Cotoneaster at Hallowe'en

This Cotoneaster shrub is bright with red berries and green foliage. It helps us with decorations for the birthday party for our clients tonight.

































This misty image of the nearby hills appealed to me on the way home from collecting the client's birthday cake, and makes a nice contrast to the roaring open fire back in the dining room.

The Belvedere and Wolf Stone

OK, so perhaps I'm star-struck with my new camera, or perhaps I need a theme to motivate my blog posts. But I have a little book of riverside (or at least, river-related) walks, and there are 52 walks in it. This looks like a walk per week for a year. Now I'm definitely not into giving myself any artificial targets, timetables or goals, I've had too many of those in my working life.



But it looks like fun and so, with no promises whatsoever, I'm looking at doing a walk per week, barring illness, foul weather or foul mood. We'll see how it goes; the intention is that we'll get a look at the seasons in the Mayenne, and enjoy some walks too. Here's the first one.




















I went to this belvedere in springtime, but the weather was misty and I couldn't see a thing. Today being bright and beautiful I thought it would be an ideal opportunity to revisit it, and see what there is to see. Pictures can never do justice to the feeling of being there, of course, the sun warming you, the breeze chilling you, and the fading of the view into the distance seems right and proper when you are there, but just makes the photographs look like they've faded out. But the belvedere is as impressive as I remember, and the views from it, this time, spectacular.




















After the views from the tower, a short walk through mixed woodland to a rocky outcrop known as La Pierre au Loup, the Wolf Stone. According to the guide, views are promised from here also, but they are obscured by young trees that have grown up. The moss-covered rocks are impressive, about 6 metres high, and fun to climb up on and over.






































What has all this got to do with the Mayenne River, you ask. Well, I was coming to that. In the opposite direction from the Wolf Stone is a similar short walk that takes you to the source of the Mayenne. The wife was with me, and tired so we didn't go that way. Another time.

Wood delivery

Getting winter fuel deliveries is a matter of timing. Too early and there is not enough space for the wood in the bunker. Too late and the boiler runs out of fuel and the guests get cold and then unhappy.

The wood comes in a great big lorry fitted with a fan which blows the wood into the bunker. This technique saved us from having to build a big ugly ramp for lorries to tip their load into the bunker through the roof.

Today was delivery day. The lorry backs up to the bunker, the driver connects the pipes, the fan blows for half an hour, and Bob's your uncle. There was even enough space for ther whole load.




















And just for the fun of it, here's one of my fuchsias, still blooming.

The ends of things

Traumatised as I was by the Caterpillar That Got Away, I decided it was time for a new blogcam. This decision was made easier by the fact that my old, old camera was on its way out. You could turn it on and only sometimes would the lens come out of the case properly; usually it would just get stuck and beep at you.

It is so old it doesn't tell you how many megapixels it offers (2 I think) and the biggest memory card I ever got for it was 128 Megabytes. But it used to take fine pics, and some of the pictures on this blog are taken with it. I bet you can't tell which ones. Here is the old camera, and this is the last picture I did finally manage to take with it, a sad, rainy car park in Laval. How fitting. The camera is for the bin. Someone recently got a Nobel prize for inventing the CCD, the device at its heart. Hmmmmmm.




















This is the new camera, a Digital Ixus from Canon. With a viewfinder so you can take pictures on bright days without having to guess what's on the screen (Just like the old camera, really, which came from the days before they tried to persuade you you didn't need one). And here is the first picture I took with it. Ohhh you lucky readers! Never again will you miss any of those minutae of daily life here in the corner....

Evil thougts

The Caterpillar that got away

While I was gardening the other day I came across an enormous, huge, as big as my index finger, hairy, caterpillar trundling its way across my path. Knowing how this would fascinate you, my avid reader, I went indoors to fetch my trusty blogcam to take a picture.

Tragedy! When I came back, it was gone. Disappeared. Never to be seen again. Knowing how disappointed you would be to hear this, I have done my best to recreate the scene for you.




This is where the caterpillar would have been if it hadn't scarpered.


















This is how huge it was


















This is how furry it was.















But it did make me think that I should perhaps invest in a small pocket-sized blogcam that I can keep with me at all times, so this kind of disaster doesn't repeat itself. It doesn't have to be very fancy; most of the pics on the blog are at 600x450 only, but it does have to slip into my back pocket, and therefore also withstand being sat on. I will keep you posted.

Plant mobilisation

Auntumn is here. We've had a hot, dry Summer, and the plans are gasping for whatever rain will soon be coming our way. (Today, according to the forecast). This is the time of year for moving plants around the garden, splitting up big clumps of perennials so they have better access to nutrients, re-homing plants to where they will get more of their preferred sun/shade, etc.

Now it is the turn of the tall, white, Dutch Iris. These grow in big clumps dotted around the garden. Some clumps are too big and need splitting up, some are just not where I want them. So I have prepared a big space for them, between two hazlenut trees, where they will form a green backdrop to the various other plants I will be putting in the bed.

They take a couple of years to settle in to a new home, so I won't be moving all of them this time, or I won't get any flowers next year. But a select few will be a nice new home with plenty of space.




These iris are far too crowded....


















So I move them to a nice new home, giving them plenty of space to grow.....




















Leaving behind some space for something new.