Local Birding & Lunch With Lucy!

I havn't spent any time with Lucy for ages and although I have invited her out several times in my holiday, she declined until today! We had a lovely day out, which involved not doing very much at all to be honest. Its a very long story, but Lucy doesn't/can't walk very far, so you have to organise a fun day out without any long walks!

Flew to the chemist to pick up a prescription, then to Argos to buy a very smart, but cheap new fold-up picnic table for my car – I don't know why I havn't purchased one before, so useful and much easier than trying to balance your coffee on the edge of the boot of the car, when you're sitting in your deckchair! Picked Lucy up at 9.30am as arranged and then headed to Holme Reserves.

Another stunning day! We parked up on the NOA car park and briefly stopped at NWT, to see some of the moths that Gary H. was studying with others, from their catch in the moth trap last night. Gary had also seen a Black Redstart by the Natterjack pond earlier this morning! We then paid our respects to where our parent's are at rest and then made our way to the observatory. We had timed it just right, as Sophie had just caught a colour-ringed Stonechat in one of the mist nets – Lucy enjoyed watching Sophie taking the usual measurements and weight etc, before the Stonechat was swiftly released. We sat outside the observatory on the seat where our father also used to sit and enjoyed the glorious sunshine. It was almost too hot to sit here – it has always been a suntrap in front of the observatory. Father loved the heat so much, far more than me – he would sit here and bake – he was at his happiest wearing his denim shorts in a heatwave!

We headed around the back of the observatory, along the path through the pine trees, past father's planted yew tree, which is huge now and onto the beach opposite the NWT access path. Lucy loved being on the beach and the tide was coming in, although it wasn't particularly high today. Surprisingly there were not too many people on the beach, which was nice. We walked back via the Firs house and to the NOA car park. As we left, we kept a sharp eye out for the Black Redstart, but no luck with that. Several Meadow Pipits were on the seaward side of the road. Lucy and I saw several Brimstones on our travels today and also a couple of Peacock Butterflies.

We then went to The Lifeboat Inn at Thornham and sat in their wonderful garden with smart picnic tables, adjacent to their large conservatory. We ordered the same amazing Superfood Salad that I had on the 13th February (link to see picture) along with chips and a dessert, washed down with a ginger beer – scrumptious! Lucy really enjoyed her lunch and where we sat was beautiful. With the red tiled roof and white buildings around the Inn, it felt almost Mediterranean and I imagined a bee-eater flying overhead in the cloudless blue skies! What a thought!

We then went to the family home at Holme to check everything was ok. Lucy had not been here for many, many weeks, but she seemed to cope with being there ok. We only looked in the house quickly and spent more time looking at all the new flowers springing up in the garden. The big potted wallflowers and some yellow daisy things, were all tinder bone dry and I gave them a good water from the water butt by the greenhouse, but this water is not exactly in a very good state. I think I will have to turn the water back on again now. I had turned it all off at the stopcock in case there were any frosts over winter and didn't want the pipes to burst in the house, but it would be nice to keep the bird drinking ponds topped up and plants watered until the house is sold. Today would have been our parent's wedding anniversary 💕😢

We visited Titchwell RSPB, but Lucy didn't want to walk anywhere – oh dear! The first thing I did was buy a new bird bath – mine at home is leaking. I have a wonderful heavy concrete one, but also have one of those plastic Gardman ones like this, but the plastic has split in the base of the saucer. So I purchased a bigger and much sturdier version from the RSPB shop, which looks like it will last far longer – they come in green or bronze, I bought the green one. Anyway, we parked up properly in the car park and then sat in the coach parking area with our deckchairs and table and sat drinking coffee whilst birding! Lucy doesn't have any binoculars, she borrows my spare Optricon Traveller ED's when she is out with me (they are excellent bins and extremely lightweight). This was the best part of the day in my opinion. We watched Common Buzzards sailing overhead, Chaffinches, Hedge Sparrows, Great Tits, Goldfinches, Chiffchaffs, Robins, Med Gulls and then heard the first Blackcap of the Spring singing!

Eventually, I persuaded Lucy to go on a 'short' walk around the Fen Trail. We bumped into Tony who had seen 6 Swallows! I havn't seen any Swallows yet this Spring. Lucy was very disappointed to find there were no toads or frogs to see in the Fen Trail pool – there were loads when I last visited. When we came out onto the main path, we made it as far as the first seat, but Lucy refused to walk any further, said she was tired, hungry and wanted to go home, so that was it! We returned to the car park. Blackcap singing again as we left.

Parked up at Choseley Barns to have our tea, which was a veggie sausage and fried egg roll each with more coffee. We watched several vivid male and female Yellowhammers, along with Goldfinches, Hedge Sparrows and a Blue Tit coming down to drink and bathe at the only puddle by the verge. We drove home via Docking, Bircham, Flitcham and Hillington and was very pleased to see that there were no queues of traffic at all or at the Knight's Hill Roundabout! Dropped Lucy home and managed to get back to my house in just enough daylight to put the new bird bath up ready for the morning!

Turned all my lights out for EARTH HOUR at 8.30pm. Don't forget the clocks go forward tonight. Lighter evenings commence tomorrow – YES! Its 10.50pm right now, which means you need to change your clocks to 11.50am! Good Night!