Project 365 day 149: at the bottom of the valley

It's been a beautiful day here, and this afternoon, on the pretext of posting a letter, I dragged J out for a little walk/wheel. We headed towards the village, then down Vicarage Lane which curves round to run along the bottom of the valley not far below the bottom of our orchard. It then becomes Lickpot Hill, the lane which runs diagonally up the side of the valley opposite our house to the top of the downs. I've photographed it many times, and the views back towards our house from the hill are lovely too, but I can't push J up there - not just because of the gradient but because it's a narrow, single-track lane with banks, so it would be impossible to get her out of the way of any vehicles. However, at the bottom of the hill there is a wide, grassy gateway where we paused to look at this spring's transformation of the landscape and to eat our "picnic" - just a bottle of elderflower and a couple of mini chocolate bars, but enough to create a reason to stop and a small bribe to counter J's general lack of enthusiasm for country walks. A year ago I helped her to sketch exactly this view, all coloured in shades of green; we enjoyed the more dramatic contrasts of this year's yellow and blue.