rose – Page 4 – derrickjknight

The Heligan Path

Last night, with Giles, Jean, another Jackie, and Paul, we were entertained, first by Windmill Swing Band, at Milford on Sea Community Centre. This was an interesting experience. It was difficult for me, with my untrained ear, quite to decipher what we were hearing. The female singer had a powerful voice and performed very well, but was rather obscured by the number of instruments on and overflowing from the small stage. Of the sixteen accompanists, ten were saxophonists.
After the break came the Sugar Rush. Quite the most outstanding wind player, guesting as soloist for Windmill in the first session, turned out to be one of a quartet forming this second group. He played saxophones, clarinet, and flute. He was one of two Marks, the other playing keyboard. Two excellent, lively, and entertaining female singers made up the four. Given the option to leave during the brief interval in their performance, we declined, because we were enjoying them so much.
Giles, being rather partial to the flute, called out for more of this instrument and was rewarded with a melodic solo. So were the rest of us.
This morning Benjamin of Abre Electrical came on time and thoroughly investigated our problems. The fault seems to be under the kitchen tiles, with which we will not interfere. We cannot use the power points in a kitchen cupboard until a feed is drawn from upstairs, and we need a new fusebox.
We experienced more steady rain, which by the afternoon had stopped. The last push on the previously invisible path was a joint one.

We began with Jackie riddling, with a sieve, the earth I dug out of the track, to gather what gravel and impacted sand was still present. That was soon given up as pointless and Jackie, who now shared my job, and I tossed each spadeful, complete with stones, into the crowded shrubberies. That should help keep the weeds down, and we will probably be digging out gravel and chucking it piecemeal back onto the path for some time to come.
As will be apparent from the picture of Jackie at her initial task, there was far more soil than gravel on the path. This meant we had not bought enough stones, given that we now had to re-cover the whole area. After lunch, therefore, we took another trip to Ferndene Farm Shop and returned with five more bags of them.
In Everton Road a little boy of about six years old gave himself a nasty shock. On his bicycle, he sped out from between two oncoming cars he was trying to avoid, turned and rode straight at us, forcing Jackie to make an emergency stop. Terror was written all over his face. A few yards further on we decided to turn back and see if he was all right. By the time Jackie had found a suitable turning space and backtracked, he had disappeared. We rather hoped he was trembling on his mother’s knee.

Back home, we completed the laying down of the stones, and raked and swept them. Jackie added the finishing touch of six varied heucheras. Just as I finished photographing our achievement, the rain returned.
I call this the Heligan path, after the famous lost gardens of that name in Cornwall, because we really didn’t know it was there.

Several new roses are in bloom. Here is one:

And an iris.

This evening we dined on Moroccan roast lamb, pilau cous-cous complete with chilli, and carrots and green beans, followed by apple strudel. I drank a Langedoc reserve 2012.

Tree Felling

Yesterday’s post carries a picture of the holly stump I decided to remove today. The promised rain fell overnight but kept off today, so I didn’t get my break.
Jackie drove us to Milford Supplies where I bought a long, heavy, tree feller’s axe, a smaller hand one, an iron shovel, and, for good measure, a fork handle.

I felt somewhat like a Mafia hit man as I arrayed my purchases in the boot of the car.
I spent the rest of the morning extracting the stump. This feat was achieved by swinging the heavy axe and bringing it down on the stubborn remnant enough times to split it a bit and chip off some residual branches; by digging out soil around it until reaching roots; by chopping or lopping out those lifelines for the tree; and eventually kicking the object to dislodge it enough to cut out the tap root. It is harder to do this than to write about it. As I wielded my long macho weapon I identified with Van Heflin’s homesteader in ‘Shane’, and kept an eye out for Alan Ladd. He didn’t show up, so I had to finish the job unaided.
The last holly I cut down was about 30 feet high in Newark almost thirty years ago. I sawed off sections of the trunk first, until reaching a manageable stump. This is the method I employed after lunch with a tree only about ten feet tall. Having added all the branches to my ever increasing pile of stuff too tough for compost, I tackled the stump in the same way as the earlier one. I was able to leave a useful length to aid me in the kicking process.

