Buttercup Meeting

We wake up to our first day in our holiday cottage/barn conversion in Ewhurst, East Sussex, both feeling pretty tired after the last few days - in fact I’d say I’m exhausted. I booked this week some time ago - before we made that last minute decision to go to Montenegro - and it’s probably too soon for us to be away again. As you’re probably aware by now, I’m not good at ‘relaxing’ holidays, and feel the need to constantly be exploring new and unfamiliar areas, so struggle to get my head into just taking it easy! 

In some ways, the fact it’s the Jubilee weekend is making it a little easier; we’re not keen on battling the crowds we suspect will be out and about. We have a very lazy morning before eventually going for a shortish walk across the countryside  to Bodiam. It’s a lovely walk, starting along what seems to me to be a hollow way, down through a buttercup-strewn orchard to a riverside walk along the River Rother to Bodiam. The castle will have to wait - it’s too busy today - but we succumb to beer and a naughty plate of chips (I’m afraid I can’t resist when I hear the table next to us ordering!)

The final stage of the walk is uphill, and it’s here I really struggle, so it’s a long and painful effort to finally get ‘home’. It doesn’t help that I have my camera and a heavy lens, but at least I have the excuse for regular photo stops. In fact, I’m genuinely surprised by the range of photographic opportunities that arise over the 4.5 miles. There’s bugs and butterflies - many sadly rather battered, wild flowers aplenty, a very cute baby magpie, a pair of Egyptian Geese fluffed up by the afternoon’s strong wind, and the steam trains of the Kent and East Sussex Railway. 

Inevitably, it’s a ‘set’ today, with collages of flowers and steam trains (the latter including a very happy G regressing some 60 years and waving enthusiastically at the engine driver) and bird shots as extras. My main’s a tortoiseshell  sharing a buttercup with an unidentified but very cheerful looking bug! 

Thanks once again for your lovely comments, stars and hearts on my recent blips.