Hopwas wood

What a glorious wood is the Hopwas wood. Mentioned in the Domesday Book (did you know you can check out the Domesday Book online?!) so some of it is ancient woodland. At the moment there's a starry firmament of wood anemones throughout and you can see there will soon be a vast carpet of bluebells.

I met a lovely old man who walked my legs off for miles along towpath, through the woods, around the village and back. He told me how a large part of the woods had been bought by Nash Rocks and was currently under threat from quarrying. That figures. Show me a stunningly beautiful place and home to miriad wildlife and I'll show you the corporate bastard waiting to fuck things up.

Then I met a guy on a boat who carves mushrooms and benches and planters from trees. His boat is covered in giant mushrooms! I don't know whether he cuts em down just for that purpose. I couldn't bear to know the answer to that particular question, but I did go back and help myself to the large amounts of sawdust for my compost loo and discarded bark as firelighters.

With the rain, came the ducks. One duck was very brave and tame and came to beg at the window. Then she leapt up onto the roof and I took this picture by sticking my camera out the window. A second later and she pecked it but I didn't manage to capture that!