After a fun-packed but bone-chilling day on the borders of Shropshire and Powys I was reminded of the town of Chirk as we passed close to it on our return journey. Chirk itself is a lovely town worth a visit but I was more interested in the two ancient oaks that I knew were situated in the village of Pontfadog nearby. It had been several months since my last visit and I had forgotten the name of the village, so we had to stop off in Chirk whilst I found a map and reminded myself of the village name and the way to get there. Once found we were only in the car five minutes before parking to one side of the B-road and crossing the road to join the short track to the ancient oak known as The Oak at the Gate of the Dead.
A gentleman who I will refer to as “The Tree Hunter” told me last year that I should try to stick to one name for this tree. Here’s his advice:
“I have done a lot of work over the last five years to get this ancient tree and many others to be recognised for what they are. Fantastic, historical towers of biodiversity, which as you know have their own aura and personality. This name [The Oak at the Gate of the Dead] has stood us in good stead for playing the media game if you like. I would be very grateful if you could refer to it by this name as there is now some confusion occurring with people calling it the ‘Crogen oak’….I will try to correct all occurrences that I come across for clarity’s sake.”
It was nice to come here to see this ancient oak grove, even in Winter, and that was mostly because Kal hadn’t been here before – I love introducing him to some of the things I find on my own. They are spectacular trees, and they do seem to attract a lot of attention. Last time I was here in late Winter 2010 there were several people milling around the old oaks and marvelling at their grandeur.
The site was all pizazzed up (if that’s a real term) – it had new flash clean colourful informative informational information signs all over the place telling visitors all about how this was a cherished site because it was where the lovely Welsh people saw off the hated English oppressors who wanted to wipe them out. Well, that was the horrid and pointless agenda that Henry the Second to do just that, so that’s good enough reason to celebrate his object failure at this sacred site. There you kind of feel that this would be a good place to gather together your energy for such a fight – the oaks are very protective and giving.
I remembered my previous visit to the site early in 2010. I had heard of the impending death of one of the greatest of the oaks – the so-called Oak At The Gate of the Dead (or OATGOD for short) and I wanted to see whether there really was anything special about this tree. As it happened the dowsing rods revealed that there was. Not that I needed the rods to tell me that – I could feel it as I approached the tree – there was a terminal sadness in the midst of a radiant glory. A strange and poignant combination. I remember putting my staff into the centre of the oak’s split core and infusing it with the final remaining energies of the tree.
Today we dowsed for whether there was any remaining energy in the tree. None. It was truly dead in an energetic sense now – there was no “chi” energy and the tree’s dryad had departed. There may still be traces of biological life, but it’s like a human being on a life-support machine – the biological functions are still registering but the brain may be dead. It would be the slow lingering death that trees have as they rot away depositing their physical essence back into the earth thanks to the assistance of time and thousands of insects and fungi.
When I dowsed I found that the dryad from the OATGOD had moved into a neighbouring tree, one that was very much alive and giving off every sign of such – green ivy wrapped itself lovingly around its trunk as though to provide it warmth through the frosts of Winter, and birds dipped in and out of its upper branches as though attending to its every needs.
Playing with a robin
Almost as if underlining this fact a robin chirped loudly as Kal and I stood beneath the new host oak. We looked up to find it was only a few feet away from us, watching us and chirruping at us belligerently – it WOULD have our attention! It was trying to tell us something…we both stopped to listen intently. It was as if…we could…understand its tone. It wanted us to listen. So we did. For a few minutes it spoke to us, telling us about the new tree, “The new tree was the special tree now, the old tree was dead, the whole grove loved the new tree. The spirit lived on.
I got out my phone which has an application on it that plays birdsong. I found the call for a robin and began to play it to the real robin to see how it reacted. At first it seemed wary, but after a couple of goes it began to mimic the calls. Kal and I looked at each other in delighted amusement – in a primitive sort of way we were making some form of communication with this little bird, and we loved the way its call was now less angry sounding and more playful – it was playing with us, repeating the phrases that I made with my phone. We watched the robin flit from branch to branch near us as it observed what we were doing and homed in on the source of this communication in its own tongue. A warm connection between us all made it seem as though we could talk to the robin ourselves and be understood. We stopped teasing it with the phone and thanked it for playing with us. At that point it fluttered its wings and flew off to a nearby tree.
I felt like the spirit of Pan had welcomed us into this ancient oak grove once more. I think that had to be one of the most delightful encounters I have had in a long while. A good start to the year’s outings.
Gwas.
Singing the birdie song
