Weekend Wanderings

I still have to post about the last stages of Japan - our stay in Tokyo - but I wanted to get back to posting about the here and now so Japan will have to wait a few days.........

I spent the weekend outdoors (despite the forecast which luckily proved to be wrong) - yesterday with the National Trust at Kellie Castle, working in the beautiful gardens - both the organic walled garden with it's apple trees, vegetables and flowers in the larger estate garden with its pond, walks and on the gardeners garden where he grows the plants for sale and for planting around the estate.

I spent the morning clearing out the silt trap in the burn.....yes in water and mud....my perfect habitat. Shovelling silt from the bottom of the burn into buckets, lifting them out of the burn and tipping them into wheelbarrows for redistribution around the garden (another name for hiding the muck in the undergrowth!)

In the afternoon, in slightly cleaner clothes I helped to level the ground for the new apple orchard, where 75 varieties of apple tree will be planted. 

The end of the day was spent in the walled garden hunting a rogue bunny rabbit that had somehow managed to make its home in the garden, luckily for the bunny we didn't find it! We got to bring home some organic rhubarb - one of the 24 varieties that they grow at Kellie....the rhubarb and raspberry crumble I had for dessert tonight was great!

Today we headed for the Fife Coastal Path, walking from Pittenweem to Elie where we had lunch at the Ship Inn. The weather turned out to beautiful (despite the pitiful forecast) and we had a good day for the 5 mile walk. The Ship Inn is right on the beach and on the occasional Sunday afternoon in the spring/summer cricket matches are played on the beach and today was one of those days.  

Pittenweem View

 Preparing the crease