marbled White

The heatwave begins in Essex so wall to wall blue skies today!  I had a couple of parcels to take to the post office, and needed to buy some cornflakes, so headed out for a little wander along the local creek with the intention of spotting some marbled whites, as the area is normally infested with them! Success!! But I only spotted 4 so maybe it's still a little too early for them - although I think some of the questionable 'cutting back' of grassy areas by the local council may have played a part!

Good day for wildlife spotting though - swifts, swallows, egrets, heron, swans, skylarks, cuckoo, squillions of damselflies, a few dragonflies and numerous other butterflies and moths. Ooh and on my walk back home through the park I came across the resident park fox playing with their 4 or 5 cubs!! So cute!

Mum and Dad have headed to Dorset today - it's been over 3 years since my mum saw her younger sister (thankyou global pandemic! ) - and in that time they lost their elder sister to cancer and couldn't even go to her funeral, so it's going to be an emotional reunion I think! I think Dad will be emotional too as the roads of Essex and Kent were not being kind to him this morning - 3 lanes of the QEII Bridge between Essex and Kent being shut for a broken down lorry does NOT help traffic flow so it took them 2 hours to do a 45 minute journey to J6 at Clacketts for a much needed drink stop.  I'm keeping all crossed that the rest of the journey was much more straightforward for them!