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It was finger-tingling cold when Jackie continued her winter planting on this sun-bright morning and I photographed some still lingering blooms.
Outside the kitchen door pelargoniums, petunias, and erigeron vie for space.
More pelargoniums,
some with autumnal plumage, as in this urn shared with verbenas, continue to spread their colour around.
Rozanne geraniums add splashes of blue
palely reflected by clematis Comtesse de Bouchard
just about thriving on the gazebo
along with the winter flowering Cirrhosa.
There are still hardy fuchsias
I may not yet have featured.
This maple on the grass had been cut down when we arrived three years ago. We are encouraging it to come back to life.
Honesty seeds are masquerading as Pauline’s light catchers.
They are seen here in the Cryptomeria Bed.
The roses to the right of the tree rise over the Oval Bed. As can be seen, there are more to come.
Hot Lips salvia,
varieties of nasturtium,
and even of antirrhinum, still bloom.
On such a day a late afternoon forest drive was essential.
A pony in a field off South Sway Lane was more interested in the grass than in Sway Tower.
Opposite Longsdale View, where gorse blooms among the bracken,
the Isle of Wight is visible across the moors.
Along the stretch of Highland Water just outside Brockenhurst,
where stumps stand like ancient tombstones on one bank,
the deciduous trees
now wear their temporary autumn plumage;
the banks are becoming waterlogged
enough for arboreal reflections.
It was here that I was introduced to Mad Max, who had no fear of freezing his nether regions.
The forest road between Brockenhurst and Beaulieu displayed trees resplendent
with the last of their glowing golds
and burnished browns;
falling fast
to carpet the floor.
As we approached Beaulieu, a pair of backlit ponies prompted Jackie to park the car on the verge and me to wander back to photograph them. Maybe it was something I said,
for, in turn,
they turned tail,
and crossed the road,
to join companions enjoying greener grass.
The portions of our meal at The Raj two nights ago were so generous that we couldn’t eat it all and brought some home.. Jackie added samosas and onion bahjis for this evening’s repast, with which I finished the malbec.