We Visit Forde Abbey Again ...

Hello there! Many, many "Thanks" for your as always lovely comments on my previous posting. Your comments are truly appreciated!

Friday night saw us driving down the A303 to our bolt-hole in Devon. When we awoke on Saturday morning, the weather didn't look too clever, we thought it was going to rain.

We headed out for Forde Abbey, near Chard in Somerset - it is one of our favourite destinations and if it was going to rain we could always shelter in the cafe!

Despite the promise of rain we all went out in our summer shoes and boy did they get wet, as we walked around the grounds of Forde Abbey - it had rained overnight. However, we were fortunate in that it did not rain whilst we were there and even the sun shone through eventually!

There were many sweet peas.

I loved these two-tone ones. The smell was divine.

George has not been immortalised in stone - perish the thought! It's one of two stone pillars at the entrance to the Abbey grounds from the vegetable garden.

We saw many butterflies - and this Peacock Butterfly posed nicely on a dahlia.

I loved the shape and colour of this flower.

Some trees had berries!

We came across a scantily clad lady!

We walked up to the lake. We had come prepared with some bread to feed the ducks and swans.

There is only one family of swans here - here are mum and dad.

The rest of the family.

We commented on how the cygnets had grown since we first saw them some weeks ago.

The swans were very cheeky and were right at the waters edge, pestering us to give them more food.

We had taken the dogs with us. They didn't seem to be at all perturbed. Charlie tried to amble towards them, on his lead a few times but, a few hisses and he was the one that back-tracked! He's a bit of a wuss!

We saw many damsel flies close to the waters edge but this was the only one that remained still long enough for me to get a photo. The others were far too busy flitting here and there.

We came across another butterfly - this Meadow Brown in the Bog Garden.

But to me the most exciting thing was seeing this dragonfly - who posed for about five minutes.

And of course, the mad camera woman was delighted and snapped away!

Another photo of that dragonfly!

One of KP's friends had come to stay with us over the weekend. Here they are posing with George!

George has now learnt to sit, lie down, roll over and give us his paw on command.

Vibrant coloured flowers.

We saw the Forde Abbey cat who was in a fairly violent mood. It scratched KP and bit her friend!

And attacked my camera strap!

This Peacock Butterfly like playing hide and seek. It would open its wings to show off its dramatic colours and then as quickly close them so as to deprive us, before once again opening its wings again allowing us the privilege to admire its beauty.

I'm shy! I don't want to show off my fabulous wings!

Oh, go on then, if it will make you go away!

More sweet peas.

A door - stating the obvious!

                                                                Another Peacock!

I think this is a Large White!

We had our lunch at the cafe in the Abbey, sat outside with the sparrows vying for some titbits - and the girls obliged giving them some of the left over crumbs from the bread that had been fed to the ducks and swans.

On the way home we stopped off at a Children's Play Area and were amazed that we had the place to ourselves. The girls loved the swings which had been padlocked together!

After arriving home, the Monopoly came out. I was fascinated to see that KP just had her money all in a heap - similar to her bedroom if I didn't insist on it being tidied every day and her friend had all her money in tidy bundles!

Whilst the Monopoly was being played I ventured out to the back garden which I had tidied up only a few weeks ago to see that it was once again overgrown. I did a bit of tidying before spotting this butterfly on the buddleia - I wondered if it was one of the ones from Forde Abey that had followed us home!

And in the evening we went to the Chinese in Chard where the girls had much fun using the spring onions as moustaches.

Before enjoying some ice-cream.

A very busy and fun packed day!

The following day we enjoyed a picnic before making a move to Lyme Regis.

More on that in a later posting.

Until next time,

June.

P.S. Annie of  knitsofacto asked on a few posts ago what camera I use. It is a Nikon D5000 - a very battered and bruised camera. I honestly don't know how it still take photos - I have dropped it on hard surfaces too many times to recall.

I would like to buy a little point and shoot as my camera is sometimes too cumbersome to carry around.

Does anyone have an opinion on what to go for or what to avoid?