Summer Tree

After the heat and travel difficulties of yesterday, I decided to stay relatively local today and headed over to a normally peaceful pond and woodland site (designated SSSI) managed by the National Trust. 

The pond has a "no swimming" policy due to its designation, but the hoards of people (mainly young families and teenage groups, many barely if at all social distancing) were ignoring that, and some even had swim boards and rafts out, and had climbed over wire fences installed to protect the wildlife and habitat to reach the water's edge. One wonders how long it will take the site to recover and for the NT to regain any control without restricting even more access - if at all. Very sad and disappointing.

However, I managed to find a quiet shady spot away from the crowds, next to one of the streams feeding the pond, and enjoyed the  birds regaling me with song while I consumed my picnic lunch.   Further round the pond I found open access to the water's edge and spent some  calming moments watching the damselflies and dragonflies (extra) flitting around.

My main image is an in-camera multi-exposure of a tree in full summer clothing for Ingeborg's Abstract Thursday Challenge.