Strelitzia - which always reminds me of my aunty in South Africa -
in the Sub Tropical Gardens at Abbotsbury on Saturday.
I love the shady peacefulness of the gardens but remembered to pack a picnic as last time we went lunch in the cafe was unbelievably awful.
The Japanese garden.....
Inside the handkerchief of the pocket handkerchief tree....
peace ....
perfection....
There is a small aviary in the gardens - I'm not sure what this exotic bird is .....
Chinese pheasant? As colourful as a painted African Warrior -
preparing for a war dance.... or a courtship.
The same two Kookaburras are still there in their cage...
waiting for freedom...
still adorable and fluffy and sad.
The highlight of the afternoon - Robin spotting a bank of wild garlic - Eureka! We pick bunches - probably not supposed to - but I'm not going to walk past an opportunity to make him unbelievably happy.
The soft pungent leaves have found their way into every meal - chopped into an asparagus and feta cheese frittata on Sunday for the annual ACIM picnic....layered on an open sandwich with smashed up avocado, crunchy salted almond butter and sweet cherry tomatoes for lunch.....and tonight's supper shredded into a roasted green garlic, red pepper and egg savoury rice with fat flakes of smoked haddock and a dollop of wilted spinach.
Supper was supposed to be a kedgeree but I managed to fuse the hob again by letting the haddock boil over when I turned away for a second..... everything else half cooked......so had to adapt by using the oven and it tuned into a completely different dish - maybe nicer. Lovely electrician coming tomorrow to mend hob.
Today while I made two more cauldrons of pink elderflower cordial ( had to go and buy more citric acid first from the Indian shop down the road), hoovered the stairs, mowed the lawn and savoured my morning alone - a lovely new gardener pruned and chopped and shaped the high-in-the sky hedges and the overgrown shrubs in the front garden - letting in the light.
Now everything is clearly defined, neat and square and round. What I asked him to do. But somehow I miss the out of control exuberance of my wild and wayward garden - tamed for the moment but still rebellious at heart - waiting for the sap to rise again
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