Satisfaction

Waking up at 04.00 this morning and looking out of the window to see it still dark was a bit of a jolt in the arm. Just six weeks ago I could do the same at 03.00 and see the first glimmers of light to the east, summer is slipping away and autumn is nearly apon us!
In my world there is nothing comparable with the height of an English summer and going to bed at gone 10.00 at night with it still part light and five hours later its getting light again. Oh joy, if only we could live forever the daylight hours of May, June and July, who needs the darkness of winter that last fourteen hours from 4.30 in the afternoon!

Eventually, after getting up to a chilly but clear 05.30 in the morning and fetching the paper from the papershop and reading it with breakfast, I was on the reserve by 07.30. There, the rain of yesterday was invisible and the day was quickly turning sunny and very warm and humid and not really as forecast thankfully. Midge and I walked from one end of the flat marsh to the other and surveyed new rills, re-dug scrapes and a freshly-flattened unnecesary bund in front of the Seawall Hide and it all looked great, at last its becoming a nature reserve again, and not only that, the work is on-going!

So, no list of birds seen, or butterflies fluttering, or paths re-walked for the umpteenth time - just a gentle appreciation of a reserve being re-awakened and I'll leave you with the distant sight of two Sailing Barges making their way down The Swale - happy days and a photo that could be a hundred years old.