Cuando los Días de Verano (When the Summer Days)

When the summer days aren’t more than grey clouds, long hours of rain and a ghostly light illuminates the passing hours. When summer resembles a half-forgotten memory, with its faint colours and blurry edges. When you come to terms with the fact that this is England and summer isn’t like anything the word is meant to imply.

It is then that, when blue reigns the sky and green shines with the colour of life, the soul wakes up early, together with the sunrise’s pinks and oranges, a clear sky and the promise of the sun’s warmth against the skin.

Creando Memorias (Creating Memories)

There was no itinerary to follow as we woke up this morning. A crisp and fresh day awaited us as we stepped out of our tent; it was like seeing the horizon in high definition, perfectly outlined against the sky.

Breakfast was taken slowly, we were trying to retain every distant outline in our memories. And right there, in the middle of it all, Skiddaw. Covered in snow, tall and imposing, it stood out against the other mountains. Just like a perfectly framed picture, flanked by two smaller peaks, it defied us to get closer.

Two-Hour Autumn Getaways

When I looked at my reflection in the mirror I half expected to see two scratches down the left side of my face: from my eyebrow, past my nose and straight through my lower lip. But there was nothing there, not even a hint that I might have fallen off my bike and landed on the spiky arms of a wild bramble on my third mountain biking getaway with the university.

We set off on a cold and misty autumn morning, the sky grey and the light dim. However, there is a big contrast in this setup. Further into Endcliffe Park the trees grow redder, warm-coloured leaves rain from the treetops as we ride past. The ground below us is yellow and orange and our chatter mixes up with the sound of tires crushing dead leaves as we ride by.