Birthday walk

It was my birthday last week and we celebrated at the weekend.  I'd originally asked some of my relatives if they would like to come over in the evening and go for a Thai meal but they weren't able to.  So we hadn't really got anything planned.  The only plan was that CBC had to go for an eye test at the opticians in Maldon.

We couldn't remember if it was a 10.30am or an 11.30am appointment so we frantically had to drive over there for 10.30 just in case. It turned out the appointment was 11.30 so we decided to go for breakfast in the best cafe in Maldon, Mrs Salisbury's!  

I ordered a small breakfast (CBC had the Veggie breakfast) . It was delicious! I chose a Hot chocolate to accompany which was also delicious.

The building is such a lovely historic one. I took a picture in one of their bathrooms/toilets for you!

Velvet curtains, a massive mirror, there's a shower behind the curtain!

Here's a photo of the loo chandelier!

Whilst CBC went to his optician's appointment, I had a look round the charity shops and a couple of other shops.

I loved this man's shirt. It was made of beautiful materials but CBC was not impressed- pity!

I ended up buying myself a Seasalt Cornwall turtle neck in the charity shop as I wear the one I have already all the time. I also bought a lovely Boden stripy linen top.

We went into Coe's, an independent Gentleman's shop and I loved this tie display full of Liberty ties!

Once we met up again, I asked CBC if we could go for a walk. Despite the fact, he was wearing light-coloured trousers, as it was my birthday celebration day, he agreed.

We parked by the Cricketers pub in Danbury and walked through  and around Danbury Common.

I felt instantly refreshed and invigorated after only 5 minutes. The power of walking in nature, surrounded by trees!

I enjoyed seeing the moss growing here. Or is it Lichen?

CBC looked for newts in the pond. 

We found a Hellebore growing.

I spy a Ladybird!

We found this curious growth coming out of a tree. We wondered if it was Mistletoe?

I very much enjoyed the open skies and lack of people.

I was photographing fungi (another post to come!) 

and then CBC did his usual vanishing act!  I asked a dog walker if he had seen him and he hadn't.

All of a sudden, I heard him calling me in a creepy goblin voice.

Do you see him?

What a joy to see signs of Spring!

Both CBC and I were enamoured by this glorious tree with its three trunks.

Finally, I have seen some Snowdrops!

As we neared the car, I saw these soft-fluffy catkins swaying like Lemur tails or tabby cats in the breeze.  I stroked them and received a layer of pollen in return.

As we got in the car, Lara texted me to ask if I was passing her house and would I like to collect some books she forgot to give me the day before.

She is a piano technician and was working on a piano mechanism. I've never seen the keys and levers dismantled like this before!

As we left, CBC said it was a pity we weren't going to see a show. He'd looked at Ballet tickets or musicals tickets in London as he thought I might like to see a show. Since he seemed so keen but his search was fruitless, I looked in Essex and found that 'Top Hat', based on the Irving Berlin film, was on at the Cliffs Pavilion in Southend.  They had plenty of tickets available and so I booked two and we drove home.  In the space of 10 minutes, I changed out of my muddy clothes and into a dress, cardigan, tights, nice shoes, straightened my messy hair and got ready to go.  CBC, worked at a slower pace and was ready eventually.

We drove to Westcliff and quickly had a meal at the lovely Thai restaurant.  We then rushed to the theatre, not managing to find a space up high and had to leg it up the steep stairs to the theatre.

The musical was brilliant fun and it was nice to be close.

I was cross in the interval that when CBC asked (egged on by me) for a real mug (they had them), he was told he had to have a disposable. I had a little rant about it (probably too loudly!) which CBC was a bit embarassed about and apparently caused smirks from some people nearby. It does annoy me though. Why is this the way of the way of the world now!

Back home, I opened my presents and cards.

