Rescued peonies and a bike ride

I went out in my PJ’s and wellies to rescue the rain bombed peonies. The midges were out in force. If I did any gardening later, I thought, it would be full midge jacket and Little She Bear's homemade midge repellent on the only bit of exposed skin, my hands.
Homemade midge repellent made from bog myrtle leaves (picked up the hill), vegetable oil and tree resin. It’s good.

After I'd done the grocery shopping, Toad and I went for another cycle ride on the Loch Long side of the peninsula. It was good to see quite a few sailboats out, including a couple with black sails. Pirates, Toad said. 😉

I stopped on an uphill bit. This was above me.

Isabella Campbell's shrine

The 60–90% threat of rain hung over us most of the afternoon but we decided to go for a walk anyway. It didn’t rain. We did a little wander along the shore at Garelochhead noticing a swan family near the McAuley Burn bridge and Biting Stonecrop in abundance among the broken shells atop the sea wall.

Then as we were leaving Garelochhead on the Rosneath  Road, we decided to stop and go explore up the path signed to Isabella Campbells shrine. I’m not sure about the shrine bit but anyway something to investigate and which we never had until today. It is a small fenced place beside the burn where she ussd to pray. Someone keeps a votary candle there.

 I soon realised that this was probably the hill path that the dog Amber and owner, whom I’ve met in my Garelochhead wanderings, go up to get muddy before coming down for a splash in the sea. It proved a lovely path, not so muddy at the moment, with lots of common spotted orchids and some huge old trees, both oak and ash.

I noted the Whorled Caraway leaves among the spotted orchid ones.

There were some good views down to Garelochhead  and down the loch. We could see the field that’s just south of our garden but the light was poor for photos.

It’s a place to go exploring with my grandsons when they are next here.

Beyond a fence into what I suppose is MOD land there was a rusty sign the colour of which Toad, with his new enchroma glasses, really appreciated! 😁

Sweepings

A barrow of driveway sweepings. Food for peonies, which are doing well this year with eleven flower buds. In former years the maximum has been three and sometimes none at all.

A walk up and along the peninsula

First over the garden fence at the top west corner and across the top of a field where bluebells and young trees abound.

Take a look down to the loch.

Then up along the old track past the house where Elizabeth Todrick, the only female shipwright at Clynder's McGruer boatyard, used to live. We checked out the benches in the garden.

Further up we climbed over this style. There is a picnic area near the brow of the hill where you can look across Loch Long: 

Breezy but still hot (by Argyll standards). It’s a good place to enjoy bog cotton and skylarks. We heard a Grasshopper Warbler too.

Cotton grass, milkwort and Cladonia lichen alongside the path.

We came back by a different way and saw some huge, keeled over, but still growing old oaks. This is a place to bring my grandsons when they next visit from Derbyshire.

Hot enough to go sleeveless and manufacture some Vitamin D, not least for its usefulness against Covid19. I don’t tan much but I think I caught some sun today.

19 March garden welly wander

Link to today's welly wander post over at Argyll Garden. Blogger is clunky on an iPad.

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33t03ed

33t03ed

Freeing violets

 It has been a pleasant afternoon with no rain and a lessened wind force. I have been freeing violets from the oppression of tough grasses and a cotoneaster. The violets seeded themselves into the cracks and crevices of the steps leading up to the shed. This year they did not flower very well.









Happily, this afternoon, I discovered that they had been spreading themselves near young ferns and under the cotoneaster to the side of the steps. Perhaps there were more flowers than I realised, or perhaps the few flowers I saw were champion seed pingers. Whichever it was, I'm hoping for a violetty spring.



Before I came in for tea and biscuits I looked for daffodil and snowdrop leaves poking out of the ground. I usually see some during December but not this year.

Boggy Brae banana walnut bread

Yesterday I made some banana and walnut tea loaves in my maternal grandma's old bread tins. They have interesting bottoms: an extra piece of metal has been added that stands away from the from the bottom of the tin and has air holes. I'm presuming this was to prevent the bottoms of loaves from burning.

bread tin bottom

Although I make a chocolate banana cake quite often and have its recipe in my head, I wondered if tea bread with nuts would have any particular requirements. My recipe tin is often more productive than recipe books, or even searching online, so I had a rummage. The tin is full of recipes I've written down, that other people have written down for me, and that I've cut off food packets and boxes. It provided a banana bread recipe from an Oxford friend and something off a packet of something — walnuts perhaps.

The actual ingredients and quantities I used were as follows:

4oz butter
4oz soft brown sugar
one and a half oz golden syrup (I have a very handy weighing spoon for awkard stuff like syrup; see pic below)

Melt those ingredients in a pan, then add:

4oz chopped walnuts
4 mashed bananas
2 eggs
9oz wholemeal self-raising flour
heaped teaspoon of baking powder

Bake at 350ºF/180ºC till done (I turned the tins around after 20 minutes and left them another 15. I think! In short, cook till a skewer comes out clean from the middle of the loaves).

Handy weighing spoon. Goes up to 200g
depending what you're weighing and whether it will fit!

Updating my photos on the iMac, it seems I took an accidental selfie while I was making banana walnut bread, and that I was having fun.