Hallowed places?

Maybe I have it wrong.

I mean, maybe it’s not so easy to hear a tree. Maybe the tree and the hare did not tell me to go into the hollow places.

I can imagine you now, “Of course they bloody didn’t, you crazy Crone! Trees and hares don’t speak. Thank goodness you’re finally waking up to that after all this hollow place nonsense.”

But that’s not what I am getting at at all. I’m not saying they didn’t speak to me, just that I misheard.

Maybe they said, “Go into the hallowed spaces.”

Yeah, see? Easy mistake to make.

That said, I still think that my hollow place inside Aulus is a hallowed place. So I didn’t get it all wrong. If indeed I did.

Now I am thinking, where are these other hallowed places? What makes a place hallowed?

Consecrated ground offers a start.

But this Norman church was built on the site of a spring - which probably had significance before Christianity.

Very overgrown, but the water is sweet and pure.

Of course I tasted it. It will be good for mead. I will return with a bottle. Need to sieve out the creatures.

Talking of creatures, what incredible nooks and crannies for bats and birds and bees!

A pair of blue tits had a nest near the top of one of the arches.

And there were some gorgeous trees - outside a beech which is now one of my Sentinel Trees - and inside a giant sequoia!

This, and the beech, are marked as "Notable Trees" on the Woodland Trust's Ancient Tree Inventory.

There were signs that for people this place still has meaning.

And, as ever, the graves tell heart-breaking stories.

There are new graves too - one from earlier this year.

It was a lovely place, a hallowed place. It did feel good to visit.