A Gardener's Weather Diary: A Highlight On The River Esk

Sunday, 19 March 2017

A Highlight On The River Esk

The weather certainly has taken a turn for the worse. It hasn't turned cold but it's dull, breezy and continually trying to rain in the wind. Saturday night into Sunday morning produced the highest overnight temperature I've recorded in March and by a considerable margin. The temperature didn't fall below 11.2°C (52.2°F) breaking the previous record of 9.2°C (48.6°F) which occurred on 29 March 2012.

Temperature, Rainfall & Solar Radiation Records 17-19 March 2017

Despite the not too promising weather forecast for Saturday we headed for the North Yorkshire Moors to do a bit of steam train photography.

The train was "The Whitby Flyer" starting from York and heading to Whitby for a short stop over before returning to York. Some of the train's journey took it along the East Coast Main Line but I opted for some photography on the rather more scenic part of the route through the picturesque Esk Valley of the North Yorkshire Moors.

LNER B1 Class 5MT no 61264 Heads The Whitby Flyer Through Lealholm

After lunch we spent some time looking for new photographic location along the railway line which follows the river through the Esk valley. We stopped off at North York Moors National Park Centre near Danby and had a walk to the railway line. Before reaching the railway the path crosses over the river Esk where we spotted of couple of dippers.

They were quite a long way off and doing everything they could to make capturing a decent shot difficult. They did what dippers do and kept disappearing under the water and emerging in a different location hidden by tree branches. It's the first time I've ever seen a dipper and it was the highlight of the day.