So, a day trip to London. For work. As I was going to spend the whole day, shut up in a sound booth, with a screen to stare at and headphones squashing my ears and my every syllable being forensically analysed by a pair of perfectionist and very professional producers.
Professional is not a word I associate with myself - dilettante, amateur, practicing... something like that.
Anyway, on the way to the studio I came upon this tree, which is one of London's top trees. The Brunswick Plane.
These plane trees are amazing - so huge and gnarled, with the polluted layers of bark peeling off the tree is freed toxins. The trunks can look like carbuncles.
Such friendly trees - coping with the city air and offering shade throughout the long hot summer. They still carry most of their leaves. Some looked ancient and vast.
I also saw ashes, beeches, horse chestnuts and some other kind of Sorbus that I could not recognise.
Going to London after spending these last few years thinking of trees and creatures makes it a very different experience. I hadn't before noticed how many trees there are in the capital. Trees along roads and in squares, in courtyards and public spaces.
There are animals too. Squirrels and cats and dogs. Pigeons and crows.
I remember seeing these trees in London with the peeling bark and having to ask what they were i.e. London plane trees. This was over 40 years ago! Interesting how they are a "natural hybrid".