Today’s guest picture comes from our friend Mike. He is currently on holiday in sunny Wales, and sent me this shot of the bridge over the River Wye at Builth Wells.
The forecast for our weather here today had been altering every time that I had looked at it, so we expected changeable weather. However, we didn’t get the change until the late evening when some thunder, lightning, and heavy rain signalled the end of our spell of sunny weather. It was almost a sunny day but it was a cloudy day too, as the weather hung about waiting for the change. I found it rather oppressive, and after church in the morning, I did very little apart from wandering about the garden saying, “I feel a bit tired.”
The garden is far from tired.
I did spend a little time trying to take a decent picture of a flying bird, but I was short of patience and got a mixed bag of sitters instead.
Under the circumstances, it was all too easy to sit down and watch a great deal of today’s stage of the Giro. It was not very exciting to say the least until the final few kilometres, and even the commentators were laughing at their own efforts to find something pertinent and original to say. They managed to pass the time painlessly though, as they have had a lot of experience watching hours of cycling with not much happening. Italy looked beautiful.
When the stage ended, I thought that I ought to do something, so while Mrs Tootlepedal went out to do some gardening, I went off for a three bridges walk. Thanks to the warm weather, children and dogs were playing by the waterside so birds were few and far between, though one regular was on its favourite rock.
I proceeded on my way along the Kilngreen slowly enough to be able to spot an orange tip butterfly having a rest from its usual incessant fluttering.
After that, I crossed the Sawmill Brig and walked round the Castleholm looking about as I went. I liked the newly repaired wall, the rtoawn blossom, the racecourse in waiting, the burgeoning oak, and the azalea peeping out from behind the trees along the Lodge Walks.
And these of course.
When I got to the Duchess Brig, I went round the pheasant hatchery loop before crossing the bridge.
I added ivy leaved toadflax and vetch to my collection of wild flowers as I went along the top of the Scholars’ Field . . .
. . . and finished my walk with a view of the rhododendron in our garden taken from the road.
A joint effort in the kitchen provided us with a meal of cauliflower cheese and mushrooms, followed by rhubarb crumble and custard. Fortified by that, we were able to withstand the shock of the thunder and lightning later on.
My failure to catch a flying bird of the day was a subject of conversation at the feeder late into the evening.