More Pond Plants

23 - 25 June 2020

On Tuesday, our delivery from the waterlily nursery arrived.  Lots of plants to get in the water or the ground as quickly as possible.  The weather has gone very hot and sticky, which made this challenging.

 The stacked up plants, some for the pond and some trees and other items I couldn't resist.

 Unfortunately I had only a scribbled list of what we had ordered, so I had to spend quite a lot of time sitting in the shade working out what was what ...

 ... while Dave pickaxed out a hole in the dry ground for the ornamental banana designed to help shade the pond.

 All planted - I helped after a while!

 We found a dead baby goldfish this morning,  maybe we are running low on oxygen or high in ammonia.  Hopefully the new plants will help.

 The first of our new waterlilies to throw out a flower.  Lovely pink colour - and more importantly, large leaves.

Can't resist it: on Thurs Liverpool Football Club won the weirdest Premier League season in football history, after a 30 year wait.  Hurrah!

Messing about with apricots

20 June 2020

The apricot question has been bothering me.  They are still not entirely ripe, but we had some windy weather and there are a lot of good windfalls, so I decided to try making apricot and ginger chutney.

 Windfalls sorted and any bruising cut out.

 My mango and ginger chutney recipe (Madhur Jaffrey - very good) wants grated mangos, so I put the apricots through the food processor, which may have been a mistake.  I matched apricots by weight with the mangos in the recipe, but I think they may have a lot more water.  I had to simmer for about three hours and add another similar weight of apricots before the consistency was passable.  More experimentation required.

 This is our first pomegranate flower to set.  We have quite a few flowers every year but they drop off without bulging out.  We will watch this one with interest.

My current painting in progress - an allium flower with a bee

Clearing the track

19 June 2020

When we drive down the track there is a screeching of thistle spines along the sides of the car, which makes us both cringe.  So early Friday morning we took a wheelbarrow of tools down to the worst bit, and started clearing.

 I was trying to get a shot of me with the hedge-trimmer, but my arms weren't long enough.  Dave was too hot and bothered to take a photo for me!

 Dave's turn with the hedge trimmer

Nearly all done, ridges pickaxed, ruts filled with stones, trees and thistles trimmed, just a couple of barrow-loads of sand and gravel to bring down to fill the ruts up smooth and we're done.

We were sitting having tea and I decided to check what the lilac flowers were.  Google lens identified them as field scabious (one of the nastiest names for a nice flower) and said they were good for butterflies.  A swallowtail immediately landed on one to prove the point.

Of Parents

13 - 17 June 2020

First the good thing: my Mum celebrated her 89th birthday by forming a 'pod' with my brother and his wife.  The best thing for your birthday is a long-delayed hug.

 Jonathan and Mum having birthday lunch in his conservatory.

Then the bad thing.  My father died at the end of May and his funeral was on the 17th of June.  We were unable to go, for Covid reasons, so I set up a solemn space in the studio, with candles and textiles and the decent dining chairs, where Dave and I could view the service on the iPad. I put one of Dad's paintings at the back, and a photo of him on my phone and then we followed it with multiple calls to the family.  I had sent a recorded reading in advance.  It wasn't quite like being there, but it sort of worked.

Garden things

9 - 12 June 2020

The Apricot tree is bowed down under the weight of apricots this year.  Every morning I am checking them for ripeness, but they are just not quite ready.  Meanwhile, we are getting so many windfalls, which are best collected and removed, in case they harbour pests.

 Overwhelmed with apricots!  Some of the windfalls are worth keeping, so I have a windowsill of them hoping they will ripen.

 Dave has been sprouting a sweet potato, and has a number of slips just about ready to plant out.

 At the pond, we have these two darling water hyacinths which float around and are always somewhere different each morning.  

 This is a salsify seed, like an enlarged dandelion clock, which landed upside down on the water over a pale rock (covered in tadpoles - aaargh!) It looks like diamond.

 Big blue mummy dragonfly (Blue Emperor type, according to Dave's researches - but surely she is an Empress)

 And a smaller pinky-red mummy dragonfly.  There are likely to be lots of baby dragonflies next.

One of our fabulous garden salads: including purslane, moringa, rocket and nasturtium.

In Pursuit of Pondlife

5 June 2020

The next day took us over the mountains and down to the Aegean coast.  We were visiting our pond plant supplier at his nursery near Marathon: Ioannis Gryllis.  We arrived after lunching in Marathon, and Ioannis was fantastic about showing us all around his nursery.  Lots of water gardens, and also developments in progress for Japanese and Mexican gardens, as well as a permaculture veg garden and green roofs and walls.  A wonderful tour.

