Life

I always like the way fresh new leaves spring from such wizened looking rootstock. This vine is probably forty or fifty years old, and still producing grapes. It will flourish throughout the hot, dry days of summer, drawing water from the stony earth via roots that can be up to 8 metres long.

Thank goodness, no wind today -- and the sun shone. We risked a table outside the local pizzeria this evening, and it was very pleasant -- warmer outside the house than in, as it always is at this time of year.