· Wirral ·
A quick visit to the Dee Marshes at Parkgate before meeting Carolyn for lunch. Several curlews piping, flocks of lapwings, a few little egrets, rooks and jackdaws, and a close encounter with a very friendly robin. As I was about to leave, a raven cronked low overhead, heading off across the marshes.
After lunch, Carolyn and I took her great dane, Minnie, for a walk in Burton Woods. She told me it has rapidly become one of her favourite walks. I was astonished to learn Carolyn was unaware of the two quakers’ graves at the edge of the wood, directly behind the church: a burial site as close as quakers were allowed to consecrated ground in less enlightened times. I took Carolyn to see the graves. As soon as we arrived, Carolyn heard a woodpecker hammering high up in a beech tree. It took us a couple of minutes to spot it among the branches: a great spotted woodpecker—always a thrill.
