Saturday 4th June 2016

Good morning. And it is because it is the weekend. And the weekend means no work, at least for a day or two. And lazing around. And orchids. And shopping.

So it will come as no surprise that I did some of each all day long, as I know how to roll.

It would be tempting to laze around the house all day, I mean I could do that with my eyes shut. Well, not shut, but you know what I mean. Photos, blogs, music and cooking, I could make all those hours vanish. But, there has to be a plan. And we need food, so it seems I will be going to Tesco for a few things, which escalates into a sixty quid shop, but we have all for the week, and I am home by eight in the morning.

On a sour note, it was foggy early on Saturday morning, which in itself is not a problem, but the number of idiots out there who drove with no lights on is mind-boggling, but I did home safe, which is the important thing, really.

We have breakfast then comes the waiting. Waiting for the weather to clear so the sun can come out and I can snap me some orchids. In the end I waiting until ten, and decide that maybe inland, the skies and mist would clear quicker. I hoped so.

My plan was to seek for the smallest of UK orchids, the Musk, and the only place I know where I can find them is PGD.

With being away through two weeks of the season, I haven't been to many of the main sites as often as I usually would, but if nothing else, seeing the Monkeys is worth the trip alone, if there were no other orchids on the site. But, of course, there is so much more there.

I have the site to myself, which is always nice. So I walk to the second paddock, and at first it seems there is little orchid action going on, other than the last of the Early Purples hanging on further up the chalk bank. But in time there are plenty of Monkey to be seen, probably just about at their peak now, so peppered over the paddock are many small Monkey smaller than I remember from my first couple of visits, but good to see that they seem to be doing so well here, as opposed to to the original site in Faversham where the single digit figures I saw this year don't seem to suggest a viable population. But we shall see.

I push on to the next paddock to begin the careful examination of the ground where the Musk grow; it is a huge site, but the Musk grown in an area of about 5 metre squared, and are tiny at first. I look and look, but see no sign. I feel better that my friend Mark also went here to look and he came up blank too. So not just my eyes then.

Further up I look for the Greater Butterfly, eventually finding one, but not yet quite open. The Flys are fading fast in the open conditions, and the single Lady has lost her glower and the spike is fading. The Chalk Fragrants won't be long, and the CSO are beginning to open. It is a wonderful site, and changes week by week. Will go back soon. I meet a couple who are orchid novices, so show the the Fly and GBO, they seem happy, but I do warn them of the obsession with orchids.

I drive to Wye travelling across country down country lanes, barely wide enough for one car to pass along, so when I meet another car it is an adventure for us to find a passing place. But I do get to Wye safe and sound, take the low road at the bottom of the down until I come to the place by the five bar gate, wherre there is another car already there, and as I climb the style, a woman holding a baby is checking who it is, as her husband (I guess) is hunched over a camera on a trip snapping the Late Spiders.

The Late Spider is, of course, one of the rarest UK plants, and is found just around here in East Kent, so people come from all over the country just to see them. This family had come down from Cardiff, and in time quiz me for locations where to go next, but there are so many places in Kent that they are spoiled for choice, so I leave them with more macro snapping going on.

The sunshine that had been forecasted had not come, so was still cloudy, but bright enough to get decent photographs, but I thought I would leave it until Sunday, as that was going to be a better day. Apparently.

I drive home on the M20 and up the Alkham Valley, where now it is summer there is no sign that the Dellingore ever flowed, there are fields full if fast growing crops, but no poppies, more's the pity. Anyway, it was half one, and I was hungry and it was well past lunch time.

A few weeks ago, Mum quized me about how to bake Camembert, which got me thinking, so that is what we had for lunch, runny stinky cheese spread on fresh crusty bread and a bottle of summer ale to wash it down with. Perfect.

THat done, Jools went into town for a barnet mangle, and I stayed home to do whatever I filled the afternoon with, mainly writing, editing and listening to the radio.

I cook steak for dinner, and try my hand at making onion rings, which whilst not perfect, were OK, and went well with the steak and shop bought chips. We had a bottle of Prosecco too, which meant that when we wanted to travel to the Rack of Ale for their 60s night, we had to call a taxi.

It might not have escaped your attention that we don't go to discos or clubs now, it seems our days for disco dancing are behind us. But, a night out, drinking real ale and listening to some 60s tunes seemed like a great idea. So, we spent a couple of hours in the bar, making beer and cider disappear, whilst in the back room, the band threw up some Cream and Kinks tunes, not a bad night.

But, at ten when the taxi came to collect us, we were well past our bed time, and we were both sleepy heads. We did sit in the garden for a while, looking at the stars twinkling high above us, and the flashing lights of passing jetliners.