Learning Something New

Today was the day for doing one of the walks I’ve been reccying recently – the bluebell walk from Baybridge.

There were just four of us – Doug, Walter, Alan and me.

It was warm and sunny and we trundled slowly around the route, identifying flowers – mainly bluebells and hearing the local cuckoo and being scolded by a curlew and an oyster catcher, who’s nests  must have been close by.

Alan does adopt-a-path in the area too, and we found that our patches overlapped in Deborah wood and on a few other paths. We’d both been reporting the same things, apparently.

We didn’t rush the walk and had plenty of stops for poking around and/or chatting, which is the best way, in my view, and, despite all this, we were only a quarter of an hour overdue at the end.

The sun shone. The birds sang. The sheep insisted that it was still May.

And I learned, from Walter, that two tree on one of my paths had been planted to mark the visit of John Wesley on a preaching trip to the area.. I don’t have a date for this as its possible that John Wesley visited the place more than once – but it is recorded that he preached here in 1747, which gives an idea of the timeframe at least. To an untrained eye (me), both trees appear to be in good condition with a long life ahead…hopefully.

very grand trees they are too – standing on opposite sides of the old road into Baybridge – now the footpath with the stile-on-a-hinge which occasionally dumps me over the wall (I have reported this!)

And we found British bluebells, Spanish bluebells and hybrid bluebells, including a white bluebell….  er…?whitebell…

We did five miles. I need to rethink the timing of these walks, I think….