CBC bought me some lovely trousers from the hippy shop in Hexham and a Susie Dent book. Mum got me a slip dress from Patra (sadly now closed), some infused honey and this unusual hoodie. It looks like it is quilted but it is printed.  It doesn't feel very nice as it is some type of shiny, thick synthetic but it looks really cool.  CBC's sister had sent me a cosmetic bag and the coolest mushroom card. Lara bought me a couple of cool books, a Cockerel brooch and  an owl necklace. My godmother got me a  a cool book on Folksongs. I had several lovely cards!

It was a totally unplanned day but it turned out to be wonderful and varied and CBC had made it nice for me.

xx

 

Schwarzwalder Champignon

When I shared my Heidelberg Fungi post, I mentioned how disappointed I was at the amount of fungi I had seen this Autumn.  This is partially due to a lack of walks in the right places.  But luckily, we were headed to the Black Forest in Germany so I KNEW this was my chance to see some more interesting fungi.  But would I be able to spot them?

We were staying in the beautiful spa town of Bad Wildbad, where CBC and I had spent a couple of happy nights and days with his Brother some years ago.

We headed up the funicular railway to the Sommerberg and after a visit to the Tree top walk and the epic slide, we walked onwards through the forest.

And here's the first of a few posts of what I saw.

The first fungus I spotted was Yellow Stagshorn emerging out of a mossy stump of a tree. I've seen this a couple of times but a colourful fungus is always exciting!

Next, I saw this pinky/red fungus which I think was a Beech/Beechwood Sickener, Russula Nobilis, definitely a Brittlegill/Russula mushroom, if not that exact one.

The ones below, which were somewhat damaged (as is often the way with Brittlegills as they are tasty to insects!) were Russula atropurpurea, otherwise known as the Purple Brittlegill.

At this point, CBC had given up on me and walked ahead.

Once I got up close and personal to the leaves, I spotted more and more.

This orangey one below was intriguing to me.

And here's another view of it where you can see the light shining through its gills. This one was in better condition.

As there were plenty of these, I wanted to have a look at its gills so I tried to lift it up a bit but then it snapped.  This bright orange latex oozed out of it.

It wasn't till after the next day's walk and seeing plenty of these that I found an ID on this fungi-type. And it's a highly-sought after edible which is called the Saffron Milkcap or to use its rather delightful and apt Latin name, Lactarius Deliciosus!

Here was another example I thought, but now, looking at it, it's not the same one as it has a white stipe!

I'm not sure what this was.  Was it a Fly Agaric variety without its spots?

These pale pink mushrooms are perplexing me a bit. They could be Rosy Bonnets, Mycena Rosea but the shape is slightly confusing

It was hard to tell if this was a Russula Amethystina or another Purple Brittlegill! It had a big pool of water in it!

 In my first 20 minutes of looking, I was already happy to have seen to many but what would I find next? I had come with a wishlist of a few fungi I would like to see but would I see any of them??

x

Madeira Day 6 and 7 and 8

On day 6, we decided to make a walk which was not too far away from where we were staying.  The route is also a fairly easy one.  The route was PR8 Vereda Da Ponta de Sao Lourenco.  It is on the eastern-most peninsula on the island and is named after the caravel sailed by Boncalves Zarco, one of the three discoverers of the Archipelago of Madeira.  It is part on the Madeira Natural Park and the penisula is partial nature reserve ce.  It had a very different feel from the other walks we had done so far.  There are supposedly colonies of seagulls and other birds species. It is 4km there and another 4km back.  

Given its proximity to Funchal, it was obviously quite popular with lots of tourists so the carparks and roads leading to the start of the walk were heaving. It was also a different walk as it was quite exposed since it wasn't surrounded by trees.

It was lovely to see the sea and bays at many junctures.

I loved all the flowers we saw.

We reached the end of the walk and here you could go kiyaking or take a boat trip out to see dolphins or take a boat back. We decided not to but I enjoyed seeing the turbulent waters.

More flowers...

As we neared the car, we saw some really interesting rocks which looked very much like fossilized creatures!

We drove back to the hotel and I decided to go for a swim. To my chagrin, there were swimming lessons going on for the next two hours for a bunch of little kiddies and I couldn't use it!

