Northumberland walk - Harthope Burn and Broadstruther loop

We are enjoying the unexpected heatwave by having a lazy day on our

Crags above Harthope Burn 

campsite in Powburn today. I have washed a couple of sinks-worth of laundry, baked another loaf of delicious soda bread (thanks to Julie's Family Kitchen blog for the recipe) and made carrot soup for lunch, but then spent the afternoon engrossed in a good book (Singled Out by Julie Lawford - review to be posted soon!) I am also now downloading my eagerly awaited Festival Of The Spoken Nerd kickstarter reward: Full Frontal Nerdity. (It's even got Klingon subtitles!) Admittedly the downloading doesn't really take too much effort on my part - Dave's laptop is really feeling the strain. Hopefully we won't lose our wifi connection at any point in the 3hrs 58min remaining. The download and DVD are now on sale to the public too and, should you not already have Kickstartered yours, you can get £2 off the DVD price by entering the discount code KICKSTARTER at the checkout. This code will only work during July though so get shopping soon!

Yesterday we strode out on another of our ten mile walks. We think this

is about the right distance for us at the moment (although tomorrow we are planning on thirteen). Long enough to really get into 'the zone' but not so long that everything aches by the time we get home. The weather was lovely and hot with just a little cloud here and there. Driving to our start point, we learned that signposts stating that the road ahead is 'Unsuitable For Motorised Vehicles' are sometimes telling the truth! A couple of others we've walked along previously would actually have been fine for cars, but the one we took yesterday was hair-raising to say the least. Crossing its ford didn't present too much of a problem, but the mile of rough track afterwards was even worse than the access to Alcossebre campsite. We did hear an ominous clunk at one point too, but think our car escaped unscathed.

We used a fair-sized car park near to Middleton Hall where I spotted the

Good advice? 

above sign about squirrels. There are supposed to be red squirrels hereabouts, but we've not seen a real one yet. We walked along the road for a few minutes, then started to melt as it took a steep uphill turn. Yesterday was not has hot as today, but when we didn't have a breeze it certainly was very muggy. Sheltered by a tree tunnel and with moss covered stone walls, the road reminded me of the Peak District near Hope. Dave saw 'Skirl Naked' marked on the map and, as we passed a small cluster of houses, we saw this stone engraved with those words too. Skirl we believe is something to do with Northumbrian pipes, but we haven't been able to discover the reason for this name exactly!

Descending the same height as we had just climbed got us to the bank of

Harthope Burn 

the pretty Harthope Burn along which our road meandered for a couple of miles. Dave had been concerned that this might be a dull part of the walk, being on a road, but it was lovely. The burn babbled quietly and there were sheep and lambs nibbling on the lush green grass. Looking upwards we could see Coronation Wood and heather clad hillsides, then passing Langlee farm there were rugged crags high on the hills above. Settlements were marked up there on our Ordnance Survey map but we couldn't see their remnants from the valley floor. I found another perfect use for my tiny microfibre towel which I always carry in my rucksack. We have used it a few times to dry our feet after paddling on Spanish beaches, but this time Dave soaked it in cool burn water and used it to cool his head every so often. He has to wear a cap to prevent sunburn and we joked that a Kepi would be more use as the back of his neck is nearly hazelnut colour!

Footpaths and bridleways are clearly marked with new posts around

Path above Hawsen Burn 

here and it seemed a popular area for walking and picnicking. We saw several people in the first half hour and then no one else until we returned back along the burn at the end of the day. Hawsen Burn led us uphill, eventually emerging onto bracken and heather moorland. We tramped a mixture of narrow peat footpaths, wider gravelly tracks and grassy verges. Our lunch was on a breezy hillside overlooking another burn and was perfectly idyllic. I love how huge the views are here and how little human construction features within them. The apex of our walk, Broadstruther, is a well-maintained yet apparently closed up isolated farmhouse and several times we could gaze around us and only see at most one building in the distance.

