The rules for the free bus service on Saturdays on the T14 have been tweaked again. Last time I went into Hereford I was able to get a free return ticket but this time the driver was only issuing single tickets, which meant I had to pay the usual £8 for a Powys Rover to get home - so no saving at all.
Once in Hereford I headed for Castle Green where the marchers were meeting. The plan was to have several speakers there, and then march, and sing, at various points around the centre of Hereford, ending up at the Shire Hall. Clipboards were being passed around the crowd to collect email addresses for future contact from the organisers, and also to sign a petition which was going to be handed to Jesse Norman, MP.
The dress code was either bright and colourful and nature-related, especially for the kids, or black, for mourning the terrible state the planet is in. Bearing in mind that it was 1st December, and therefore cold (though mild, and the sun came out), I decided to go for black - and was almost mistaken for a vicar! There were lots of kids in costume - a little girl dressed as a bee was very good, and there were kids in onesies that looked like gorillas and other animals. Among the adults, there was a lady with a peacock tail and hat, and another with elf ears and a white dress (Galadriel, maybe?). Gandalf was there, the spokesman of Don't Frack the Shires, who were helping to organise the event. He also introduced the first speakers from a little stepladder by the PA system:
We were standing between the River Wye and a large tree on the edge of the Green, a good place to be speaking up for the natural world.
The first speaker was from the Herefordshire Green Network, talking about organising locally. She was followed by Ben Salmon, who was at the big protest in London a week or so ago when five bridges across the Thames were closed by protestors. A poem was read out by his eleven year old daughter about how all nature is connected.
Then there was a lady from the local Wildlife Rescue, who had brought along a barn owl and a tawny owl, who are both trained to go into schools for educational purposes. There was also a hedgehog! Owls and hedgehogs have seen their numbers fall drastically in recent years - barn owls can't live within 25km of an A road, because so many get mown down by the cars as they fly too low. The solution to this is well-known - if trees are planted along the sides of A roads, the barn owls perch higher and go over the cars. The trees are also traffic calming, and improve the air quality, among the many benefits they have. So solutions to the decline of species are there - it's just the political will to use them.
This theme was carried on by later speakers, Kathy Monkley, who said a few words about the science of climate change, and Richard Priestley, who has been writing a blog for several years now about solutions to the problems of climate change around the world. It's called Global Problems, Global Solutions. There was also another poem, by Gary Snyder.
Some of the marchers - there were more behind me, and more round the corner of the Cathedral
We marched from there to the Cathedral, led by mourners carrying a painted coffin labelled Nature, where we stood on the paved area with the picture of an apple tree outside the West End and sang choruses, including "Never doubt that a small group of people can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." Helpfully, two of the marchers were carrying a banner with the words on it, which they held up at the front.
From there we continued to All Saints, where we stopped again. I didn't hear much of the speeches this time, because I had been asked to hand out leaflets, and got into conversation with an old chap who told me all about how he was encouraging his grandson to enjoy the countryside and old games that he had enjoyed, and how everyone used to use glass bottles for milk, and the same carrier bag every day.
On we went again to the middle of the market stalls in the Square, for more singing, including the chorus of the English version of This Land Was Meant for You and Me ("From the coast of Cornwall to the misty Highlands").
And from there we continued to the Shire Hall for more speeches - no microphone this time, and sadly one of the speakers couldn't project, so a really interesting speech got lost because only a few people could hear it. The second speaker, from the Green party, was much better at getting her voice heard at the back of the crowd.
The event was organised by Don't Frack the Shires, Ban Fracking in Herefordshire and Human Mappa Mundi, all of whom have Facebook pages. This was the launch of Extinction Rebellion in Herefordshire, and they can be found on social media at www.rebellion.earth twitter.com/ExtinctionR @extinction.rebellion.hereford and @Extinction Rebellion and Facebook Xr.hereford
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