May 2023 – Page 3 – where the journey takes me 2

Most of the packing has been put away now until next time and just the washing remains. Being in the garden most of the time at the cottage means a heap of very dirty gardening clothes but as usual I always start with the bedding and towels so I can get them ironed and repacked ready for our next visit.

Yesterday we went to the supermarket to gather up the groceries for the week and a few extra to cover the bank holiday and hopefully beyond. The increasing prices have become the normality now so I try to stretch the food out as long as I can though I much prefer to do the shopping on the same day if possible but no amount of careful planning can stretch it out to a fortnight as we would run out of fresh fruit and veg. Whilst in town I aslo picked up a length of Coronation bunting to put in the garden. It was hard to find – I tried all the most likely shops (B&M, Wilkos, The Works) to no avail and was on the point of giving up when I discovered The Party Shop in the precinct, but why they are still making bunting in plastic I don’t know, it goes against the grain but I bought it anyway; why couldn’t the manufacturers print it on a cheap cotton that would at least be biodegradable.

Added onto the grocery bill I bought some new insoles for my gardening boots (£4) to make them last a little longer as the soles are wearing quite thin now and really need replacing but new boots would cost me about £35-£40 (I buy yard boots which are actually used for mucking out but are more flexible than wellies). I do find them both comfortable and quite tough – they are waterproof too and fleecy lined so are nice and warm in the winter and they cover my ankles and provide extra support.

My menu plan is still mostly made up of winter meals and I really need to introduce some more summery meals as the weather begins to warms up – but this isn’t the week for that task. I have planned some fairly easy meals for this week as I need to spend time in the garden here at home – we left it two weeks ago just waking up and now everything is shouting for attention – flowers to be staked, pots to be refreshed and a lot of feeding required.

The back garden is starting to look better than the front though there is little colour in the back garden this year as I didn’t get to plant the tubs of tulips. The front garden has all the colour as the tulips I planted for last Spring thankfully came back again this year but other than a bit of weeding and digging out a frosted and very dead Hebe I haven’t done much work on the front as I have changes in mind and this will take time and better weather – I hear from DH (my weather man) that rain is imminent.

I did manage to clean out the greenhouse on Tuesday and before the week is out I need to get those seeds going if I am to have any flowers at all this year. I bought three outdoor bush tomato plants in Scotland (they are always cheaper up there) and before we went away I did get the seed potatoes planted – the ones in the tub are already making an appearance. I never sow the courgettes too early anyway as they need plenty of warmth and the selection of salad vegetables I usually sow straight into the outdoor beds.

But today the worst of all days in my mind – a trip to the dentist this morning. I knew before the check up that there is dental work to be done as I have a broken tooth and I have 3 options to put it right so I have been given a little time to think about it and decide which course of action I want to take. I was uneasy about going as the previous dentist who I knew for a long time and I trusted implicitly retired during the pandemic and I didn’t seem to quite gel with the person I saw last year that had taken over who is slowly switching over to mainly private patients (I am still NHS) but today my appointment was with someone else in the practice as it has expanded and I felt far more at ease with this guy and in fact one of the options is to do nothing at the moment as the broken tooth is not painful or inflamed and he wasn’t suggesting I had to have expensive work done so that must be a good sign.

As it happens our electric Oral B toothbrush has just stopped working – we hadn’t dropped it or anything but it just will not charge or show any signs of life and we have had to resort to the old manual toothbrushes until we research a replacement. Luckily the dentist said I am doing a good job of cleaning my teeth and not having an electric one is not having a detrimental effect but they do not feel as clean to me.

Well better go and get these seeds started. x

Our time at the cottage came to an end, as it inevitably does, all too soon with many gardening tasks left unfinished or not even started but we just have to accept we do what we can in the time available.

Of course in hindsight travelling home on a Bank Holiday Monday was not the best of ideas but one borne out of the fact that our half way overnight stop in Carlisle at the Premier Inn was so much cheaper on the Sunday night.

It was exceptionally busy, both in the hotel and on the roads.