Returning back towards Harthope Burn, we descended a steep hill that

we had looked up on our way out. We could have done the walk in either direction, but Dave chose to put the more gradual incline first with a steeper descent towards the end. Considering how hot it was, I am certainly glad he did! We turned off the road we had already walked in order to finish by coming back parallel to it through Happy Valley, an area of green meadow with woods rising up the hill to our left and the burn to our right. I saw this gorgeously coloured thistle. We also spotted a single black and white bird watching us from a fence post and later identified it as an oystercatcher. It had a distinctive long bright orange beak and we saw another pair on the riverbank a few minutes later.

We calculated our route at just over ten miles and completed the

Happy Valley 

distance in a few minutes over five hours. We have heard from our friend Andy who I recently mentioned was involved in doing a much longer walk - the Refugee Tales from Dover to Crawley which he successfully completed. Every evening the group had a different speaker and he was excited that one was author Ali Smith. She soke of her experience visiting detainees and the tale was published in The Guardian so I have been able to read it. I found the piece upsetting and was shocked at how these traumatised and vulnerable people are treated. If this is the best we can do in this country then we don't deserve the moniker 'Great'.

Back to my download which now has just 4hr 6min remaining. Hmmm. This wifi appears to be going backwards!

Micheline Robinson exhibition and a Wednesday in Whitby

For my readers in New Zealand, and I know from my stats that there are

a few from time to time, I would like to invite you to visit the Arts In Oxford gallery on South Island this month. I discovered artist Micheline Robinson via a randomly-spotted tweet, loved what I saw, and supported her Kickstarter campaign to get her work framed and transported ready for her first solo exhibition, Essence Of A Landscape, which is being held there. In return I received these four gorgeous cards. (Thanks to Gemma for posting them on.) The green works represent what Micheline is currently creating and I have put the one top-left, entitled Italian Garden, up on Bailey's wall. Unfortunately, for obvious reasons, we are unable to visit Essence Of A Landscape ourselves, but if you are more local, please drop in and pass on my regards! The exhibition started today, June the 10th, with its Gala opening this Saturday coming, and continues until July the 1st 2015.

We unexpectedly revisited the New Zealand theme in Whitby today, at the

20th century printed Tapa fabric from Fiji 

Captain Cook Memorial Museum which is a restored town house on the town's harbour. The young James Cook stayed here while he was apprenticed to the house's owner, Captain John Walker and the building is now an excellent small museum and reasonably priced at £4.80 for me. We were warmly greeted by an enthusiastic guide and enjoyed exploring the house. The museum contains lots of letters to and from Cook as well as fascinating early maps of the Pacific and Americas from when much of the coastlines was unknown. Two rooms are furnished in 18th century Quaker style. Best of all for me is the 2015 special exhibition in the attic of Polynesian and New Zealand traditional fabrics which included this finely woven cloak made of tree bark! The Polynesian Tapa fabric is also made of plant fibre, beaten to tissue paper thinness by hand and coloured by a process similar to delicate bronze rubbing. Amazing in a culture that had no metal tools, simply wood, bone, stone and plant fibres and good to learn that the skills are being rediscovered by artists such as Jo Torr.

Hand woven bark cloak 

Before the Cook Museum, we marched up the famous 199 steps and

Whitby Abbey 

through the grounds of St Mary's Church to reach the iconic ruins of Whitby Abbey. Another for our collection of places-destroyed-by-Henry-VIII, Whitby Abbey has a wonderful presence. Its skeletal remains tower far above visitors and I loved the way the sandstone pillars and blocks have eroded. The site is maintained by English Heritage and paying to get in is compulsory as the high stone wall all around obscures any good view otherwise! I didn't mind the £6.80 though as this is one place I very much wanted to see. The audio guide is informative, if a little twee, and I now want to learn more about the one-time Abbess, Aelfflaed and her mother, also a Whitby Abbess, Hilda. A few finds are on show in the Visitor Centre and we could walk freely around the Abbey where only the towers were blocked off. I can easily see how Bram Stoker could have been inspired here and plentiful copies of Dracula were on sale in the English Heritage shop!

