#hiking #silentsunday

#silentsunday #Photomonday #Mosstodon #hiking

#hiking in #ticino

#landscapephotography #swissalps

Historic Entrance of Mammoth Cave.
(Please boost if you are in the US!)
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Do you agree that public lands need to stay just that: PUBLIC?
Then contact your reps & congressfolk now, because they are voting to start selling off public lands to the highest bidder.

At midnight on Tuesday, May 6, the House Natural Resources Committee passed legislation for around 460,000 acres of federal public land in Nevada and Utah to be transferred to local governments or sold to private entities. These are primarily National Forest and Bureau of Land Management lands.The amendment is part of a sweeping tax cut package. It omits public comment and environmental assessment, leaving the stakeholders, the American people, completely out of the process of how OUR land is managed. If it can happen in Utah and Nevada, it can happen anywhere.

Call or write to your House Representative and remind them that our public lands belong to the American people and they should be protected, not sold. Here is a suggested script:

"I am a constituent calling from (zip code). My name is _______. I am calling to urge (your Representative) to oppose the budget reconciliation bill provision authorizing the sale of public lands. Public lands should be protected and preserved, not sold off to fund tax breaks or for any reason. Public lands belong to the American people!"

(And yes, #LandBack would be better, but let's at least not fucking sell it to private interests!)

#cave #caves #forest #NationalPark #publicLand #action #nature #hiking #outdoors #water #waterfall #silentSunday #travel #getOutside #altText #utah #nevada #zion

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A view looking down into a cave. There is a staircase winding down into the depths for safe visitor access, part poured concrete and part natural limestone. Limestone bedrock shapes the entrance of the cave, it's layers lined with moss and ferns. The entrance has a small waterfall, we can see there is a bit of stream within the depths but otherwise it is darkness beyond.

Another weekend, another hike. This time was up on the hills & moor tops around Dove Stone Reservoir, beyond Oldham way out at the very eastern edge of Greater Manchester.

Lots of fascinating gritstone rock formations and fortunately it's been very dry recently as otherwise the trail over the moors would have gone through some extremely boggy sections.

According to the GPX track we did about 16km in total, with a total climb of 613m (highest elevation 551m).

#hiking #walking #PeakDistrict

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A view from high on a gritstone moor ridge looking down into a valley where a reservoir can be seen.

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A cairn pyramidal of stones stands alone on a moor, which extends as far as the eye can see. Amongst the heather (which has not yet flowered) and tufts of moor grass, small white fluffy balls of cotton grass can be seen.

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Cyclists stand on a flat gritstone outcrop, in the distance are more hills and the reservoir in the valley below.

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The reservoir is in the foregound, with a number of small sailing boats on it, they all have white sails. In the distance a hill rises steeply away from the reservoir. It is grassy with trees on its lower part, but as the elevation increases the change in colour indicates it becomes moorland.

A few more pictures from out and about around Pendle.

#pendle #hiking #lancashire

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Looking out over Black Moss Reservoir towards Pendle Hill. In the foreground and middle ground is an expanse of water, while in the distance is the very distinctive shape of Pendle Hill. It is long, stretching almost from edge to edge on the image, falling gently to the left but sharply to the right.

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A young lamb relaxes, eyes half closed, in the shade by the trunk of an old tree.

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A small group of cattle, the adults are dark brown and standing while the calves are more reddish-brown and sitting down.

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The Pendle Inn, a pub in the village of Barley. It is made from light coloured sandstone and looks welcoming, with plenty of outdoor seating. The pub sign has the image of a witch on a broomstick.

Today's hike was up and around Pendle Hill, probably most famous for the Witch Trials 400 years ago which resulted in nearly a dozen people (mostly women) being put to death for witchcraft.

Near Pendle today there is a sculpture trail, supposedly inspired by the witches' stories, although the connections are I think fairly tenuous.

They may appear to be only sculptures but we took no chances and were of course suitably polite to the fae creatures of the forest.

#Pendle #witches #hiking #Lancashire

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An abstract sculpture consisting of a tree trunk sliced into pieces and curved over into an upside-down U shape. It has a somewhat serpentine look to it.

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A white unicorn stands in the forest, one front foot raised.

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A dryad emerges from (or maybe merges into) her tree. She has elfin features and is partly covered in ivy.

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This is Black Dog, a fearsome creature of old English myth. It is mostly wolf-like in appearance although its tail and lower limbs have scales, not fur. It has protruding canine teeth and glowing red eyes. All in all probably not the goodest of boys.