Today’s location is at the far end of yesterday’s path. It widens out beyond a decking area which is approached by stepping stones through the gravel. The condition of that terrain can be seen from the stump picture. With the two hollies out of the way I thought I just had to weed, rake, and sweep the gravel and I would be finished. No such luck. The few sprigs of copper beech piercing the elderly weed protection lining in front of the platform would just pop out with a little gentle persuasion, I thought. Not so. They were actually suckers sprouting from a root of the mature tree nearby. So I chopped out a section of that root and completed the job.
In the first photograph the keys to the location are the blue clematis and the red rose. The holly stump was situated close to the central two stepping stones. The disturbed area to the right of the second image was occupied by the other tree.

The wooden arch leading into the front garden now supports a rose of deeper pink than the first that bloomed.
Yesterday’s roast pork and red cabbage meal was beautifully reprised. The crackling was even better. With it, Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I drank Bishop’s Finger beer.

A Fatal Error

Whilst Jackie drove the well used route to Shelly and Ron’s this morning, I, like Wordsworth’s Lucy, ‘dwelt among the untrodden ways’. Well, untrodden for a very long time. And, apart from lunch, I trod them all day.

Yesterday’s clearances had revealed the presence of another hidden gravel path, which I determined to open up and refurbish.

The camellia mentioned yesterday is now fully visible through the cleared area.
I began by planting the two forgotten items from yesterday – a lilac and a fern. The lilac was to be placed alongside this path, and required the usual clearance of weeds, brambles, and ivy.

Sneaking up behind and to the right beneath the allium in this next photograph can be seen the tentacles of the ubiquitous grasping gallium aperine.

Poppies of various hues are cropping up all over the place.

I have not featured the deutzia before because I could not identify it, but, happily, Jackie has done so.

Although its leaves bear the dreaded black spot, that curse of pirates and rose-growers, the pink climbing rose at the front of the house is beautiful and abundant.
Well, that’s enough of wandering around the garden. I’ve done the planting and had a look at the flowers. Now I must get down to business.

A few yards into the rediscovered path, some quarry tiles had been laid as a point of interest. A few were broken. A little further on, and to the right of these, is a smaller, linking, and also overgrown stretch of lined gravel. This has a similar feature of four tiles. I therefore diverted from my main objective, cleared that route, and took up the tiles and used them to repair the other set on the longer, meandering pathway. In this photograph of the first opened thoroughfare the rake at the far end lies on this arrangement. I have left a few little violets in situ.
Jackie had not, of course, been idle on her return. She continued with curtains, and has now made and hung curtains for the whole house, often fixing the rails as well.

After lunch, I allowed myself a little diversion to pull out two thistles like those of yesterday, and to plant a little round tree/bush in place of one of them. Jackie had unsuccessfully tried to persuade me to take it easy this afternoon. Whilst I was engaged in removing the second of the thistles she came out and asked, in that mock accusative tone that indicates that the speaker thinks you are overdoing it: ‘What are you doing now?’. When she saw what I was engaged in, she gasped, and her expression turned to horror. ‘You’ve pulled up the acanthus!’ she exclaimed.

The head gardener was very forgiving, and most encouraging. She estimated that what was left of it would reach maturity in about seven years. The fatality, in this case, was therefore not the plant, but the tool that I had broken in trying to uproot the very stubborn sections of the acanthus. The plant should revive. Not so the fork handle. I wonder if Ronnie Corbett has any in stock? (Anyone who doesn’t know this reference is highly recommended to look up the Fork Handles sketch on Youtube. It is The Two Ronnies at their very best).

To return to the main path. I will need a heavy duty axe to remove a holly stump from the far end of it. Someone has cut it down in the past, and it had bushed up. I trimmed off the shoots but otherwise cannot shift it, even with the aforementioned fork when it was still intact.

Two photographs will not suffice for the finished article, but here they are.
We are promised rain this evening, to continue into tomorrow. This will be a welcome relief because I will be forced to take a break.
I do ache a bit.