CBC and I decided to try and go out for a meal locally and CBC found a place that was very individual, had a tiny menu.  Sadly, I cannot remember its name.  Weirdly, as we drove to get there, all of a sudden, I started to feel really queasy.  As we looked at the very meaty menu (game and that sort of stuff), I couldn't bear the thought of eating anything! CBC thought I was sulking because I wanted to go elsewhere but it was so strange that I felt so odd.

He ordered stuffed mushrooms

He then ordered me the beef stew.

And a salad for us.

I managed to eat a bit of salad and about 2 pieces of beef but it was a real struggle. At this point, CBC started to realise I genuinely didn't feel well and nobly ate most of the stew.

We headed back and I got into bed feeling utterly awful, my tummy felt terrible and I felt sick.

In the middle of the night, after many hours of grasping my tummy, I made my way to the toilet and then lay on the floor outside the bathroom. I felt like a change of scene might help me.  CBC came and made me go back to bed.

It was a long night.

In the morning, I was very slow getting up, still feeling very unwell.  CBC wanted to go to breakfast and hurried me up.  Just as we were about to leave, all of a sudden, I knew I had to be sick and ran for the loo.  After 6 times throwing up, I think I'd expelled whatever was irritating me.  CBC headed off for breakfast and left me behind to lay down.

After this, we decided to head out to walk.  Despite having felt so unwell and not having any food inside me, I felt it was probably best just to get outside. We headed to the north-east of the island to the PR6 trail, Levada das 25 fontes.    Waterfalls were to be involved.

It started raining heavily as we did this walk.  The first part was on road and it was quite a popular route.  We made our way along and reached the waterfalls which were lovely.  After around 8km walk, we came back and found a lovely cafe in the woods which had a massive queue. CBC and I managed to find a table. Sadly, the only thing I felt like eating was soup and they had run out of that so I decided to give it a miss.

I don't have any photos sadly!

Once we were back to the car, we decided to drive up to the northern coast to Porto Moniz where there are natural saltwater pools on the sea.

To our delight, once parking, we discovered, as it was around 4.30pm, the pool was free to enter though there were no facilities to use to change or store things.

I did a sneaky changing manoeuvre in full view under my sarong and changed into my tankini.

As I entered these breath-taking pools, it was the first time all day I felt well.

It was blissful!

We drove home, after a walk around town. I should mention at this point, that wild nasturtiums grow absolutely everywhere in Madeira and I took the opportunity to collect some seeds

When we got back to Canico and got changed, having not eaten anything, I needed something to eat so we went out to La Carbonara which had an extensive pizza and pasta menu.  I ordered a lentil soup and a half portion of Spaghetti bolognese which was absolutely enormous!  CBC ordered a meal which he didnt realise had chicken in it.  His flexitarianism doesn't include chicken so he was very sad.

The next morning, we went for our final Buffet breakfast and then packed up our things. As our flight wasn't till 5ish, we left out stuff with conceirge and walked down to the sea front in Canico via the supermarket...

 

Where I picked up this epic bag of Pick and mix crisps! I love foreign crisp trying!

I was pleasantly surprised by the beach there. It was stony but the sea looked clean and  I wished I had come to swim here when I couldn't get into the hotel pool

If it hadn't started raining and I had no towel, I might have swum.

I sat and read my book on the beach until we had to shelter in the nearby cafe because of the rain.

I doodled on some stones.

We made our way back towards the hotel, passing monster aloes.

Beautiful flowers and lots of sea food restaurants which we wish we'd known were there.

I love the street signs on Madeira. Like lots of the municipal walk ways, they are beautiful!

CBC downloaded the Bolt App and we got a very cheap ride to the airport in a yellow car.  Public transport would have taken 1.5 hours. This took 10mins!

At the airport, I marvelled at the myriad tins of sardines for sale!

We'd had a wonderful holiday in Madeira and were so grateful to have had this time away together, away from the anxieties of real life and work!

We got home around 12.30am, via the X30 bus and a taxi and then I was up for church the next morning at 9!

xx