Once I am orientated towards home I suddenly get a longing to be back and reacquainted with all my own things, especially my bed, so we didn’t have a leisurely trip down this time. We left Carlisle at about 10am and as we neared the top of the Lakes the traffic had increased considerably but no queues had formed and we seemed to keep rolling. Our main stop was when we pulled off the M6 at junction 36 (Crooklands Interchange) and headed for Burton in Kendal, hoping to find a cafe for a drink.

A very interesting village with some grand architecture which I thought had quite a French influence in style.

Some interesting street names too.

Sadly, the little village only has a shop with a coffee machine and no tea, the Kings Arms is presently closed for a refurb and the main road through was like a race track and parking non-existent for visitors……I took a few pictures on a quick walk around – it is a long drawn out village and halfway along we decided to cut the exploration short and never made it as far as the church as the noise level of the through traffic drove us back to the car and we moved on ending up at the notorious Lancaster motorway services with a hundred other fellow travellers lunching at Costa. The queue for service was long and the vegetarian selection limited but luckily we managed to grab the very last two mushroom, egg and spinach baps to tide us over – but again with all the noise and grubby tables we didn’t stay long.

Once we arrived home and unpacked I realised how exhausted I was but a quick walk to our village was necessary to pick up some fresh milk and rolls. We came across the end of the village Scarecrow Trail and stopped here and there to admire the ‘Royal’ scarecrows.

The ‘quick walk’ took much longer than we thought and once back home again I prepared a nourishing lentil and leek stew for tea and then relaxed in front of the TV for a while….promptly falling asleep while the tea cooked itself on the hob.

I promised pictures of the cottage garden. As we left many plants had grown over the fortnight we had stayed there and were just about to bloom. The ferns had grown so much in height unfurling as they go.

I was surprised at how many primulas had sneaked up around the pond as I thought we had lost a lot under the heavy leaf fall from the sycamore it lies beneath – they might be a spectacular sight that we will miss by our next visit.

Looking down from the lane it all looks under control but believe me in a garden like this with the wild flowers like red campion and blue alkanet poised and ready to invade nothing is under my control….we only manage it.

This is the view from below looking up toward the lane – doesn’t look so good now from this view does it!!

DH has still to finish the staging – but it was never going to be this visit and I had to content myself by removing as many of the overgrown wild planting of campion, buttercups, alkanet, some extremely viscious nettles and the straggling goosegrass, as I could – uncovering the few actual plants that had not been nudged out or given up. It was a place I didn’t get to weed last year and the results are always the same – the invaders move in swiftly.

These old terracotta drainage pipes I use for herbs. I had to clear them of the old ones as they had become huge and woody. The rosemary had reached 5 feet with a four foot root and had lost the will to live – probably through exhaustion a couple of years ago and no amount of pruning back encouraged it back to its former state. It is a sheltered and sunny and spot by the conservatory and the open ended drainage pipes act as a deep rooted bed and the soil here is very fertile so I will set some herb seeds at home and plant fresh ones again this year.

The solomon’s seal is one of my favourite plants in the lower wood and they continue to spread and march along quietly interspersed now with the bluebells – well, unfortunately they are the Spanish variety set by the previous owner and there is no hope of ever getting rid of them to replant with the English variety so I just have to tolerate them – but they look equally as beautiful at this time of year covering the wood floor.

I left a little patriotic contribution to the Coronation celebrations next week.

The dicentras are spreading nicely again and the white have now merged with the pink.

The cherry tree keeps going – it needs attention too but we keep thinking it will not survive much longer – it must be getting on for 50 years old, has some form of hard fungus at the bottom of the trunk and has had to undergo some rather extreme pruning in its time but it merrily carries on flowering each year although the striking pink candyfloss that looms up over the weeping larch is not as abundant as it once was.

The tale of our latest confrontations with the new site owner will be told another day. As always it tainted our visit somewhat – my head says to leave but my heart is still drawn to our little tumble down cottage with its wild garden looking out over the sea.