Two of the delights of Indian food are the aromas and the colours. Jackie adheres to these in her presentation, which is why she produced a special variety of red cabbage as a suitable compliment to her succulent roast pork, crackling, and vegetable rice (recipe).
For cabbage with a suitable gentle piquancy for this meat:
Take 1/2 small red cabbage, 1 large red onion, 1/2 a cooking apple (this one was Bramley`) cored, but not peeled.
Thinly slice all ingredients. Stir fry with big nob of butter and splash of olive oil. When part cooked add a splash of white vinegar and a good glug of red wine.
Stir it all up, turn the heat down, whack the lid on and let it cook a little while longer until soft but not soggy.
Try it. It was perfect.
With it I drank Dino shiraz Terre Siciliane 2012 and Jackie didn’t. I would have given her some but she doesn’t like red wine, except in cooking.

Nomansland

When I posted The Magnificent Seven, I was in France, and not carrying my archived photos from 2008. I was therefore unable to illustrate it suitably. This morning, having stored them on the new iMac, I picked a few at random and added a postscript. It wasn’t quite a straightforward operation because I had to change the original formats to JPEG in order to upload them. It took a wee while to work it out. I don’t fancy my chances of remembering how to do it next time.

In 1995 the B3078, Godshill Road, was named Roger Penny Way after a much respected local highway official sensitive to the forest. We have often driven along it from the Cadnam roundabout towards Godshill or Fordingbridge. Jackie has sometimes dropped me off along there for a walk across the heathland to meet her at Frogham. Our latest investigation into a possible new abode led us to take a turning to the right along this road. About three miles from the Cadnam roundabout lies Lyburn Cottage in Lyburn Road, Nomansland. This is actually in Wiltshire but still in the New Forest National Park, although the forest itself stops at the cattle grid on the hill at the top of the road. The now familiar ponies and their droppings trails are directly opposite this. Just around the corner stands the Lamb Inn with an interesting looking French restaurant, Mirabelle, next door. As I read the bilingual menu affixed to a post outside, a French family were leaving, and in conversation with a man I took to be the proprietor. The restaurant separates the pub from the methodist chapel.

The current owner of Lyburn Cottage was painting the outside of the garage, so we expressed our interest and had a good conversation. Not yet in possession of our money, we explained we were not ready for viewing. He said we were welcome to walk around the outside and take photographs. I had a very good feel about this one. The gardens are an attraction, as are the rose covering the frontage, and the vine over the carport.

We enjoyed a drink and a snack in the pub. The nearest shop, not far away is in Landford. This is run by an escapee from south west London who told Jackie some months ago that this was the best move she had ever made. The publican told me there was a cash machine in the Landford Post Office. Indeed there was. The woman serving summoned a man who was eating his dinner inside, and he came into the store to operate it for me. We took a slow drive back through the forest to Roger Penny Way and home.

When I got soaked a couple of days ago, so must have my camera, for today’s pictures have a kind of woolly effect on the far right of the frame. On inspection I discovered a smear on the lens. Hopefully, cleaning it will have done the trick.

This afternoon I finished reading Peter Roberts’ ‘Minstead: Life in seventeenth century New Forest Community’, lent to us by David Watson. Clearly, not much has been written on the subject in the past. A small forest village has probably not engendered a huge amount of interest and according to Roberts there wasn’t a great deal of local literacy at that time. The author has therefore relied heavily on such records as court rolls, wills, and inventories. We have a picture of people without full employment living off the forest as best they may. For me the book suffers from a certain adherence to facts and figures gleaned from the records with less attention to interpretation. It is, however, fascinating. And it offered an interesting addition to the possibilities of the origin of the word Seamans. Peter Roberts writes: “The name may originate with J. Seman, a forest officer in the reign of Henry VI. Whilst this could be thought to dispel the old story of the lane being used by the press gang, an item in the churchwardens accounts of 1666 for two shillings paid to ‘….8 sholgers in the conveying of prest men two Portmuth’ leaves room for thought as to how such tales start’.

Jackie’s juicy jalfrezi and scrumptious savoury rice, followed by New Forest strawberry ice cream, provided our dinner tonight. I drank Torretta di Mondelli Nero d’Avola 2011, and Jackie her usual Hoegaarden.