Skip to main content

A busy weekend so far

We have a much loved friend from Hampshire staying with the family this weekend.  Yesterday he came with me to the beach where we walked with my two younger grandsons. The boys made the mistake of taking their father's rather expensive British and Irish Lions 2013 commemorative rugby ball with them.  It was temporarily forgotten about while they larked around doing a spot of dune jumping.  
When they remembered about the ball it had blown a long way back down the beach to the water's edge and was bobbing about in the running waves.  The labrador took it upon herself to try and retrieve it but each time she tried to grab hold of it in her mouth she was actually nudging it further and further away from the beach.  It was quickly a long way out to sea.  You can just about see the ball and the dog at four o'clock from the sea gull!
Our heroic weekend guest was then required to take off his top layers and wade out until he was chest deep in the very cold North Sea in order to grab the dog and say a fond farewell to the rugby ball, which is probably knocking around off the coast of Norway by now.  Maybe it's caught up with Wilson, who knows.

Walking back across the salt marsh we passed some ragwort covered in clusters of cinnabar moths (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnabar_moth).  I haven't seen any for years, probably decades, so I was very delighted to see them again.  They are so handsome.
Just by the car park at John Muir Country Park there is an excellent play area.  Typical of East Lothian Council, the landscape planting is lovely.  Whoever is in charge of municipal planting in the local authority has a very nice and sensitive touch.  Every year I am impressed!  The whole of the play park is extremely well done.  Nice rope too.
 On the way in to the play ground you are met by these two upside down characters.
If the weather stays fine I might pack a picnic lunch next week and take the mob there to work off some energy.  It's a very good place to be.

Today I have been on Traprain Law again, continuing with the grassland survey.  The sun has shone all day long.  We even managed breakfast in the garden which was a great way to start the day. 

The views from the top of the Law were wonderful, as always.  To the east, out to sea

 and to the west, towards Edinburgh and the Pentlands, faint in the distance.





Comments

Popular posts from this blog

In a vase on Monday - colour

The intense colours in my vase this week come from nasturtiums, sweetpeas and a single glorious zinnia! Their beauty and love of life speak for themselves and need no further words from me! Enjoy!

Colonsay postcards - on arrival

The first thing I do, once we have unpacked our car, which has been groaning with all the stuff we need for a week's stay in the holiday cottage, is head for the outer gardens of Colonsay House. It is a place of wonder for me! I particularly love the leaves of the giant rhododendrons. There are many different varieties, all planted in the early 1930s. The outer gardens are generally overgrown, having had little tending over the decades. That makes them even more magical! The old woodmill falls apart a little more every year, but that's fine by me because I love corrugated iron and especially if it's rusted! And of course the bees. Colonsay's beekeeper, Andrew Abrahams, has one of his apiaries on the edge of the pine wood. So lovely - the hum of busy bees and the heady smell of the pines. We are here - finally! Delayed by four months by the wretched virus, but now I am on holiday! Hooray!

Found items IAVOM

I am on holiday on the Inner Hebridean island of Colonsay. It is my happy place. Thoughts of Colonsay rattle around in my head each and every day I am not here! I haven't got a vase to share this week but some lovely things I have found over the past few days, which are just as beautiful as a vase of flowers! I hope you agree! Here are some leaves of giant rhododendrons, growing in the outer gardens of Colonsay House. Some skeleton leaves of magnolia. The dried stem of a kelp seaweed. A couple of conkers (can never resist those!), and a branch heavily populated by a number of lichens. The air on Colonsay is so clean that lichens flourish here!