Late yesterday afternoon we were both too knackered to clear up and put our tools away. The good news about today’s weather forecast is that we will be enjoying steady rain; the bad is that this will come with 60 miles per hour wind by the evening. This meant that we had to be out early this morning making our usual preparations in addition to the said clearing up.
We emptied trugs (WP you’ve got drugs on the brain) containing compostable material and buckets of alliums for bagging separately.
The trugs were then overturned to prevent their being filled with water.
Chairs were laid down gently before the wind did it ferociously.
If you biggify this second image of the scene, and examine the owl’s head you should see Where’s Nugget Junior? (2). While he was interested in what was going on he was not inclined to come any closer.
Paths were swept and hoed.
Beautiful as they are, the Weeping Birch Bed is just one that reminds us we will need to be back on the case soon enough.
Although the wind increased in ferocity we received no rain until early this evening.
Later this afternoon we drove to Keyhaven in search of windsurfers. We found none and therefore turned inland.
The rape fields off Sowley Lane are coming along well, and the oaks beginning to come into leaf.
Ponies grazed on the road ro Burley.
Cattle, blending into the landscape, foraged at East Boldre,
where some of the stumps and fallen trees have been around long enough to host lichen and frame violets.
A number of the roads in the New Forest area have been resurfaced. One of these arrives at the green sited where South Baddesley Road begins. Clearly a troop of donkeys has been engaged to maintain the grass in keeping.
Many of our English bluebells have been replaced or hybridised by Spanish imports. We have all three in our garden, but a number of our woods still contain our home grown variety. The first image in this gallery is alongside Sowley Lane; the rest along South Baddesley Road.
This evening we dined on oven fish and chips, baked beans, pickled onions, and cornichons, with which Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Fleurie.