Cold Winter Sunset, Grenade, France

Today has been all about beautiful big skies with great big rolling snow clouds ready to cover the Pyrénées in the Ariège, Les Hautes Pyrénées and L'Aude with the biggest coverage of snow since records began.

And, yes, I was at the gravel pits again ... I just can't resist them. In fact, I am keeping my eye on a grebe, who will surely be dancing with his partner in Spring - if you have never seen this and get the chance to do so - grab the chance, it is fabulous.

It was getting towards dusk as I parked the car up and unloaded the dogs, got well covered up and set off to do the circuit of one of the bigger lakes.

As we got 1/4 of the way around Norman, my Jack Russell was getting ever more excited ahead, running in circles, nose glued to the ground, then lifting his nose then bouncing up and down in the grass, clearly looking for something.

Scooby, my Beauceron cross Belgian Shepherd was also getting excited.
When I got to where they were, I could see great furrows driven into the ground, which made me look around nervously.
It was clearly the work of wild boar, and we were a fair way from the car - this was confirmed by the huge hoof prints that were all around.
Now, I am no Apache scout, but I figured that there must have been a few of these creatures here recently, and they looked big!
I was OK with Scooby as he never goes too far from my side and obeys whenever he is called - but Norman ... well he's a Jack Russell ...
If he gets the scent of an animal, no matter what the size, he's off chasing it - he did this yesterday behind the house with a large stag who was resting up in the thick bramble hedge at the bottom of my garden - I don't know what he would have done if the stag had turned around ... but I guess that's a bridge that Jack Russells think about when they get there.
So, I was a little nervous that if the boar were hiding in the bushes around the lake that Norman would just go for them.
You see Jack Russells have eyes that suffer from some sort of Zoom / macro errors, where they believe that they are as big as a Great Dane and any other animal - stags included, are as big as small gerbils.

Anyway up, we got around, following in the footmarks clearly dotted around the path of deer and wild boar - we never met any of either and got back safely - only to be attacked ny a Burmese Python when I got into the car ... nah, only kidding, but had you going there didn't I ...