Whitby Abbey 

I was disappointed not to see a single goth in Whitby, but it was a

Eroded pillar at Whitby Abbey 

gorgeously sunny day today so perhaps wouldn't have suited them! We took advantage of the new Park and Ride which has only been open since last year. The fare was £4.60 for us both - there is a bus pass concession if you know to take your card - and this was equivalent to four hours' parking in the town centre, but without the hassles of clogged streets and actually finding a space. Whitby is somewhere we decided we definitely don't want to live! It was very busy and I can only imagine the chaos on a sunny weekend or during high season. Our plan originally was to sample the Whitby fish and chips for lunch. There are many chippies to choose from, but most involved queuing or were large establishments that I wasn't sure could be as good as they claimed. We ended up in a pretty cafe called Crumbs and Cobbles where I had the rare treat of a veggie All Day Breakfast. It was delicious and so massive that I am still no hungry now and it's gone 9pm!

In 'other news', an email from Go Outdoors could well be of interest to other Camping And Caravanning Club members. If you have a Go Outdoors discount card and are a CCC member, you can now get an extra 10% off the discounted price and that's online as well as in store. Get shopping!

Poppies and cow parsley by Donkey Road, Whitby 

Swanning around Swannington -we go on a cycle tour

Another day, another leaflet!

One side of Swannington village sign 

I already mentioned the excellent information pack that Claire and Tim have put together here at The Siding campsite. After our Marsham walk, it was Dave's turn to choose and he selected Off The Beaten Track: Around Swannington which is a fifteen mile cycle tour prepared, again, by Broadland District Council. One side of the leaflet is a fold-out Ordnance Survey map of the route, the other gives brief details of places of interest along the way.

We cycled from our campsite - head for St Agnes, then Church Lane, Jack Lane, Brandiston Road - and joined the tour at point 6 just before Brandiston. The whole route is on small roads which were generally deserted or with just light car traffic. I thought the car drivers on the whole were courteous and gave us a wide margin (except one show-off in a banana-yellow Toyota) and I liked that all the other cyclists called greetings as we passed. There's a friendliness here that I could get used to! We got lucky with the weather too. The forecast drizzly cloudiness failed to appear so we had glorious blue skies all day. The wind is cold, but when sheltered from it, the temperatures are practically Spanish (winter!).

Don't mess about in Haveringland! 

I was surprised by the Scandinavian-looking names of several villages we passed through which had been there since pre-Domesday times. Haveringland used to be Heveringalanda and Swannington was Sveningatuna. Was North Norfolk part of the Danelaw? I should know that but need to find out with a google! Haveringland's village sign is positioned right next to their old stocks, presumably not still in use, but we didn't take the chance.

Another side of the Swannington sign 

Swannington has a curious metal pyramid on top of a wooden post which, I think, depicts important influences in the village's past. We identified the helmet on the top, oak leaves, corn stalks, chains and a castle. It is intricately moulded and worth pulling up to gawp at properly. Thanks to the bus driver who slowed right down giving Dave time to hoist his bike out of the road! Swannington still has its water pump, built in 1888 and with two plaques on it honouring Hastings Parker and his wife Elizabeth who lived at the Manor House. It is protected by a thatched roof that echoes the pyramid shape of the sign - or perhaps the sign echoes the pump?

Swannington village pump 

A gentle warning about Kett's Lane, going away from Swannington and named for Robert Kett, leader of the peasants' revolt in Norfolk. It's not an especially steep uphill, but it does go on awhile so pace yourself!

Towards the end of our tour, we suddenly spied the delicate spires of St

St Michael's and All Angels, Booton 

Michael's Church at Booton. It looks wonderfully dainty and out-of-place here because pretty much every other one is a square-towered Norman example. I learned that it was designed by Reverend Whitwell Elwin who was rector there from 1850 until 1900 and was a literary man. We pulled into the driveway of the Old Rectory to take this photo, possibly the same driveway used by Thackeray, Scott and Lockhart when they came to visit.

From Booton, we were guided home by the beacon that is St Agnes. That huge tower is a real landmark and a very welcome sight as we were both quite tired by this point. Overall, with the additional cycling from Cawston and a brief unintended detour, we probably completed about 17 miles. We're proud of ourselves!

