After a shop at Tesco this dreary grey morning Jackie and I drove up to Hockey’s Farmyard Shop for lunch.
A few ponies foraged on the moorland flanking Holmsley Passage. while a familiar pair harnessed to their trap trotted down the hill.
Well before noon weekend traffic illuminated headlights along the Burley Road at the top of the Passage.
Thatching had been begun at The Elm Tree on Hightown Road and some wit had chosen to place a banner advertising Thatchers cider across the work. (access the gallery with a click on any image for enlargements) The thatchers themselves had clearly taken Sunday off but the handwritten notice proclaimed that the pub remained open. Soon after the new owner took over this establishment last summer the ground floor was flooded. The local residents set to and participated in the clearance work.
While I photographed the thatching Jackie focussed on a mossy roof.
As usual a number of donkeys abounded in this northern part of the forest. Jackie produced the first of these images at Ibsley, where I photographed the third,
and another trimming a hedge on
Blissford Hill where two clusters of the currently ubiquitous catkins can be seen.
As we joined Roger Penny Way it seems scraps of a metal fence have been blown up a bank.
On our way back down this road a troop of ponies ambled across it.
Ian returned to Southbourne for work this evening and was sent home with a doggie bag prepared by the ladies as he was unable to stay for dinner which consisted of Jackie’s wholesome cottage pie; crunchy carrots; tender runner beans and stem broccoli, with which the Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden and I drank Saint-Chinian Langudoc- Roussilon 2021.