Recently I took Duna for a walk – locally – not too far from the house. We walked alongside this river, the Congost, which runs through Granollers. This is how it looks close up.
This is the same view when you stand further back
It made me think about how I look at things and how I can miss beauty if I don’t adjust my vision.
On the other side of the river is this soap factory
Granollers is an industrial town so there are lots of factories along this stretch of river and many have been responsible for polluting the water and the land. What probably was once an idyllic stretch of water is now lined with ugly buildings with little thought for their visual impact. It couldn’t be more different from a walk along the coast path at Lamorna.
But Duna and I had a beautiful walk.
Looking up there was a blue sky and signs of Spring on the bare branches
And the most wonderful thing was the art gallery along the walls – urban creativity and energy
Duna ran free and poked and pottered,sometimes stopping to sniff the air
I watched ducks on the river
It’s hard to photograph them when a Springer Spaniel keeps arriving to ‘spring’ them….
We were alone which is an unusual blessing in this land where people love to be outside and to gather in big sociable groups
We ignored the rubbish – for such a deserted place it wasn’t too bad
and when it was time to go we left by these colourful steps
Outside the towns the countryside is beautiful, there are hills and fields and wild flowers and little quiet lanes. Towns in general seem to be blighted by development but here by the river there was a different kind of beauty and many of these rather desolate places provide homes and food for a lot of wild life. There is now in place an Environmental Action Plan to support the ecosystem of the Congost and to offer some protection to the wild life. Green spaces have been created and the plan is to further integrate the river and its banks into the lives of the local population making it more a place to be used and enjoyed than forgotten and abused.
Along the river bank runs a long cycle path which you can take all the way to Barcelona.
I hope to do this one day and will tell you what it was like. Duna loves to run beside the bikes so it will be a great excursion for her!
It is a chestnut oak and beech wood with areas of pine forest and twice I have been there with a small group of people to do Reiki in the Woods. It is organised by a gentle and interesting man called Jordi. We meet up in Sant Celoni at about 10am on a sunday morning – sometimes it is nearer 11am when we all finally arrive but I must write another post about Time! Jordi takes us to a secluded and peaceful part of the woods and we spend time doing simple but deep exercises of healing, meditation, body movements and connection with ourselves and the natural world around us.
I have done lots of classes in Catalunya which of course are all taught in Catalan which I still don’t speak but I have become accustomed to this new position of welcome outsider. I don’t understand everything, I miss some of the responses that people give to the exercises, I can’t communicate all that I am feeling in words. But something else happens – I have become not just practised at smiling and nodding but also more sensitive to body language, my heart hears emotions which may not be expressed in words. I make connections with people without being able to talk very much. When I first arrived in Barcelona I often felt frustrated and invisible and out of kilter but I have recently noticed this happens less and less.
There are ways to connect and communicate without words – or without all the subtleties and clever wit that in the past I thought were vital. I think people here talk a lot – especially women – but perhaps it is just that I speak so little now. Words flow around me as if I am a rock in a fast flowing river and goodbyes can last over an hour as it seems there is always something else to say. I live in a more silent world – and the danger could be that I start to think too much and make judgements as I observe the other people. This sometimes happened in my first months here – a defense against the strangeness of my surroundings. But now I seem to have settled into enjoying this time of acute awareness of other levels of communication. Of course I also understand a lot more Catalan and I can respond in my hesitant but improving Castellano but I have also relaxed more into accepting this stage and taking things one step at a time – poco a poco or poc a poc!
These pictures were taken the first time I did the Reiki in the Woods workshop and after a beautiful morning connecting with the trees – the new growth – the colours of the fallen leaves – the sounds of birds – we found a nest on the ground, intricately woven with grey beech twigs and I raised it on a longer branch and placed a pine cone inside – art – another way of communicating without the need for verbal explanations.
And Duna was there too. Noone seemed to mind a little wild dog racing around excited by the woody smells as we did our more meditative work. She was the free spirit of adventure and for three hours was happy to explore by herself and bury her nose in the sweet leafy earth until in the end she become one with the surroundings.
