Early spider orchid (Ophrys sphegodes)

I took a walk around the circuit and came across a clump of these small and low orchids coming up on Windmill Down. There were close to the cliff edge (you can see how close by all the wind blown chalk debris from the storm-lashed cliff face). It is supposedly rare but apparently colonised the chalk waste of the channel tunnel at Samphire Cove with ease. I'd never seen it before.

Later I took a walk on the Lydden Downs Nature Reserve but not a lot is happening yet. One rock rose out, a few cowslips and violets. Hundreds of rabbits.

I finished off with a drive along some nice Kent lanes.

Right at the end of my wandering I came across the St John's Commandery. Built in the 13th C it was part of the administrative centre of the Knights Hospitaliers' Kentish lands. The KH also had a base in Cyprus and one of the local wines - Commandaria - derives its name from Commandery or its Latin counterpart.

The extras are of an oak tree coming into leaf and the steep chalk escarpment at the Lydden Nature Reserve.

Funnily enough there used to be a coal mine at the foot of the scarp slope called Stonehall Colliery. One building remains (you can just see the brickwork in the off-centre of the 2nd extra) and the spoil has been spread in the valley bottom. The miners' houses (with some mock half-timbering) still stand in the part of Lydden known as Stonehall.