A threat of thunder, Hameldown Tor, late summer 2024

No-one is visiting Hameldown tonight, just me.

Thunder is in the forecast, risk of disruption, heavy rain, that kind of thing we’re warned so often about these days. And the sky is heavy, ‘though not yet dark – a possible threat, but perhaps in the distance. I’ll carry on up.

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It’s 1st September, and I want to see the heather and gorse here again, before it fades this year. It’s not likely to be so different from last year’s or the year before, but never mind that. And yet – there is a difference. There’s so much space up here, usually. There still is, but in several directions it feels limited. If space were a sound, in those directions it would be muffled and I wouldn’t quite be able to make it out. Again, I’ll carry on up. 

Here it’s very open, with crisp definition of details in front of me, the colours intensely vibrant, and I take a kind of self portrait; but over there it’s close and far away at the same time, cooler looking, almost colourless. What’s going on? There’s occasional drizzle and ahead I see a low-lying backpacker’s tent near the path above, which I soon reach. A middle aged couple, friendly, interested, German, I think. They have questions: do I think it’ll thunder?; will they be okay where they are?; where am I heading?; is there rain in the forecast? I open my Met Office phone app and there’s the thunder warning. I scroll down and find the animated weather map against our location and see the thunder is to the east, missing us by some distance. They’re somewhat reassured and wish me a good walk, saying they don’t mind the rain, but have children with them (I haven’t seen them) and don’t want to risk anything. I say no guarantees, it’s up to you, but it seems clear enough. And I carry on up.

It’s easy walking up Hameldown, and hypnotic with these colours and the distant mist. There’s the trig point ahead – far enough for me tonight; the light will be gone soon, but it’s a good place to stop for a while, look all around and then turn back downhill. I look behind me: the wide snaking path that might disappear into a parallel misty world, but ahead I see something on the little fence near the dead-straight drystone wall. A jacket or backpack, something that someone found and hung there for its owner to find? For a moment I think it might even be a bird, but it’s far too large, and I carry on up.

It is a large bird. One I’ve not seen in the wild except near the Exe estuary a few weeks earlier, but this is much closer to me and quite unafraid. A raven – unmistakably a raven. It’s common these days for carrion crows and rooks to be referred to as ravens, but this really is one and it’s enormous. A great, black dinosaur of a bird studying its domain intently. I stand by the trig point, taking photographs and talking to it, and it half listens, moving its head. Later I will message my wife to say I told it it was wonderful, just before it eventually flew off, and she’ll quip back that the poor creature has probably gone for therapy. But those wings, that beak. A runner passes me, heading further uphill. I’ve just seen a raven!, I say to him, without hesitation. It was just wonderful, I add as he carries on up.

I’m heading down because nothing will top this and the light is fading, which doesn’t bother me, but there’s also mist developing, edging uphill and all around. Soon the runner passes me again on his way back down, waving but speeding up a little. I reach the German campers again and there are more of them this time, sitting and eating a late meal. I saw a raven at the top, I say and they say wow, they’d love to have seen that. Yes, it was wonderful I add. I wish them a good night’s sleep, undisturbed by thunder, and carry on down. 

It’s rapidly darkening, misting, sort of disappearing around me, but still subtly colourful. I’m a little drunk on it, and will remember this ordinary-made-extraordinary walk for some time. And the raven. It was wonderful.