Not quite there - almost. Have only used 732 words so far.
Northerner
The daffodils of Farndale
Once upon a time I was very, very ill. Lying in bed I would gaze out of my window, aching for the heather-covered hills and rushing becks of the North York Moors. I yearned for the daffodils of Farndale that I had never seen.
Finally, after surgery and convalescence, I recovered and returned to university to retrain. I haunted the tourist information bureaux, feverishly hunting out every reference to Farndale, until one day I emerged triumphantly clutching a Moorsbus leaflet. Now here I was one April morning at Stand 18, Middlesbrough Bus Station, waiting for the M11 to Thornton–le-Dale. Beside me was a small queue of hikers with backpacks on, boots cleaned, and wearing woolly hats. When the M11 arrived I clambered on board excitedly. “Farndale please!”
At Guisborough we picked up more hikers till the bus was full. All around me I heard a companionable buzz of “Well, if you go down Little Fryup…” and “If you go two miles out of Danby”. It was a long time since I’d been on the Moors. I turned to the lady next to me and asked “What’s that hill called?” and “Which dale is that?” We were soon talking nineteen to the dozen as the bus rolled along through Danby and Castleton.
At Hutton-le-Hole I got off and walked through the village, sniffing the fresh, clean, spring air. I stopped to look in some of the small shop windows and eventually headed for a tearoom and sat for a while looking out on the village green cropped short by black-faced sheep. At last I took the side-road that leads to the car park where the Daffodil Shuttle Bus stood.
Eagerly I climbed up the bus’s steep steps and looked ecstatically out over the dales as we passed them. The bus left us at Low Mill where I found a tourist information stand and picked up a leaflet on the Daffodil Walk. Going through the gate on my right I could see the River Dove.
And here were the daffodils, in a golden ribbon on either side of the Dove. At first there were just a few but then the river widened slightly and I saw hundreds, no thousands! The footpath was busy with walkers of all shapes and sizes. Old ladies with dogs, youngsters, and families with Mum and a pushchair, all strolled along the Daffodil Walk. No one knows who planted those first daffodils so many years ago. Perhaps monks from the nearby communities? I tried visualising those medieval monks with their medieval trowels.
At the end of the Walk was the Daffy Café, bursting at the seams with walkers. The café’s garden was full of them, and they had spilled over into the nearby field. Eventually I squeezed into the café and had a bowl of soup.
After lunch I retraced my steps. I had bought a new camera, a digital camera. Reading the instructions carefully I peered anxiously through the viewfinder and squeezed the trigger. Click! The daffodils of Farndale were my first digital photographs.
Now I got down to the serious business of getting to know the daffy known as Narcissus pseudonarcissus. Down on all fours I eyeballed its flower with its golden corona. The plant was smaller than I had imagined, only a few inches high. I leaned closer and pressed my nose against a golden trumpet. Nothing. No scent. Used to its larger, more garish garden cousins I had anticipated a perfume. I felt a momentary disappointment.
The path by the River Dove was quieter now. Many of the walkers had already completed the Daffodil Walk earlier in the day. I returned to the pond that I had passed in the morning. Several mallards were roosting near the footpath beside the pond. My digital camera saw service again as I tried to capture their colours.
I stood and looked round me at the dale itself in its tranquil setting. It was everything English with its dainty patchwork quilt fields and its lush spring grass. In the distance were the first lambs of spring. All around me I could hear birdsong. I felt my soul bind hard and fast to this land of ours.
It was then I knew that I’m the luckiest woman alive. After all, how many of are granted our heart’s desire and find it lives up to our expectations?
First draft of daffies of Farndale
This latest jaunt of yours reminded me of William Wordsworths, "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud." Especially the line," "Ten thousand saw I at a glance, tossing their heads in spritely dance!" I could just picture the sight of all these beauties as you described them which is also the way the poet saw them. I would love to see your pictures from this jaunt also. Thnk you for sharing this.
Thank you djm906. I did this jaunt last year but am intending to repeat it very soon. I posted some pictures last year. I am of course intending to get some new ones this year. And I'll certainly post them!
Hope they're as lovely this year and you enjoy...