Wrexham County Borough 38 - June is busting out all over/flowers everywhere /the sound of the bees on the Comfrey

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As I walk this morning I hear the sounds of the countryside . The constant hum of the bees as they flit from Comfrey plant to Comfrey plant . The river bank is clothed with the light lilac Comfrey plants . The blue Demoiselle mayflies are themselves flitting from nettle to nettle , Over the last few weeks the nettles have grown . The river which glides effortlessly today looks different to a few weeks ago . Yellow Iris grow here and there . A hint of yellow amongst the lilac of that Comfrey.

As I walk I take it all in . I stop to talk to a friend . One I used to work with many years ago . We share a few memories and he looks out for the Kingfishers . A Heron rose from the opposite bank . A huge gangly bird with enormous back legs trailing behind it . The river as it meanders has taken away one bank and is slowly depositing it on the other .

I can hear the birds in the distance . I don't know their calls but they sound musical . I make my way along the paths until I reach the road .

Sheep look over the hedge at me as I walk by. A couple of hares appear and run off into the distance . I am too slow to photograph them. They hop off into the long grass . The Queen Annes Lace has gone over and are replaced with yellow Buttercups . I can see the Honeysuckle starting to grow up into the hedge . Soon it will be out and the lane will smell lovely .

June is a fine month. The weather is hot as warm fronts approach our country . As I walk I start to think about Covid . Days 444 to 450 have passed me by. The longest day is just around the corner . I try to find new things to see . Sometimes I cannot find any and I begin to count my steps . My counting stops when a cow pokes its head through the gate and moos gently at me. I pass a few walkers , one runner and a man with a dog . I love this time of the morning . It gives me thinking time . All this walking on my own with just the river and its wildlife to keep me company.

I reach the gateway to the river again and start to walk her banks . This side is different to the other . There is no Comfrey here . The orange hessian bank covering which a few weeks ago looked out of place has settled in. A few weeks ago it was bright orange . Now the grass has started to push through and it has a coating of green. The dock leaves that are very large are doing their best to push through the holes .Here and there they have pushed up mounds . A mum Goosander is hiding on the casemates . She has a brood of twelve chicks . They dive into the water and entertain me for a few minutes before I move on .

Pink Campion lines the bank . June is busting out all over . That song goes round and round my head . The sky is Cobalt blue and it is Summer in our small isle . We began to think that it was safe to come out of the woodwork . I see more of the white tailed Bumble Bees . I find myself thinking about holidays . We should have been heading south to stay overnight in a pub car park ready for our trip to France . Today we should be on the train en route to Calais . A stop at the first Le Clerc supermarket as we would have an empty fridge . We no longer can take food in the fridge and head off quickly . Under new rules we are a third country and as such cannot take fresh meat , cheese or dairy products to France . All because we are no longer part of Europe . We have to have six month left on our passports , purchase a green card for our insurance and make sure we put a GB sticker in our vehicle . Luckily our girl Gabby is only 3 .5 tonnes or we would need a sticker mort for those pesky angles that stick out and catch the unwary on the road . Life out of Europe is not quite what we wanted when we were sold Brexit .

Portugal opened and the visitors tore over there quickly . Within a few days our government had moved Portugal from Green to Amber . Holidaymakers found themselves having to rush home before quarantine kicked in. The holiday industry is a mess . Heathrow have opened a terminal to isolate arrivals and it sounds as if other airports will do the same . The Delta variant is growing and the Reproduction rate is now over 1. Areas of the North West are going under tighter restrictions . Clusters of the variant are turning up in the south of Scotland . Just where we had intended to visit . As we cannot go abroad we have to rethink our plans . I wonder where we will end up next week .

When I almost reach home I pass by a large bank. In Spring it was covered with Primroses and Cowslips . Now it is covered with Mauve Grannys Bonnets that have escaped a garden. They took me back to my childhood when I used to pick them in my grans garden. Everyone had them in the garden. Pink ones and mauve ones . All looking like an old fashioned bonnet. Time for coffee .

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Comments

[Home and Away]

Why are there restrictions...
such as testing and quaranteens for those who have been vaccinated? It doesn't sound like the UK is following the science. However, it sounds like you are having a gorgeous spring.

[JenGog]

cases
I think the problem here is that they are following the science and the cases are rising and are as high as last February . Hospital admissions gone up but not so many deaths . I guess that is because the young are catching and spreading it . It is the Indian variant that is causing the problem . the R rate is over 1 which means we are highly unlkely to open up at the end of June . Keeping an eye on Scotland as we had planned to go there , Some parts of the central belt are under lockdown conditions again . We are going a little lower but who knows what this week will bring . It is lovely weather here and just wish we could travel . I am sure we are not alone but not sure that other countries give out as much information as we seem to give .