Early Spring at Calke

So far my New Year resolutions aren't going well (still there's eleven months left for that), but the one I'm trying hardest to keep up is getting out regularly in the fresh air, and preferably some sunshine. I think I'm doing quite well. we've been to Church Wilne, Swan Lake and Shipley, and last week headed out to an old favourite, Calke Abbey.

winter honeysuckle

I'm not looking for a long hike, just a morning's wander somewhere interesting, and the advantage of visiting a garden, rather than say a nature reserve, is that the paths are likely to be drier and, in the event of frost, probably salted to avoid slipping.

witchhazel

hazel catkins

It's not the time of year to find much flowering but the small wood surrounding Calke's walled garden has various shrubs chosen deliberately for their winter interest - hazels and alders for their catkins, witchhazels and winter honeysuckle for flowers.




Despite an overnight frost still lingering in the shade, the walled gardens are generally warm and the palm trees looked to be doing okay with wallflowers beneath them just showing their first flowers.

guarding the leeks

The vegetable garden was mainly resting for winter but the scarecrows were making sure birds stayed away from the winter crops.

while snowdrops were flowering in front of the main greenhouse.

Passing out of the walled garden there's a wonderful view over Staunton Harold reservoir - looking bright but chilly in the distance.

And heading back through the wood I found snowdrops. In a week or two a huge swathe of woodland floor will be covered in flowers but for now there's just a few peeping through the leaf cover here and there.

They're always a welcome sign that winter is drawing to an end.

Sunshine at Swan Lake

We've had a good run of bright sunny days recently so headed off out to make the most of them.

























A bit of a cold over Christmas had left me without energy, so Swan Lake which is only a short walk seemed like a good place to go. There are always lots of geese, ducks and swans to be seen - all very noisily scrambling for food.

There may have been sun, but it was still cold in the shade, and this pond, one of the smaller ones with no birds at the moment, was still frozen after lunch.

 When we last visited on Boxing Day the weather was grey and the paths muddy. This weekend was lovely with blue sky reflected in the water and Spring feeling just around the corner

Winter cheer

After the bustle and excitement of Christmas, January is always a bit 'flat'. Normally I head off to the sales on the search for treats, but this year I've resisted. Instead I'm cheering the month up with indoor flowers.
















I have several cyclamen plants acquired over the years, and they're all in flower right now in various shades of pink, so I've massed them together for greatest impact, and turned my living room windowsill into an indoor garden.







Elsewhere, I've filled vases with greenery and winter jasmine from the garden, and added some (really cheap) supermarket daffodils for extra yellow brightness.














As they started to fade, I went out with the intention of buying more - but came across a pot of mini tete-a-tete daffs. Still only a couple of pounds, they'll flower this year, hopefully next, and maybe longer. The day after, I found last year's bulbs out in the garden, still in their pot and staring to grow - they're now 'warming up' in the cool porch, and will be ready to come inside when this year's plants have finished flowering. Hopefully one way or another I can keep up a constant display of seasonal, but early, flowers until spring arrives properly.





Meanwhile, the sun has been shining, so I've been out and about - to Shipley and Calke - and found snowdrops in flower. Maybe winter won't be around for much longer ...

Searching for Spring at Shipley

  One of my New Year resolutions is to get outside more, so I'm making an attempt to get out walking at least once a week, and this time's destination was Shipley Country Park.

After a slightly overcast start, the sky had cleared to glorious blue by the time we went out.













Although there are no flowers yet in my garden, I hoped I might find some snowdrops as they frequently flower earlier there than at home - it was more like wishful thinking really, and I was surprised to find some actually in flower.












It's a sure sign that Spring is somewhere on the way.

Carrying on, I found more flowers. Blossom this time - on a prunus of some sort (possibly almond or early cherry)

and a viburnum - both a wonderfully cheering sight.














I'm hoping now for a gracious glide into Spring, with more of these blue sky days, without any of the late February snow that the weather seems so fond of.

Somewhere new for the new year - St Chad's Water, Church Wilne

One of my resolutions this year is to get out and about more, so on Wednesday with dry weather forecast we headed out to somewhere new. There's no longer a village at Church Wilne - just a twisting narrow country lane leading to the old church of St Chad, and, on the opposite side of the road, a small lake called St Chad's Water, which is a nature reserve with car park and a path around the water.






We seem to have walked round every park and nature reserve within a short drive, so I was delighted to stumble across somewhere new (through the not-necessarily-reliable method of zooming around on Google maps satellite view)







It's a larger body of water than Swan Lake which we frequently visit, but with less birds - maybe because there are less visitors feeding them. We definitely spotted moorhens, mallards, black-headed gulls, and half a dozen swans, and possibly a heron.

Despite warnings about damage to the path from recent floods, the footing was good and dry, and there are several seats on the way round - it wasn't really the weather to entice me to sit a while though - maybe I'll be back in summer.