Saturday morning, 7.30am, after an early morning yoga practice at home, I met Nick (my cousin, the professional photographer) at Petit Bot for some early morning yoga shots by the waterfall.
While it was rather misty with lots of sea fog, it was still a stunning way to begin the morning - barefoot and feeling the damp earth under my feet was grounding to say the least, let alone sitting by the waterfall, hearing the sound of the water falling onto the ledge below, and feeling the splash of water on my body. Wow!!
Nature is powerful, have no doubt, and it was wonderful to spend this time with Nick, noticing the budding trees and the daffodils and primroses growing around us. I had brought along my bathers with the idea of going for a morning swim, but my feet were soon chilled and it all of a sudden didn't seem as appealing as it had when I had awoken hours earlier! Mind you there were quite a number of people going early morning kayaking, so at least someone was making the most of the empty sea.
I joined Nick again in the afternoon, this time at his house, which is fairly much "the good life" way of living. You have to love it - there I was sitting surrounded by daffodils, the sound of the birds and Nick's youngest daughter practising her tapping on a piece of wood in the garden, and there behind me a mother duck and her 7 ducklings (1 of the initial 8 died unfortunately!), while in front of me the chickens laying eggs. Brilliant!
Nick's eye for capturing the spirit of nature and indeed the spirit of Yoga is incredible and he took some fantastic shots and we even managed to get two of his daughters involved - thank you girls, and a huge thank you to Nick, a wonderful way to start the day and indeed wind down at the end.
A couple of hours later and when I really did think I was winding down for the day, having sat down and watched Oxford win the boat race, my partner decided we should go for a run. Admittedly I had mentioned to him a few weeks ago that I was considering starting running again, and would he like to train me so I could fulfil a yet unfulfilled ambition of running the Guernsey half marathon. But still...I had kind have started to forget about that back home and in the swing of things!
So anyway, what was meant to be a gentle run around the block, turned into a half an hour full on run with 4 lots of 20 second sprints, which made me feel so sick that I really wanted to stop but Ewan wouldn't let me and so we gently ran it through instead - evil at the time, but empowering all the same!
It is incredible what running does to the body, mine was certainly thrown into shock, it has been almost 8 years since I ran the London marathon and soon after hung up my running shoes and discovered Yoga to help me sort my body out after all those months of pounding the tarmac and the cliffs so I guess I have running to thank for bringing Yoga into my life!
Still my joints felt fine and while I collapsed onto the sofa after some gentle stretching when I got home, and while my face may have been bright red for a full hour afterwards, I remembered why I enjoyed running in the first place - it does make you feel great, not least the fresh air and the sense of achievement that you have gone out in the first place, but the fact you get to witness nature, for us the sun setting and the changing skies - it is certainly a lovely distraction from the pain you feel inside!!
So all in all an energetic and nature based day!
xx
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