As an added bonus to the hot shower and cuppa when we got home, an email was waiting from one of our favourite singer-songwriters, Danny Schmidt. His album that I helped to Kickstarter last year, Owls, is now available to download. Woo hoo! I'll get Dave to put in on the iPod later this evening so we can have a listen. The official launch is May 19th, but you can hear previews and pre-order your copy through Danny's website.

If you like my photographs, some are now available as Greeting Cards via Zazzle.
Please feel welcome to browse my new shop!

St Michael's and All Angels Church, Booton by Stephanie_Jane

Swannington village sign on a sunny day in Norfolk by Stephanie_Jane

The snow gets a bit close and my new Pine Hill Project album arrives

What passes for wintery weather is upon us now although, in contrast to

If you really squint, you can see snow! 

northern Spain where people have been left stranded by the falling snow, we really don't have much to complain about. Being British though, that is unlikely to stop us! The first photo here shows the snow on the tops of the Sierra Gador hills which we can see from our pitch at Camping Roquetas. I took the photo about ten minutes walk away on the beach a few days ago. We had had wind and a little light rain the night before, and awoke to white-topped hills all around. Quite magical!

Birds, not kitesurfers 

The wind has strengthened considerably over the weekend. It's nowhere near as strong as during the storms, but has completely changed direction. I had previously really struggled to jog to Roquetas town and found being blown back much easier. Yesterday evening I was blown all the way there and had the struggling jog for the return. Interestingly, I found the second version the easier overall of the two and managed more running minutes that way around. Probably this is due to being better warmed up by the time of the more strenuous effort. I was lucky on the way out to spot a whole flock of about a dozen kitesurfers just off the beach. Their multicoloured canopies were really pretty all together. I tried to get a photo on the way back, but wasn't close enough for my phone camera to get the detail so I photographed this rainbow instead.

A rainbow at the end of the Carril Bici
(cycle path)

We are just drinking a cup of red tea after cycling to Aguadulce harbour and back. It's only a twenty minute ride, but involved a lot of effort to get there. I don't think I was above third gear all the way. The return journey was a breeze -literally! The wind took the strain, sixth gear most of the way a practically no pedalling required. Dave wishes that all cycle journeys could be wind-assisted!

Fortunately I have lots (and lots and lots!) of books to keep me occupied during the extended indoor hours so you can expect a glut of book review posts. Plus yesterday I received my eagerly awaited new music album via Kickstarter, Tomorrow You're Going by the Pine Hill Project which is the name of the new venture by Richard Shindell and Lucy Kaplansky. Long-term blog readers will already know how much I love Richard Shindell's songwriting! Tomorrow You're Going is brilliant! We had our first listen through yesterday evening and I was very impressed with the music. There's some great mandolin playing on there and I even liked their U2 cover! Highly, highly, highly recommend this album and I think it goes on general sale in March. There's an 'email when available' button at the end of this Amazon link:

The Awakening by Kate Chopin / The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver / The Gin Thief: Becoming Scarlet by S C Barrus

The Awakening by Kate Chopin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Download the ebook free from Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk
Buy the paperback from The Book Depository
Buy the paperback from Waterstones

