Sunday 26.07.2015

A cool afternoon - no - let`s face it, a cold afternoon with a no-nonsense wind setting the metal gates to their slightly eerie wailing as we walked up the road. Once in the woods the percussive accompaniment continued, the trees buffeted by the wind sounding, as they always do in these conditions, like a very rough sea.

On the ground though we were sheltered and able to hear the birds - the cry of a Buzzard, the "little-bit-of-bread-and-no-cheese" of a Yellowhammer and the insistent two note refrain of a Great Tit. And the grasses are at their very best just now - just glad I don`t suffer from hay fever so can really appreciate them!

But it was the butterflies that made the walk a little special in the end. The sun appeared briefly as we turned for home and suddenly there were dozens of beautiful chocolate brown butterflies flitting round our ankles. Fairly sure they were Ringlets, even though the guide says they`re absent from the north of Scotland. Not this afternoon they weren`t. :)




Back out of the woods and down the road the gates were still wailing in the cold but the sky was bluer and it had at least stayed dry......small mercies. :)