Bloomin' eck - it were a good day!

Our life is about honouring gentle rituals and traditions and around this time of the year we go and walk through our favourite blue bell woods on Oxenber Hill. Today (Monday) Himself had taken the day off so we could do exactly that, and it was wonderful (bar a slight mishap!)

We knew that there was the possibility of rain in the afternoon, so we set off after breakfast with a picnic lunch and flask of tea and a rather over excited Moss. She could barely contain herself. She's been on restricted exercise again (due to catching a dew claw and making her 'thumb' tender) but this last weekend the damaged claw finally came off and the new little stumpy claw has been clipped carefully to make sure it was not too scratchy and she was raring to go!

When we first arrived, Himself and I got ourselves booted up while Moss sat (im)patiently fidgeting and wriggling as she watched our every moved, her whole body language was 'shrieking' HURRY UP!

We followed a favourite route and as we got closer to the bluebells we were drenched in their fragrance - it was absolutely gorgeous.  We could smell them before we could see them and as we reached, then climbed over the stile, we were blown away by the rolling fields of blue.

As soon as we could, we were down at flower level taking pictures and just imbibing in their fragrance.

Hidden amongst the wash of blue were flashes of white with wild garlic and wood anemone threading through. 

Further round, where it was sunnier and the soil seemed drier, primroses and violets danced in the light breeze.

The path turned upwards on the the hill where the bluebells completely covered the slopes. Almost at the top we turned off the main path and followed a quieter path to a grassy mound where we stopped for lunch.

It was not long before Moss found herself a 'small' stick and insisted on presenting it to Himself several times.  Her antics made us chuckle but we refused her request as we knew she would go tearing through the flowers and just flatten them, so we invited her to sit with us and have a biscuit or two while we ate our lunch.

Popping up through the bluebells were now rich purple orchids - the array of blooms just invited every bee in the near vicinity to the banquet and the air was not only filled with fragrance but the industrious buzz of hundreds of fuzzy bumble bees - I could just not stop smiling at their fat little bodies going from flower to flower in their quest for pollen.

With one eye on the sky, we thought we better not linger too long at lunch and set off through the woodlands.

We met a few folk along our way, also loving the display and enjoying the walk, one lady we came up to was trying to photograph her dogs however, they were not cooperating, preferring to snuffle around than sitting and posing, so I offered either to hold the dogs (with me hiding behind the wall) or to take photos - the owner plumped for the latter as she felt they - the dogs - would behave for her...... not a chance! She called them, bribed them, grabbed them, whistled and gave them instructions which they totally ignored.  I must have taken at least 20 images for her on her cellphone when we called it a day. I handed the phone back to her when suddenly the dogs posed for her on the wall. I snapped with my camera as I walked away of her taking the photo she'd been trying to take for about ten minutes. 

We walked past a crooked tree which we have rather sweet memories of. We have a number of photos taken over the years of little boys leaning up against the trunk, too small to sit on it safely, then them sitting on it as they were now 'big stuff', then later again as they nonchalantly leant up against it again - too grown up to swing their legs. Now we have Moss in front of it - ready to charge off but good enough to sit and wait for me to take the obligatory picture.

All too soon we reached the far end of the woodland and re-entered farm land, where we passed a husband and wife couple walking in the opposite, we did the 'fellow walker nod' and carried on by, when suddenly I heard the first cuckoo of the year - the other woman heard it too, and almost simultaneously we both gasped out loud 'Cuckoo!'  Funnily enough neither husband had heard it. As the light breeze had become a little more blustery whilst we'd been in the woodland, it made it hard to hear the bird call but I was so pleased when I did!

We met a few more folk - some happily walking along, others marching on a mission and one couple laden with cameras - she was wearing a full length pale green skirt which billowed and flapped in the wind as she clamped her hand on her straw hat - she was delightful as she exclaimed how wonderful it was to see our dog (we missed the first part of her sentence as she grappled with her hat and her bag and her skirt) so we smiled and grinned and agreed with her!

It was soon after that my bad knee suddenly gave way and threw me to the ground. My other knee did the heroic thing and landed hard 'to save me' and in doing so I ripped my jeans and grazed my knee. (Bad knee BAD BAD knee grrrrr) any hoo, our rather jaunty bumble took on a bit of a lumpy gait.

With a bit of a limp and a dent in my pride we followed old tracks filled with flowers and surrounded by sheep and lambs. The lambs are quite large now - little mini sheep.

Our final thing to do was to pick some wild garlic to eat with our meal later (delish!) and to find a stream for Moss to throw herself into. Once we'd returned to the van, my knee was cleaned up, Moss munched on biscuits before falling asleep in the cab and not moving until we got home.

When we returned home - the kettle went on, I gave my knee another clean and slapped on some antiseptic cream. And talking of cream, we then sat down with mugs of tea and scones, jam and cream - what an excellent way to end a lovely day!