Claremont

According to the official record it is just about two years since we visited Claremont Landscape Gardens, a visit noticed at reference 1. Which seems a long time ago, but there are plenty of other attractions with similar appeal in our general area.

But as it turned, the beginning of last week was ideal. Warm sunny day with little wind. Plenty of young families to provide entertainment, but easily absorbed in the space available. Plenty of seats for older visitors.

A rather lazy visit, involving a lot of sitting around in the sun, but we did manage tea and some sort of raspberry slice (which may have been sold as a frangipane), we did find quite a lot of small fish (with red tipped fins) in the lake and we did come across a duck with no less than 10 ducklings, very fresh out of the egg by the look of them.

The most important tree in the gardens is illustrated above. We once saw a large foreign duck (or perhaps a goose) sitting on one of the large lower branches. And we once went for a ride in one of the punt like objects visible to the left. Objects which were minded by an older gentleman volunteer from the US, on the lookout for more volunteers to do punts. They must still have been short on this occasion, the punts not being open for business.

The daffodils were over. The camelias were more or less over, although they must have been good not so long ago. But there were some fine rhododendrons in flower, quite possibly from one of the azalea sub-departments.

PS 1: talking of eggs, we had a couple a very fresh eggs the other day, less than a day out of the hen. I had forgotten the the white of such an egg, when boiled, is not the same as a Sainsbury's egg which must be a week or more old at least. Not the smooth rubbery quantity one is used to at all, rather more soft and fluffy.

PS 2: later: for some reason moved to check about ducks sitting in trees, to find that the senior brain had translated the memory, in itself not so far wrong, from Painshill to Claremont. See reference 2. Level of trust that can be accorded to such memories just taken another knock.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/claremont.html.

Reference 2: http://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=Yesterday+to+Painshill+for+a+stroll.

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