The Awakening cropped up as the ForgottenBooks book of the day a few months ago now and, as its synopsis looked interesting, I downloaded it. Set in an upper class American society in the last years on the 19th century, The Awakening attempts to understand, although not to condone, the actions of a woman who finds herself trapped in a domestic life for which she is patently unsuited but, due to the morals of the day, which she has no choice but to endure.
Edna has two children whom she loves and a frequently absent husband who loves 'owning' her. However, Edna is not overtly maternal so when she knows her children to be cared for by nursemaid of their grandmother, she often does not give them a thought from one hour to the next. I got the impression that if she had been allowed the same choice I enjoy over a century later, she would have given motherhood a miss. Unfortunately, she has blindly followed societal expectations. When a summer meeting with a younger man awakens Edna's sense of self, she first tries to bury her emotions as she 'should', but unable to continue the charade, she sets out for a future which is impossible to achieve. Her potential new man will not take the risk to be with her and a bereft Edna cannot return to her previous life.
The illustration of desperation and Edna's inner turmoil is always believable when set against the strictness of the time and I was amazed by the vitriol and spite churned up against the character in other reviews. In her mind, Edna does the right thing. Leaving her husband would permanently stigmatise her children and she would experience serious mental breakdown by staying, so instead fakes accidental drowning while the boys are safely out of the way at their grandmother's.
I liked that Chopin obviously understands her characters completely and manages to set out their lives without actually proffering any as best. Mademoiselle Reisz is fascinating and an interesting choice of confidant for Edna. Leonce is ghastly! Self-important and only out for possessions and social climbing.
The writing style is a little dated now, perhaps too coy for modern tastes, but this softness did not detract from my growing sense of unease as Edna's behaviour becomes both stronger and more erratic.

Search Lit Flits for more:
Books by Kate Chopin / Contemporary fiction / Books from America

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I registered my copy of this book at BookCrossing

Buy the book from Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk
Buy the paperback from The Book Depository
Buy the paperback from Waterstones

I read another Barbara Kingsolver book, The Lacuna, a while ago, and was in two minds about it as I enjoyed the depictions of lives and relationships but was then left cold as the second half descended into dry politics. I was concerned that the brick that is The Poisonwood Bible might go the same way, so was delighted to find that it doesn't. The then current situation in The Congo/Zaire is woven around the immediate story of the Price family but its intricacies are not thoroughly explored so if you're hoping for a more factual novel of the country's upheaval, this might not be the one for you.
Instead Kingsolver has created a powerful portrait and caution against the insanity of blind faith and ill-prepared attempts to force one people to the will of another. Her creation of the out-of-their-depth Price family is inspired and I was interested to learn how a Southern 1950s white American family viewed both themselves and their Congolese hosts. Tyrant-father Nathan, believing himself master yet more useless and alienated than anyone due to his refusal to see the Congolese as more than savage children, is the only one whose words we do not directly hear, but his character is rounded out by the five women and girls, his family, existing despite his best efforts(!).
I did find it tricky early on in the novel to remember who was speaking but as each develops her own distinctive voice, the sisters and mother each show their Africa from very different viewpoints and it was interesting to see how their varying skills both allowed some entry to Congolese society but also kept them apart. The pages rushed past as I found this novel impossible to put down and have been thinking over it a lot in the couple of days since I finished. There are so many issues raised - family and friendship, race and colonialism, religion and choice, life and survival - that I think I could read The Poisonwood Bible several times, seeing new detail in it with each read. Perhaps this is one that won't get Bookcrossed too quickly!

Search Lit Flits for more:
Books by Barbara Kingsolver / Historical fiction / Books from America


The Gin Thief: Episode 1: Becoming Scarlet by S C Barrus
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I've not tried reading a serialised book as it is published before so am interested to learn whether I will be able to remember all the storylines over a period of time. Generally I read intensively with scarcely a pause until my current novel is finished, immersing myself in it completely. My break with tradition was caused by spotting the Kickstarter campaign for S C Barrus' new creation, The Gin Thief series. Taking a minor set of characters, The Scarlets, from his steampunk novel Discovering Aberration which I previously enjoyed reading, he is now telling their story and particularly that of their now newest recruit, Miss Yevylin Over.
S C's writing style is dense with intricate descriptions of place, costume and character. I appreciate that he takes time to set up scenes without simply rushing to the action and, although this does mean his stories advance at a slower pace than those of other authors, I think the approach suits the imaginative steampunk genre and it also mirrors that of Victorian authors so adds to the 'genuine' atmosphere.
Becoming Scarlet, as the title suggests, recounts how Yevylin meets and tries to join The Scarlets. A plot device of her storytelling for the leader, The Missus, works well to allow us to get to know her while still keeping up pace and I am now eager to download the second installment!

