The Bumps

July came and went and only now have I had enough of a pause to record the wonderful week of The Cambridge Rowing Association annual Bumping Races. Most people call them the Bumps. It is a mad annual summer event that must have evolved to cope with the fact that the River Cam is too narrow at Cambridge (Cambridgeshire) to allow side-by-side racing in something as long, wide and unmanoeuvrable as a rowing eight. They measure about seven metres wide blade-tip to blade-tip.

At the start, up to 17 eighteen-metre long boats are lined up along the bank with a boat-length-and-a-half between them. There’s a countdown of a four-minute canon and a one minute 'gun' when a coach on the bank will start to push the boat out into the river with a long pole. The cox holds onto a chain to prevent the boat getting an unfair advantage.

 

 

Then when the starting canon fires, the cox drops the chain and the crews row as hard and as fast as they can. The start is frenetic, splashy and can be full of panic. The idea is to try to ‘bump’ the boat ahead before the boat behind bumps them. You’re rowing as hard as you can, not knowing how well you are gaining on the boat ahead. (Sometimes coxes lie). Meanwhile, you can see the boat behind and think, are they gaining on us?

 

The challenge our crew had is that we are what my youngest son, Ʃ, would call a ‘seasoned’ crew and worked out we were about 250 years older than the boat that chased us on the first night. They were lithe sixth-formers (dressed in white) from the local girls’ public school. Predictably they got us, but the event goes on for four evenings. Any boat that ‘bumps’ is promoted further up the start order, while ‘bumped’ boats move down. The aim is to end up ‘Head of the River’. We were full of hope on the second night but again, a younger crew got us. Their start was faster, though we had plenty of comments on how neatly we rowed.

 

Third and fourth nights were going to be ours, we felt. Setting off rowing as hard as you can is all right, but the difficulty with this race is that you start as if you are running 100m, but have to keep going for over 1000. We kept away from our rivals the third night but by the time we reached the Plough at Fen Ditton, we wanted it to stop. ‘Stoke’ was beginning to whimper. I felt I couldn’t go on. But then I registered that the chasing boat had fallen apart. They had died completely. Suddenly the energy returned and we powered over the finishing line, and an honourable ‘row-over’. Fourth night too we rowed long and strong and again managed to maintain our place. It felt as if we’d done all right, AND we avoided serious collisions with other boats and even the bank.

 

And it is a great feeling working in metronomic harmony with women you know you can rely on, pushing through beyond fatigue, until finally there is the satisfaction of the end of the race – even if the whole event is mad and pretty pointless.

(With thanks to A and Ʃ for photography)

(I'm rowing at the 7 position)

Standing on the Shoulders of Giants

Our early ancestors explained away impressive features in their landscape as the work of almighty gods, and later mediaeval peoples blamed the devil for scars in the countryside. The impressive Devil’s Dyke in Cambridgeshire has caused a lot of head-scratching over the eons and has been at the centre of several interesting traditional stories. One legend says Hrothgar chief of a race of Fen giants built it to protect the virtue of his beautiful daughter Hayenna from a fire demon. There was a terrific battle but Hayenna was saved by a water god, who wanted the rampart maintained forever after.

It is easy to believe that the ancient rampart is the work of a race of giants. At its greatest height, the Devil’s Dyke is 10.5 metres high, and it is steeper than would seem possible without concrete and JCBs. And with the ditch along the south-western edge it is a formidable barrier, although it is difficult to capture the steepness in a photograph.

Pasque flowers in the most exposed parts of the dyke, in April and May

Another legend about the Dyke, is that it was carved by the devil’s fiery tail when he left in fury after failing to gate-crash a wedding in the village of Reach.

Even until a few decades ago, scholars were uncertain when or why the Devil’s Dyke had been built and by whom. Some assumed it was a defence against invading Danes, but the steeper side of the rampart faced away from the North Sea. What was clear was that it was a barrier defending or controlling an obvious corridor between dense forests to its east, and boggy Fenland to the north-west.

The land at the north-western end of the Dyke is now drained by a system of quidditches, but 1400 years ago this would have been a malarious swamp. These days, the village of Reach marks the furthest extent of the Dyke. From there it runs in an almost perfect straight line seven and a half miles to the south-east as far as Woodditton.

it is tough to capture the steepness of the dyke on camera

the forested Woodditton end of the Dyke

There may have been a barrier at this site during the Roman era, but archaeologists have now dated the latest building on the site to the 5^th or 6^th century AD. It is the last, best preserved and most northerly of a series of defensive linear earthworks – the others being Fleam Dyke, Brent Ditch and Bran Ditch.

