Day 5:Tuesday 7th July 2015

Tuesday.

A day of relaxing.

I took a long time to drop off last night, as I was aware of the new surroundings, the wind in the thatch above our heads. We opened the side window wide, so heard the sounds of the countryside all night, including the steady rain before midnight.

All the above might explain why I did not wake until twenty to eight, and Jools an hour later. But we did feel so much more relaxed.

The first item on the ‘to do’ list was to set up the dongle I bought, so we could at least look at the weather reports while we were here. It operates over the 3G mobile phone signal, but is painfully slow: about ten minutes per page, and larger WebPages like Flickr or Facebook were out. But, we got the weather report for the week; Thursday looks best. And so that is the day we will try to land on the Farne Islands. Again.

Some research shows that Inner Farne is a safer bet, so we are booked on the afternoon sailing from Seahouses. More of that later in the week.

We drove to Hexham again, this time to get an OS map of the area, and to get some waterproof coats, or summer ones, as it is something we have not had in a couple of years, or 5 years in my case, since I left it in a real tent beside some preserved railway. Silly me.

Tuesday seems to be market day in Hexham, and finding a parking space was difficult, but we got one in the end, and at least parking in the town is now free, I am sure this will encourage more visitors; if only Dover would learn....

Up the hill again, and we find an outdoor clothing shop: they have the coats, at half price: we buy one each and will nearly match!

A quick walk to WH Smiths gets us the landranger map for £10, seems everything is expensive now. Anyway, we have a map, showing the paths and byways around the cottage. Just need some decent weather now.

A few miles down the road is a farm shop we have been to before, so we drive through a sharp shower to it and have lunch: just a roll each, but is good. We also buy more food to have, including two punnets of fresh gooseberries which will be made into a crumble tonight.

With the weather looking increasingly unsettled, we drive back to Bardon Mill, as it was time for the second orchid hunt: this time the Tyne Helleborine. Another rare orchid, but we know the site, we just need to find the orchids. And being two weeks or more later than last year, I had high hopes of finding them.

We park in the village, walk to the footcrossing over the railway, just in time to see two trains pass, neither of which I photographed! I must be slipping.

Over the footbridge across the river and onto the riverside path to the nature reserve. I am sure that if there had been helleborines growing we would have seen them, which will tell you right away that we did manager to draw another blank on the orchid front. Once back home I checked the book and it said that usually the inland varieties are a week or two behind the coastal: which meant we were too early once again. Bugger.

It was a long walk back to the car, disappointed at another failure. But as I said, if they were there, we would have seen them. And anyway, in a dry year there might be no spikes. Saying that I have no idea if it was a dry or wet year up here. Just that the season is later than last year.

All the best laid plans of mice and Jelltex then, ones supposes.

Back in the cottage, we, or I, console ourselves with dark chocolate covered ginger thins; a type of biscuit which is a prince amongst its peers in the biscuit and savoury snacking aisle.

I tried to get the laptop to get online again, and on occasion, a page loaded in less than two minutes, which was just too painful to check anything else other than the weather for tomorrow. And tomorrow, we are going to Newcastle to see the new castle, which is quite old I believe, something like 800 or so years, so I will be contacting the trade description people as soon as I am back home.

Meanwhile at Wimbledon, some people have won, whilst other lost, whilst lots of people paid lots of money to eat a strawberry and some cream. In truth, tennis on the radio is just ahead of Formula 1 in being dull, so I did not concentrate too much as to who won. Or lost. But it was somebody. And they were quite happy. Or those that won were.

Dinner was chicken Kiev and salad. And beer. Or cider. Which was very nice indeed. Now for a round of cribbage or two. We know how to live.

Ten years today, I was preparing for a holiday of a lifetime, nine weeks in the US, doing stuff, driving, taking photos and the like, when two days before my flight, news began to filter through of the terrorist attacks in London which claimed over 50 lives. I lost my appetite for adventure, and almost did not go, but decided at the last minute to travel. I have no earth-shattering thoughts on that, how it could be better or worse. Just that on days like that, we are numb, numb from the stupidity and waste of life it caused.