Basking in 30 degree heat borrowed from July, it's a still September day. This forest, set in the Hertfordshire countryside, is at its calmest. As it is so quiet, it may take a little time for your ears to adjust. It is late on a Monday morning, there's nobody else around to hear the woodland alive with the buzzing of insects and scattered bird calls of rooks, robins and wood pigeons.
This forest, first established in 1767, is bisected by a railway line linking Hertford North station with London. Regular passenger services reverberate the cavernous space beneath the trees as they slide through. There's a heavy freighter at 40 minutes pulling smooth wagons that scythe the steel rails, and at 63 minutes another, a single locomotive with squeaky suspension. The noise of the passing trains seems to accentuate the sense of space in this wood and to intensify the silence in between. It's a silence sparsely punctuated by flocks of jackdaws as they forage the surrounding fields, and at 54 minutes a buzzard, a drooping whistling call as it circles high above the tree canopy.
This recording highlights just what an unusually peaceful place this is. It is a rare spot in the south of England where there is no road noise. The airspace above has layers of slow rumbling, high altitude jet planes, then lower down their tuneful cousins the propeller planes, banking and wheeling over the landscape. These are in themselves calming sounds. This non-stop spatial audio recording, made from the trunk of a tree just next to the public footpath, runs for 73 minutes. Its length shares the extraordinary qualities of the Clinton-Baker Pinetum as a long-form listening experience. Lastly, because it is so easily missed, hear at 32 minutes far off over the fields the bell striking 12, this is St Mary's Church Bayford, built by William Robert Baker.
Listen to other episodes from this special place.
222 The trees of Kielder Forest before dawn
221 An hour on the headland
220 Empty night Cornish air (sleep safe and best with headphones / Airpods)
219 Country meadow summer breeze
218 Sing dawn - the songbirds of Abney Park nature reserve
217 Upland woods in winter gales (part 2 - sleep safe)
216 Sat on the sand of East Looe beach
215 Calm within Kilminorth Woods
214 Storm over hotel peninsula
213 Sound-scenes we love from four years of Lento
212 Ear witness: innercity woodland peace
211 Nothe Fort at night - quiet swirling waves
210 Watery dell amidst trees at night (sleep safe)
209 Downstream of the old mill
208 Lone tree under windswept telegraph wires
207 Bucolic dell in upland meadows (subtle, slow, best with headphones)
206 Dawn birdsong in the leafy ravine
205 Soundscenes of a changing tide (sleep safe)
204 Rain falls on steep craggy woodland (sleep safe)
203 Dartmoor stream above waterfall gorge (part 2)
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Good Mood Revolution
Your Sleep Guru Podcast
Anxiety Slayer™ with Shann and Ananga
Men Do Talk Podcast
The Dr. John Delony Show
On Purpose with Jay Shetty