Muscle memory is a wonderful thing

I'm still on a small high this morning having managed thirty minutes of jogging yesterday

Tiled street art mural in Sagunt 

evening without - touch wood - any ill effects or damaging my leg again. Woo hoo! I found it quite incredible how my body remembered my best pace and things like breathing coordination without any real conscious effort on my part. Quite fortunate really! I was even 'swift' enough to get back to our pitch in time for the evening bat show - dozens of little bats swooping and diving for bugs right above the caravans and motorhomes. There was a fabulous display yesterday because they were silhouetted against an orange-pink sunset. We learnt the German for bat - fliedermaus - and I looked up the Spanish too - murcielago.

Turning right out of Camping Malvarrosa leads to miles of beach, turning left and hopping over a small dry canal reveals the elegant boardwalks and paved promenades of Casa Blanca. Yes, really, although Not This One. Plus Dave's cycle explorations discovered a blocked off road which must have been the old route but is now cyclists and pedestrians only and it runs parallel to the sea but set back. Consequently, I now have a route out along the prom, across a playgound and the new road, then back along the old road. Yesterday's jog was thirty minutes running interspersed with a couple of short walk breaks. Hopefully I can work up to continuously running before we move on, maybe even start lapping.

Before I change subjects, huge congrats to Victoria Hazell for her Abingdon marathon finish. Fantastic time!!

The above mural is discreetly tucked away on a wall in Sagunt. There isn't a lot of street art in the city so I think we were lucky to have spotted it. I love the design and the colour. Finding the image still on my phone reminded me that I overlooked blogging about the Teatro Romano in Sagunt which we visited on the same day as the castle. It has been extensively renovated which has apparently drawn much criticism from those who believe ancient monuments should be left as discovered. However, having walked around inside, I liked the way the space has been brought up to date. Ancient rock seating is still visible to either side of the auditorium and a thin white skim covers the central part which is now used again. I think the skim is concrete or similar so today's audiences still get the authentic uncomfortable Roman experience. The stage reminded me of the one at The Globe in London. There is the same openness to the elements and no obvious concessions to scenery. I guess props and costume would suffice. We thought we might take in a show, albeit in Spanish, but the theatre is only active through the summer months so we are too late. Maybe another year?

A neat(ish) segue into another arts topic because the first instalment of another Kickstarter project, S C Barrus' episodic novel The Gin Thief appeared for download in my emails this morning. I enjoyed his previous, Discovering Aberration, so have been looking forward to the new work. I'm already loving the cover. If you didn't Kick for this, you catch catch up on Amazon at the end of the month.

Sizzling in the Sagunt sunshine

We liked Camping Malvarrosa when we first arrived practically a week ago and are still

Oh look! Girlfriend on a beach with a book! 

impressed with it now which is pretty rare for us! Being so close to warm, swimmable sea is obviously one of the main attractions, but it is also generally peaceful, there is plenty of flat countryside for Dave to explore by bike, I have beaches and lovely promenades to jog and walk along, and we even have History and Culture close by. The site has a section for touring caravans and motorhomes, a separate bit for tents, and the rest is a village of various permanent places but each is an individual encampment rather than simply bland, identikit statics. We have had more luck with wildlife spotting. There are several herons that fish the nearby irrigation canals and we have also seen kingfishers and Dave came across a field, maybe of harvested rice, with dozens of egrets in it. A cheeky red squirrel accompanied us for part of the climb to Sagunt castle. It was much smaller than the grey ones we used to see in Polegate and refused to sit still long enough for us to get a decent photograph.

We visited Sagunt city which is a few miles away. We had thought we could walk there, but got as far as the pretty Canet de Berenguer in an hour and a half and decided perhaps all the way to Sagunt was a bit optimistic in this heat. It's up to 29 degrees in the afternoons! In common with several towns along this bit of coast, Canet is spread over two sites. There is a pretty coastal strip of summer homes which is practically deserted at this time of year, and the town proper is set back a little inland. Therefore our walk along the beach to Canet only got us to their part of the beach and not an ice cream kiosk in sight! There were lots of large tyre tracks in the sand where the frequent boardwalks out to the sea are being taken up, presumably for safe storage through the winter. We discovered a shady park for a rest and then wandered home.

