COWS IN THE COTSWOLDS

Actually, they are not strictly cows, because they haven’t had calves yet, but I liked the alliteration for the title!

I led the Worship at Church this morning and thankfully, my slide show went very well, after a lot of angst getting it ready - but I will know what to do next time.  I think many there enjoyed singing some of the “old” hymns too.

As usual I had prepared a picnic for us, so off we went looking for inspiration.  We drove north through Highworth and Lechlade and then Mr. HCB took the road signposted to “The Barringtons”.  We never actually reached there, but stopped some way along the narrow road in a gateway, when we saw a herd of cattle in a field.  

Remembering that when we came back from holiday last year, a herd of cows came towards us when they heard the music on Classic FM, we left the windows open and the strains of Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto floated through the air.  Before long (top left) the heifers started to move and they came quite close (top middle and right).  

Soon after a man came along in a pickup and stopped - I asked him if they were his cows and he said they were.  I told him that we were I was singing to them, at which he seemed amazed - well what’s wrong with that?  He asked what I sang so I gave him a quick rendering of part of the music - it’s fair to say he was smiling when he drove off - probably thinking what a mad woman I was!  Mr. HCB was far more “measured” and told him we just loved the countryside and enjoyed coming out to see the beauty around us.  He asked where we were from, so we then introduced ourselves and said we lived in Swindon.  He said his name was Charles and that the land where the cattle were grazing was part of the Cotswold Wildlife park.  I asked what breed the cattle were and he said that the brown ones were Limousin Pure and the black ones were Aberdeen Angus.

Off he went and we ate our picnic, but by then the cattle had had enough and were beginning to walk away (middle right) - I managed to catch these two (bottom right) and thought what lovely faces they had.

After about 45 minutes, Charles came back along the road, drove past and waved, but then stopped and reversed, so I was able to ask a few more questions.  I asked if they were cows or heifers, and he confirmed they were heifers.  He said they would keep about 15 of them for breeding and the others would be slaughtered for beef.  I told him about Blip, so when he asked the name of the website, I gave him one of my cards and said that his cattle would have their 15 minutes of fame!

After that, we sat in the car for another half an hour, watching red kites, the occasional cyclist coming along the road - and I might add, “mooing” at the cattle.  With very little traffic around - the only sound was the wind in the trees - idyllic.

We drove home though beautiful Cotswold countryside, with typical stone walls and of course, in the sunshine, with blue skies and beautiful clouds, it all looks wonderful.  Some corn had already been harvested, but the corn in the bottom left photograph had obviously been cut and was drying out - not something usually seen in the fields.

We saw about six tractors and several combine harvesters, then on the dual carriageway on our way home were behind a tractor stacked with bales of hay - it's definitely harvest time around here.

What a beautiful day we’ve had and I nearly forgot to mention the lovely heifer in the middle of my collage - Mr. HCB has named her "Henrietta" - and that’s good enough for me.  He is so good and patient when I want to stop and take photographs, the least I can do is let him name a heifer!

If Charles looks at this - I would like to say “Thank you - it was so kind of you to stop and chat twice - and I appreciated your input for today’s Blip.  There are so many lovely people in the world, and today you were one of them!"

“Money can’t buy happiness
      but it can buy cows,
          and cows make milk
and milk makes ice cream
     and ice cream makes you
          HAPPY!

P.S.  We had an ice cream when we got home!