 Just a little of the waterlily gardens at Gryllis Nursery.

 We stayed the night at a hotel in Nea Makri, as there were no local campsites open, and experienced our first post-covid 'sealed' breakfast.  No more buffets!

 The route back took us over the Corinth canal, somewhere I have only ever glimpsed from the bus, so we agreed to stop to charge at a slow-but-free charger right by the canal.  We had lunch and a bit of sight-seeing, and then decided we would press on for another 30 km to a fast charger.  Unfortunately, it turned out the fast charger was not yet operational (despite advertising that it was), and we had a nail-biting 100 km drive to the next charger.  The car was showing 120 km range - which was a little too close for comfort.

 We had ordered a lot of plants for the garden and pond, to be sent on, as there was little room in the car with the camping gear, but we did bring one bucket of fish and aerating plants back.  Several of the fish didn't survive, but most did, and now our one mosquito fish: 'Big Mo' has a school of little followers.

 Dave introducing more pond weed to the pond.

 Some floating weed, as our most pressing need is cover for the water to slow down evaporation.

 Big Mo with a friend.

 And we spotted a (spotted) toad.  We should've been suspicious ...

... next day we found a new string of toad eggs.  There is no more room for animal life in the pond - the plants are struggling to cope with balancing the intake of nutrients.  We are starting to get blanketweed algae.  But would she listen ...!

Alone at Delphi

4 June 2020

We were staying at the campsite (Apollon - just outside Delphi village) for two nights, so we could relax and enjoy our first visit to Delphi, a fantastic archaeological site.  The amazing thing was that for the whole day, we were the only visitors.  Delphi is usually Greece's second most popular ancient site (after the Acropolis), and we could see the coach parking facilities, so we knew just how lucky we were.

 First thing we noticed was the amount of wildlife roaming the site with us.  This was one of two tortoises, and we also saw a little green-headed whip snake, loads of unusual birds and a wealth of butterflies.

 Selfies at Apollo's temple.

 Dave in floppy Egypt hat

 The empty site.  It is in an incredible bowl of mountains, and involves a lot of walking up steps, but the views were astounding.

 After climbing to the top of the main site, and back again, we were directed lower down to another site, and then had to climb back up to the road.  Lots of exercise today!

 Walking back to the car - an enormous cricket, at least 10 cm long.  Also enjoying the quiet.

The car happily plugged in at the - now sunny - campsite, fuelling up for the next stage.

Taking to the Road

1 - 3 June 2020

Greece relaxed the lockdown rules a little on Monday 1 June, allowing campsites and all-year hotels to open, so we were good to go on our travels.  We didn't leave on the 1st, as rain was forecast until Wednesday, but we didn't want to start out too close to the weekend, so we decided to risk Wednesday's showers and leave that morning.

 While waiting, I rustled up a pink bag for the tent overflow packing: the groundsheet, pegs and a mallet.

 Our biggest concern was the new chickens.  They only had a few days to acclimatise to their new housing arrangements.  On Monday night we went in and rounded them up and put them one by one into the chicken house.  Tuesday morning they were cautious, but poked their heads out and eventually five came down the ladder on their own (we brushed the sixth one out with a broom). That evening, we were busy packing and planning, and forgot to go out to them until dusk, when we were overjoyed to find they'd put themselves to bed.  So that was one worry dealt with!

 We set off on Wednesday morning and had a lovely trip to Delphi, with no sign of rain - until we put the tent up!  Five minutes later it was pouring down!  We had the campsite to ourselves and the owner said go anywhere, so we picked a pitch for shade and easy electrics.  Then found it turned into a river in the rain.  The extra groundsheet turned out to have a design fault, as it collected water running down the sides and channelled it under the tent.  We had a water-bed effect during the worst of it.  

 We sat and watched the rain, after moving the electrics to safety and making tea, until it went off a bit.  While also finding out where the seams leaked.

 Dave checked us out, and tightened the guy ropes, then we put the bedding back into the car to keep dry and went in search of supper.

 We didn't want to go too far from the car in the rain, so we stopped at the first open souvlaki shop, much to their dismay, and asked to eat in.  They said we weren't allowed to, but we could sit on the pavement under an awning.  It was a fun meal, and there wasn't much traffic to splash us!

The kiosk across the road - I wouldn't have thought there was so much demand for gingerbread cake from England's north-east (Parkin). Hehe!

Back at the tent, it wasn't too damp and we had a warm and snug night.  And at least we know where the leaks are now.