Sagunt is famous for its historical past having existed since at least the fifth century BCE, been at war with Carthage, and been invaded by Hannibal after an eight month siege. We visited the extensive castle site on a hill above today's town. There are remnants of several eras throughout the site, but sadly not placarded so we weren't always sure what we were looking at. Roman columns and inscriptions abound, but the ancient buildings were plundered for later rebuilds including a Moorish stronghold and the Christian reclamation that followed. There is also a section at the far end which obviously very recent renovation, perhaps to stop subsidence down the hill. A small museum housed some of the best preserved pillars and inscriptions, otherwise outside was a huge jigsaw of broken stone, sorted to a degree, but not yet with its places identified. An interesting aside for the museum was that all the information was bilingual. One language was Spanish, obviously, but the other was not English or French or even German as most of our fellow campers are, but Valenciano. I knew Catalan had its own dialect but we didn't realise that Valencia does too.

There is a railway station nearby with several local trains a day into Valencia. It is supposed to be getting a bit cooler here next week so we plan to take advantage of this to spend a day or two exploring the city. Any suggestions of must-sees?

In the meantime, my eagerly anticipated Kirsty McGee album has arrived. Do you remember I blogged about its Kickstarter campaign? It's called Those Old Demons and we're really enjoying the music. Interesting lyrics and unusual orchestration make it quite different from our usual fare. I think the official release is at the end of October and pre-orders can be placed here:

A spot of culture in Tavira!

Bolshoi Ballet Lost Illusions 

Lest you all think that we're spending all our time walking or just lazing around in the sun with good books, today I have indulged in a spot of real culture by Going To The Ballet! There's two cinemas in Tavira, both of which show films in their original languages with Portuguese subtitles. We were browsing the listings at the nearest venue, the Tavira Gran Plaza, less than an hour's walk away, when I spotted the Bolshoi's Lost Illusions! I blogged about this on Theatrical Eastbourne a few weeks ago, not imagining that I'd actually get to see it. The performance was excellent and different to the classical ballets I have seen previously. While it didn't have the spectacle of Don Quixote, it more than made up for that in sheer emotion. The delight, anguish and despair shown through the dances was incredible and the storyline, by ballet standards, was a believable one. A young composer squanders his musical talent and chance of true love in favour of fame and fortune, only to realise that there's more to life than money.

I've supported some new music recently too, two very different artists, the first of which is fundraising on +PledgeMusic and the second on +Kickstarter:
Joan Osborne's new album, Love And Hate, has just 10 days left of its campaign and is at 61% of its target. Pledges start at $10 for a download of the album when it's finished.
Peter Mulvey's new album, Silver Ladder, has 13 days left on the campaign and is already practically at a fantastic 200% of its target! However, Mulvey has exciting ideas for the overspend. Pledges start at $1 for three songs immediately or $10 for a download of the album when its finished.

In one of those 'small world' coincidences, I found this YouTube of Peter Mulvey with Anais Mitchell singing the Magnetic Fields song, Book Of Love. If anyone knows where Dave's heard this song before, can you Comment below?!

I just found another Kickstarter project to back

photo by Rachel Ries 

I love Kickstarter! So far I have backed six projects, three of which have reached their funding goals, two of which haven't and one I backed today which still has 28 days to go - exciting times.

Local-to-me documentary film The Moo Man had a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund its UK cinema release. Two of my favourite Austin musicians Devon Sproule and Sam Baker have both turned to Kickstarter to help with their most recent albums and now I discover through Anais Mitchell that Brooklyn songstress Rachel Ries is fundraising through the platform for her new album Ghost Of A Gardener.

We saw Rachel sing at the Blind Tiger Club in Brighton when she accompanied Anais on the Young Man in America tour in 2012 but this is apparently the first music of her own in five years. Ghost Of A Gardener also features the Austin contingent of Devon Sproule, Paul Curreri, Danny Schmidt and Carrie Elkin - all favourites of mine.

Please pop over to Kickstarter, check out Rachel's music and help out if you like what you hear!