Lazyish Weekend

 Having had my 2nd Jab on Thursday, I was feeling a bit strange on Saturday so decided to spend the day sitting around doing nothing, so not much change from normal I suppose!! Stayed on the sofa for the most part and watched the Champions League Final, good performance from Chelsea, a well deserved win and a quite entertaining game, be Leeds in a couple of years time obvs, MOT! I did however make some Organic American style Pancakes for Breakfast and rustled up a nice Organic Fruitcake as well, so not a totally wasted day!! Cake has Black Treacle and Dark Muscovado sugar so is quite tasty!!

Quite a thick batter for the Pancakes

A few Blueberries added during cooking for health reasons😀

Quite a lot of organic Maple Syrup added also for health reasons

The Fruit Cake

Nice and dark very tasty!!

So having rested up Saturday, we decided to visit somewhere different on Sunday, you would think with all the rest and an earlyish night we would be up nice and early? Nope!! It was gone nine when we arrived at the Mens Nature Reserve, near Petworth. On the plus side the small car park was empty, kitted up we headed into the woods! Was a very nice, calming, relaxing walk mainly cos we didn't see anything!! The trees are impressive very large what I think are Beech but with so many leaves visibility was at a premium which was a shame as there was plenty singing.

Sunshine through the leaves

Sun shining through the canopy

I heard 7 Great Spotted Woodpeckers calling before I saw one. Plenty of Crests calling and I had good views of a Goldcrest but couldn't get the camera on it, lots of Robins, Blackbirds, Song Thrushes and Dunnocks heard, a few glimpses of Blue and Great tits but it was quite hard work, a family of Long-tailed Tits came by and one of the young-uns posed ok and a Grey Wagtail was on a shed roof randomly! Quite a few flowers in the wood as well although I think the Bluebells were mostly the Spanish variety.

What I think are Spanish Bluebells

Grey Wagtail

This Dunnocks upright stance had me thinking Spot Fly til I got the Bins on it!!!

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Young and rather cute Long-tailed Tit

Long-tailed Tit

We at this point we got well lost, despite What3words, Google Maps and my Footpath App!!! Margie's famous sense of direction kicked in, which made things worse😂and I, despite my legendary tolerance and patience found myself getting a tad shirty (I blame the jab)😡😈😱!! However after much turning of phones up the wrong way, accosting of strangers and general wandering about we came to the road, turns out we was both right and a combination of a ripped out footpath sign and the path not following the road had foxed us!! As we headed up the road towards the car park  Margie spotted a couple of Buzzards, one of which gave us a low flyby probably thinking in our exhausted state they could be in for a large dinner!😱😰!

Common Buzzard

Bit further away!!

We arrived back at the car park, several more cars here now, as we was divesting our equipment, I heard a Firecrest singing, after much scanning of Holly Bushes Margie finally spotted it and it eventually posed ok, although trying to get pics was a mare with the light, shade, leaves and twigs which my camera prefers to focus on, anything but the poxy bird!!! However due to mighty perseverance I managed a few pics I was quite pleased with!

For once it didn't focus on the leaf!

Possibly my favourite shot of it!!

Singing

Talk about the bird that saved the day!!!

We then decided, despite our exhaustion, to pay a visit to Ebernoe Common a nature reserve we hadn't been to before and one that wasn't that far away, We arrived after a journey without incident and set of around the reserve, we bumped into a guy who was looking for Birds Nest Orchids, so decided to see if we could find some, long story short we couldn't although we did find an Orchid but not sure what sort it is, wasn't quite out yet anyway

Orchid Sp by Margie

It seems a very nice place some beautiful Meadows covered in Buttercups, unsurprisingly few birds at Midday in the blazing sun, we didn't stay long as we was knackered but definitely a place to revisit in the future, a few more of Margie's pics below

So a nice trip out, Firecrest are always good, as is a walk in  spring woodland, no good for photography but good for the soul!!