First day back at school for many, but for us oldies living the quiet life continues; so a trip to Somerset is in order, it is virtual, you understand that, don't you!

Liz and myself, when able, attend the New Wine conference each year, where until recently it was held in the Showground in Sheptom Mallet. For the last five or so years we stayed in a superb barn conversion in a little village called Crosscombe, which was situated in a steep sided and deep valley, not far from Wells.The village has a history stretching back as long as we Brits have been in this lovely land; many of the buildings seem to be from this earlier period as well.  Whenever we went out of our lovely barn, we passed this charming, if rather dilapidated farm building. There is something about dilapidated, run down country side building which I find rather attractive; colors are faded, paint is chipped and scratched, plaster is falling off and they look rather splendid. Hope you like it. 

Today we had a walk at Hatchlands and saw what looked very much like a Goshawk. Size and colour were right and location was correct as well; it was in deciduous woodland, but it was very close to nearby coniferous woods. We saw it in deep woodland and this bird flew straight through the branches of this mass of dense foliage, straight onto to something, which I just could not see and then flew straight off again, it was all very quick, only a few seconds, amazingly quick. At first it seemed to be a sparrowhawk, but it was to big, so maybe I am right. But what a sighting, I have never seen one before. That was quite something.

Oh well Liz and myself have a date night tonight. that means that as far as possible, there will be no phone calls, nor any other interruptions, just each other; now that will be lovely.

See you soon.