Last rambles (for a while)

I loaded these pictures of my last few walks with Mum and Lyra last night, to give me something useful to do when I was hanging around before my hip op, and so here I am on the hospital wifi at my little wheelie desk. I have been labelled and have a fine array of hospital garb to wear for the big event in an hour or so. In the meantime, here’s the last of the rambling updates for a little while (though the surgeon who came to put a big marker pen arrow on my leg first thing was making optimistic noises about getting up and cracking on…).

What with the manic weeding and mulching and the worsening limp (these two may be connected) we have tried to stick to shorter walks. However, to mix things up I declared that we should take a few of the untried paths around the Hirsel woods which had been earmarked for future investigation.

One new route was along a wide grassy path running up through a formerly densely wooded slope, now opened up entirely thanks to Storm Arwen. It has been partially planted with young trees but these are still small and basking in the sunshine of a south facing slope a veritable forest of raspberry canes has grown up, dotted through with tuffets of crosswort and tangled at the edges with brambles. Jam supplies are secure for the foreseeable. A couple of attempts to cut across to the woods via narrower tracks were thwarted by fallen trees but we did managed to get in far enough to see the little hobbit house we found a few years ago (when completely lost). I think it has something to do with the pheasant shoot, but it is hard not to imagine young Pippin popping his head out the window.

Another foray took us along a promising track at the top of the tree line. The afternoon sun made beautiful Watteau like canvases of light filtering through the young birch leaves above a carpet of starry ransom flowers. We let Lyra lead the way that time and ended up going much further than intended – though there is a still a tantalising final downhill stretch we aim to try out once I’m on the mend.

As a last hurrah for the season we made a final trip to see the rhododendrons, just in case there were new later varieties to see, taking an as yet unexplored path. Distracted by a rather dazzling display of dark reds and pinks, Mum and I got hopelessly lost at one point. The half hour of walking in circles was worth it though for the enormous and fantastically scented, yellow azalea we discovered deep in the heart of Dundock Wood.

Anyway I’m signing off now to don the attractive surgical robe and stockings……