Reflections

After visiting mum today I decided to call into a local country park which is about half a mile from the nursing home. We used to live in this area 50 years ago and I remember the place well before it was developed as a country park. It's not very big and doesn't take long to walk around this small lake, but the changes from when I was a boy are remarkable.

There's a pic in extras of an old railway bridge at the end of the lake, it carries a long closed branch line over the overspill. This line used to transport coal from small local mines to a railhead a few miles away. It was closed even before Dr Richard Beeching had his way with our railways. A little further on this old line used to run parallel to our family property and my dad purchased the old cutting with a view to filling it in but he didn't get the chance before he and mum moved house. I drove past our old house today and see that the infill was indeed completed, many years ago.

Spotted today: Small Tortoiseshell, Holly Blue and a Dragonfly - I have no idea what variety as it was travelling just below the speed of light as it whizzed past my ear. I've put a pic of the Holly Blue in extras just because it's my first one. The pic is very poor quality, a highly cropped phone image, I didn't want to get too close in case I frightened it away.