Ed Vogue's World

Bertie our three year old mini dachshund is always up for a walk. Considering the tiny legs that he has his stamina is something akin to Eddie Izzard running three marathons in one day. This is even more remarkable considering that he popped a disc in his spine whilst getting out of his bed 6 months ago leaving him paralysed and requiring an operation that literally saved his life.  He likes a walk anywhere: in the woods, up to the kids school, in the park...but his favourite place to walk is across the beach and on the cliffs with the wind blowing his ears as he trots along sniffing out the smells of the sea air.  For a little thing he can walk for miles and even when his human friends are exhausted he still finds the energy to go bounding up to a canine coming the opposite way woofing with the attitude that belies his small form.  Today he was in his element.  Bertie took to the South West Coast path in West Dorset from Abbotsbury to West Bexington and back. The wi...

Picture the coast of Southern England 180 million years in the middle of the Jurassic era and you would see tropical shallow seas teeming with life.  Crustaceans, fish, marine reptiles and ammonites filled the waters.  The clays, sandstone and limestone that form the wonderful cliffs of West Dorset were formed as sediment in these seas.  How time has changed the landscape. The seas are no longer tropical and although still teeming with life,  marine reptiles hunt no longer in the waters off the Dorset coast.  Nowadays the coastline between Lyme Regis and Charmouth reveals the secrets of this long ago time. The remnants of the creatures that once swam in the warm oceans can be found strewn over the beaches, imprinted into the rocks and embedded into the cliffs.  The ‘dink-dink’ of the fossil hammers against stone rings out across the shoreline as keen fossil hunters of all ages descend on the sands attempting to find that perfect specimen, enabling the lucky...