Country diary: Glittering beauty from a simple water pipe | Mark Cocker

Lightwood, Derbyshire: The spray had created such a stunning showcase of ice that it lured me down a steep bank - twiceFor 10 days Buxton was buried by snow and further bound, night after night, in sub-zero conditions. At Lightwood there's a steep-sided dell enfolded beneath old beech trees and held in almost permanent shadow, so that as I threaded a precarious route to the bottom, I could feel a further instant fall in temperature.The goal was a water pipe. Its outflow cascades for barely a metre, but relentless spray has scoured as its catchment basin a gritstone arc 3 metres across. Those rocks are plastered by platyhypnidium moss, while the drier south side is adorned with frost-wilted remnants of broad buckler and hart's-tongue ferns. Continue reading...