Being Mrs C

A wet weekend

After an incredibly wet Saturday we were woken in the early hours of Sunday morning by yet more rain. Looking out of the bedroom window the wind was raging, the road turned into a river and several rumbles of thunder passing overhead. We therefore headed down to the WWA this afternoon expecting to see some degree of damage from the weather. Luckily we were proved wrong.

The butterfly garden seemed to have escaped the worst of the wind, and with only a couple of small exceptions, most of the plans were still standing proud. There weren't that many butterflies to be seen today, but the bees did seem to be out in force.

The coots that live on the Mere were out and about with their chicks. We think there were eight in total. Quite an impressive number when you consider that the heron was keeping a keen watch on them from afar.

They are such incredibly cute fluffy bundles, but catching that look in a photo is somewhat difficult!

The rain had certainly made a difference to our new pond on site. We think that the water level must have risen about at least 3 inches in the last 24 hours. As I sit here typing this we're in the middle of another storm, so by now it may have increased further!

The water was a bit too murky to be able to see much life apart from that on the water's surface. It looks promising though as there were quite a few pond skaters visible, and what may have been a leech at the water's edge. (Mr C's currently looking it up to see if we were correct or not) As we walked away a large dragonfly also came to visit. A good sign that the pond is attracting exactly the sort of wildlife that we were hoping it would.

Bank holiday exercise

I'm sure Bank Holiday Mondays are supposed to be for lazing about. Ours turned out to be quite an active day. We met up with our friends S and A and headed out for a good long walk in the sunshine. Mr C and I often go walking with these particular friends and know that they're up for a bit of a challenge. Hence we decided to repeat a walk from our Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire walks book which took us from central St Albans to Harpenden and back.

Now the book reckons this walk is 10.5 miles and should take about 5 hours. It's not a particularly challenging walk, but a nice one all the same that takes in some lovely stretches by the Ver and along the common in Harpenden itself. We left St Albans at 10am and, despite stopping for a 40 minute leisurely picnic lunch, somehow managed to be enjoying a nice cold beverage in a St Albans pub before 2pm. I'm not too sure how, but my legs certainly now ache, and my camera has a lack of photos suggesting that I was possibly too busy to take any! I'm sure it took us much longer last time.

It was definitely time to relax though once we got home, and I was able to curl up with two books that I'm enjoying right now. After reading quite a few books set in stately homes, and following my numerous National Trust visits, I was delighted to find a book in the local charity shop about the history of the Trust and some of it's holdings. The National Trust: The First Hundred Years apparently accompanied a BBC television series that was shown around 1995, to mark the Trust's one hundredth anniversary. It's fascinating to dip into.

The second book I'm enjoying continues the theme of stately homes and what it must have been like to live and work in them. The Edwardian Country House was again a book to accompany a television series, but this time a reality style show that placed a family inside a country house and gave them the identities of turn of the century aristocrats. Below stairs staff were also "employed" and the series looked at the challenges facing both sets of occupants. Being a reality show there was some coverage of the relationships that were between the people living there, but the majority of the show focussed on what life would have been like in Edwardian times. The series showed back in 2002 and I thoroughly enjoyed it at the time. I bought the accompanying book at a discount at the time, but over the last few years had quite simply forgotten about it. To pick it up again and remind myself is great and I'm really enjoying doing so. The book seems to be available very cheaply via amazon at the moment, so if you have an interest in this sort of thing I'd certainly advise getting hold of a copy.

Birds, birds, birds...

We've had quite a quiet Easter weekend, but it seems that we've actually been quite busy looking at birds and making the most of our RSPB membership.

On Saturday we headed into the centre of St Albans to Verulam Park where there are currently a large number of herons nesting on the island in the centre of the lake there. We read in the local paper about how the RSPB had set up a viewing facility there for the public to get a better view of the nests and chicks. Unfortunately the day that we went along this didn't seem to be operating. Still, with the binoculars that I got for Christmas and Mr C's big camera lens we get a pretty good view. 

You obviously can't take pictures with binoculars though so you'll have to rely on Mr C's photographic evidence. 

On bank holiday Monday we went along to the Rye Meads reserve over by the River Lee. The reserve is jointly run by the RSPB and Herts & Middlesex Wildlife Trust and has a total of ten hides across the wetlands reserve to allow visitors to get a good sight of the local wildlife. Once again, photographic evidence is provided by Mr C. 

One thing the visit did make me realise is how few birds I actually recognise. The photographs at least allow us to come back and in our own time compare the photos with what is in the bird books. It'd be much more useful though if I could actually recognise them in real time. A trick I'm still to master!

St Albans' Abbey

Last Sunday a friend of ours came up to St Albans to join us for Sunday lunch. After being well fed on a fantastic pub roast dinner we took a walk around the city centre to show him some of the sights. One must do venue was the Abbey. It's one of my favourite parts of St Albans and the building itself is quite spectacular.

I'd like to share two of my favourite features with you.

Firstly, the ceiling of the tower which dates from the sixteenth century. The middle four panels show the arms of St Alban, England, St George and Edward the Confessor. Surrounding these four panels are the roses of York and Lancaster that signify the importance of St Albans in the War of the Roses. Two battles that were part or the War of the Roses took place in St Albans in 1455 and 1461 and many believe that the 1455 battle was actually the opening battle between the Lancastrians and Yorkists.

Apologies for the poor photograph quality, but I can never cease to be amazed by the colours in the rose window. The window in the north transept was designed by Lord Grimthorpe in the late nineteenth century, but the glass in it was designed by Alan Younger and unveiled in 1989.

This photograph doesn't do real justice to the colours; the blue in particular is incredibly rich and like nothing I've ever seen before.

I can't pretend to know all these facts myself though - I've recently been reading St Albans: A History by Mark Freeman and it's providing me with some fantastic detail into the history of the city and many of the fantastic historic buildings. I like knowing about and understanding the history of where I am living and in London this was relatively easy to do. Not as much is written about St Albans, but this book is certainly a real gem - and the only one I've seen that covers everything in the city rather than just a specific thing.

New year's day walk

After a wonderful night with friends today was a bit of a lazy day. After a fantastically long lie in today's main activity was a walk around St Albans.

We started off by wandering across Verulum Park and were somewhat amazed to find the late their frozen. I know it's been cold lately, but I hadn't realised just how cold! The ice looked about an inch thick in parts and quite a few ducks looked confused as they slid along it looking for the water.

The River Ver was still flowing on the other side of the footpath and was home to a vast number of ducks, including more coots than I think I've ever seen before.

We then headed down into St Michael's Village before heading back up Fishpool Street towards the Abbey.

After a reasonably heavy night last night it was wonderful to get out and get some fresh air. It was certainly cold out though and I was very grateful for my hand knitted woolly hat to keep my ears warm. We're not due back to work until Monday so we're now looking forward to a relaxing long weekend to start the year.

Happy new year to you all.

Festive St Albans

Mr C and I took a wander into St Albans this afternoon to pick up a final few Christmas presents. We walked up into town past the Abbey which was a hive of activity this afternoon. Such has been demand in past years for the carol services, this year they decided to do Carols on the hour, every hour from 11am until 4pm. 

Outside the Abbey was a small craft market, in addition to the main Saturday market in the centre of the City. I thought it was a lovely touch and in beautiful surroundings - I just hope they use the space again for a similar purpose. The Abbey is very much the centre of the City and a spectacular sight and it was great to see the area so busy.