Herald Copse

Ten days ago or so saw our near annual visit to the snowdrops of Nonsuch Park, in a patch of woodland called Herald Copse. A day which was brighter and milder than it had been, even if a bit damp.

Starting in the rather muddy and pot-holed car park in the top right hand corner - and with the fine Scots pine snapped above.

More mud as we made our way across to Herald Copse. And the young trees left looking to be coming on well.

Snowdrops present and correct, although my impression was that they were not as thick as they have been in the past. Maybe something is wrong with the ground? Maybe too many people are being a bit careless about walking on them? But still very pretty for all that.

The toasted teacake from the cafe tasted better than it looks in the snap above. One suspects that it had been microwaved from frozen or something of that sort.

When we arrived there was an assembly of runners, replaced by the time we left by an assembly of doggie people.

We failed to remember the box hedging from previous visits. So far they seem to have been spared the plague that killed off the rather larger box bushes at the bottom of our garden. Now replaced by yew.

The Wellingtonia, previously scored in 2022 at reference 2.

BH at foot of same. I knew there was a reason why I had taken my trolley. Daffodils pushing up round about and will probably be looking good quite soon now.

The coastal redwood next door. Which looks healthy enough - so why are there so more more Wellingtonia dotted about the country. Were people attracted to their very distinctive shape? Do they do even better in our climate?

All in all, the pinetum here boasts a handsome collection. Plus the spring bulbs. Didn't spot any mistletoe, but we did spot some just after we had left the park and were heading back to Epsom.

Where, in the brick compost heap, the pineapple was hanging in well, along with lots of red grapefruits.

And while I was inspecting the compost heap, BH was knocking up a spot of lasagne, probably involving a spot of left over mince.

Up close and personal.

Taken with a new-to-us Spanish white, to us via the people in Guildford, to be found at reference 3. Part of their lucky dip box. Seemingly, Txakoli is a Basque word to do with charcoal, rather than something more exotic.

It went down well enough, but I imagine that any further purchase will again be a matter of lucky dip.

PS 1: a correspondent offers this image for crane lovers from Rotterdam: my first water crane. Lots of big cranes in action, including this one, at reference 6. Subsea7 which has offices in Sutton and which used to advertise at Motspur Park or somewhere like that, visible from our Waterloo trains, is a relative.

Possibly a publicly listed Norwegian company.

PS 2: I have now dipped twice into the Pope version of the Iliad noticed at reference 7, and have been a little shocked by the brutality of what I found. In the first dip, Agamemnon explains how he will use the captive Briseis until he tires of her, after which she will be turned out of his bed to be a servant of some kind, or perhaps put to work in one of his factories. Not a very good look-out for her. Then in the second dip, Achilles is not content with killing Hector, he has to further defile his body in front of his father by cutting a rope in under the tendons of his ankles, rather as one would hang up a side of beef these days, and then towing the probably naked body by the heels, from his chariot, in the dust, around the walls of Troy. And to think that this book was revered by generations of classicists.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/02/nonsuch.html. We seem to have missed last year - and we were a little too early on this occasion.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/01/wellingtonia-62.html.

Reference 3: https://shop.lescaves.co.uk/lescaves-shopfront.

Reference 4: https://txakoliameztoi.com/.

Reference 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Txakoli.

Reference 6: https://www.seaway7.com/.

Reference 7: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/02/culls.html.