In May evidence of another traditional tale can be seen on the Dyke. One of England’s rarest but most sumptuous wild flowers blooms out of the closely cropped grasslands. These have been said to spring out of drops of blood of slain Romans or Danes since they are often found on old boundaries or even barrows. An explanation of this though is that such places stay undisturbed for hundreds of years, and this favours the Anemone of Passiontide. The fact that the Dyke has remained safe from ploughing for 1400 years also encourages other fine rarities, and in the summer lizard orchids blossom there, as well as plenty of cowslips, violets, and within the wooded parts of the Dyke, bluebells and wood anemones.

Pasqueflower,

wood anemone

Wandering the length of the Dyke is a pleasure because it traverses several very different habitats; an information board mentioned snow berries and I wondered how I'd recognise them, until we arrived in a part of the woodlands where - if it hadn't been for the spring warmth - we could have believed there had been a fall of snow. The tranquillity was perfect so that while listening to birdsong and looking out for rare butterflies, I found myself trying to imagine who might have fought and died here on this ancient barrier.

Archaeologists have solved some of the mysteries surrounding this place. The Dyke, considered the finest Anglo-Saxon earthwork of its kind, was probably reinforced to defend the Kingdom of the East Angles from the expansive Kingdom of Mercia.

Wimpole and paparazzi

See what I mean about the paparazzi, kids? Can’t get away from them.....

Feels like the first day of real summer at last - and we had breakfast in the garden for the first time this year - oh the luxury!

Had to stretch our legs and take proper notice of the sunshine, by taking a trip to the very fine National Trust property Wimpole Hall, where we even found a cowslip. If you see my post on Hayley Wood you'll see they are totally different to oxlips - not.

Hayley Wood

The bitterly cold weather has been getting us all down but finally there are glimpses of spring.

This was enough for S and I to take ourselves to Hayley Wood on Sunday. It's a reserve in the flatlands of Cambridgeshire:52 hectares of ancient woodland managed by the local wildlife trust. It is also a site of Special Scientific Interest renowned for its oxlips.

We've pretty much consistently missed them over the last several years and were determined that this year we'd get there early enough in the season while the trees were still skeletal. When nothing much was showing any signs of being alive. The wood can seem a bit desolate in winter but we were determined to catch it at its best. We wanted to see and marvel at these rarities.

We searched for green sprouts. There weren't many. Just some hints of Dog's Mercury

and a few Bluebell leaves. We were sure we must be too early.

But then there were few likely leaves, and then some plants in bud, and finally.....

 The birds were in fine spring voice and there was a total absence of traffic noise. The unaccustomed sensation of sunshine on my face and forearms felt like unadulterated luxury.

 

 

 

there were even a few shy wood anemones

 

Roadkill

She must have died instantly. The trauma was massive. Her skull was shattered and separated from her spine. A leg was missing completely, her pelvis broken. She bore Silent Witness to the carelessness of the driver. He must have been speeding. This stretch of road is, after all, wonderfully, liberatingly straight. Driving up towards a rare Fenland summit, it is exciting to keep the pressure on the accelerator: a little more, and more. There won’t be other traffic, just that slight bend at the top by the trees announcing Nine Wells Farm.

She also admired speed, loved tearing across the fields, jumping high to see who else was about. She was in her prime: her eyes bright, intelligent, her muscles toned. The coat she wore that day was a thick beautiful russet brown, with darker highlights in the fur on the back and tips of her pert ears. Her underbelly was soft and the purest white. It had kept her warm throughout a tough winter without central heating. Her mate, no doubt, had admired it, and her. Where was he now? And their children? Do hares mourn for long?

When I brought her back for the post mortem, Ʃ said I looked like the sad obsessed creature Golem with his coneys. Remember the scene when he says he likes his flesh fresh and wriggling? I’m not at all like that. I’ll marinate the meat for some days in my Mum’s homemade wine, then cook it in a good rich stew, and serve with taters, of course.

And it was delicious... and enough to provide a dozen portions.