Burnet rose

Yesterday evening, after dinner, Pete, Chris, Alex and I travelled down to Surrey so that we could make an early start today. It was so hard leaving Rosie and Ben, having received such devastating news yesterday morning. But I knew that Ben would take excellent care of her, and there was no way we could change our plans at such short notice.

We stayed at a rather strange hotel in Horley. As we were planning to check in late we had been given the door code and went in to find our keys on the desk, along with three chocolates! The rooms were excellent, with very comfortable beds and there was a breakfast kitchen, open 24 hours a day, where you could help yourself to cereal and toast. This suited us as we had to make an early start. However, the contents of this area were rather odd - I'm afraid we looked in some of the drawers and found, among other things, three bottles of champagne and a very large bag of Chinese wooden ear fungus! In the whole of our stay we never saw the owner, or indeed any other human being!!

Today was spent working hard, with little time for photography, despite driving through the most fantastic misty morning, with the Surrey hills beckoning. However, at one of our survey locations I was pleased to find this burnet rose, a species that we just don't get near Peterborough. Roses are notoriously tricky to identify, but this is one of the easiest, as it's the only British species with round, blackish hips and upright, simple sepals. Normally it's found round the coast, and I suspect that this may in fact be a garden escape, as it was rather a vigorous bush.

We completed our surveys by 5.30 and then spent some time in the pub, waiting for the M25 to clear. A cafetiere of coffee and some wasabi nuts helped prepare me for the journey home, which was smooth and fast. Ben had looked after Rosie splendidly, though he hadn't managed to administer her medicine. She had eaten some food, and been out in the garden a few times, so maybe the drugs are beginning to have some effect. We sat down for a Thai take-away just before 10pm and after that it was straight to bed - exhausted!