I have walked many, many miles with my children over the years, and both of them will make excellent companions on this journey. My son, Ruairidh (usually Ru), joins me for the next of these walks. He is five years old and not yet at school. I am excited to find out what strange and unpredictable things he will tell me about the Moss, and where his attention will take us. Unlike his city-loving older sister, Ru is in his element on outdoor expeditions and one of his favourite activities is when we head off on our ‘Ru walks’. On these trips – often taken between dinner and bedtime – Ru gets to choose which way we go (more or less). Often, we have ended up in unfamiliar housing estates or overgrown pathways through unexplored woodland. I plant gentle suggestions rather than setting our direction. The trick is to make him think it is his idea. ‘Where shall we go on our next Ru walk?’ ‘Did you know there’s a tree swing on the Moss?’
We set off between rain showers on a warm Saturday evening. I tell Ru about a deer I encountered in our garden the previous morning. This was only the second time this had happened; the first was during the winter storms. Wandering bleary eyed into the garden to dispose of coffee grounds in the undergrowth, I became aware of something large in the bushes at the far side of the lawn. I stepped towards the noise and suddenly a flighty doe bolted over the wall onto the street and off down towards the Moss. I watched her as she wondered about entering a couple of my neighbours’ gardens, but she seemed to know how to get home and eventually made her way back along the pathway to the woods. Ru is delighted to hear of this event, and we are now on a mission to find the herd.
As we walk, multiple distractions interrupt our progress. We collect leaves, imagine crocodiles in the now waterlogged woodland, throw stones into the pools, and peer between the trees for signs of the deer. We also have a repertoire of games for the Moss and we go through them as we follow the main path. A favourite is ‘the Moss animal game’, when we take it in turns to say three animals (or sometimes trees) and then guess which are the true inhabitants of the Moss. ‘A holly tree, an oak tree, and a lemon tree’, then getting sillier, ‘a fire vole, an earth vole and a water vole?’ We are revelling in each other’s company.
Ru is keen to follow some of the desire lines that lead off into the Moss, or through the waters of the carr on the other side of the main pathway. I have to explain to him that the land is fragile and that we can’t walk too much where there isn’t a proper path. I also explain the dangers involved, particularly on a day like this when the land is so sodden and marshy. Ru listens carefully and understands what I am saying, but he has not forgotten about the tree swing and assure him that a detour will be permissible when we reach the other side of the Moss.
Another thing that we do every time we visit this place together is to open the Merlin app on my phone and identify the various bird calls. There are many now: great tit, robin, goldfinch, pigeon, starling, magpie, willow warbler, jackdaw, wren – all of these we have heard before. Then, as we pass an ancient oak tree halfway along the northern border, a picture of a long-eared owl appears! We look up into the canopy and I wonder if the technology is correct on this one. At this moment, a couple walk by and one of them asks what we have seen. She is very excited by my answer and tells me that she has seen owls here before. She also has Merlin on her phone and shows Ru what her phone has detected. They plan to return at dusk to listen again, and as they continue on their way, Ru and I hang back until he hurries me along to find the swing.
We turn onto the boardwalk and the open grassland to the west is covered in bog cotton, the fluffy white heads dancing in the light breeze. Ru is intrigued by their ability to grow out of the muddy water, and he lies down with his head over the edge of the path to get as close as he can. This prompts another regular routine, when I hold him upside down and pretend to drop him over the edge: ‘throw me in the bog, Dad!’. As we playfully make our way towards the southern woodland, we pass several walkers, some with dogs, and they all smile to see a happy little boy and his dad enjoying nature. We watch meadow pipits and use the app once more to identify their high piping call.
Ru not only has a talent for rhyme, he also knows how to use it to get what he wants. As we approach the end of the boardwalk, he launches into a funny little song:
I’m really, really tired.
My hands and knees are weak.
Daddy, will you carry me?
Otherwise, I’ll squeak!
I am unable to resist a request delivered so inventively, so I lift him up and we walk for a while with him clinging onto me. But we are now close to the spot where the tree swing was pointed out to me, so we step over tree routes and climb down a muddy bank. The swing is a stick hanging by a rope from an overhanging branch. Ru holds onto it, and I push him for a while. He is delighted.
Ru is keen to continue along the woodland trail at the edge of the bog, but I have to insist on returning to the main path. Trains pass by and we hear shouting at the other side of the track – a football game, perhaps. As we reach the ruined peat processing station, we explore the area around it and discover a disused metal train track buried in the mud. Ru asks me if it is ‘dead’ and I say that it is, in a way. But he is keen to get home now, and he once again leads the walk, calling for me to catch up, setting the pace. I reflect on how independent my little boy is becoming and wonder about our future journeys and all the detours and distractions that we will enjoy along the way.