Walking through The Horns to Happy valley

We had fun searching for our Easter eggs this morning, and what a lot of goodies we now have. We managed to refrain from scoffing any before we headed out for a walk up and along The Horns valley to the riding stables. There we turned and crossed over the Lime Brook following the path of the track which was an old route across the valley in bygone times.

The sun was shining strongly, the sky was blue and we both felt so grateful to have all this wonderful landscape available for us to enjoy nature and beauty in our own backyard. We walked through leafless avenues of trees on the steep hillside, passing old stone quarries and coppiced woodlands with the light filtering through to illuminate the beginnings of new plants leaves beneath the trees.

I had suggested a particular route, as there are many optional paths around this valley, and I wanted to take some photographs of a special white blossomed tree lower down the valley. We walked away from the stables up the far side of the valley into another wood and then along the ridge to where we could drop down to Happy Valley, Helena's name for a beautiful meadow beside the stream which runs down from the Heavens.

As we descended we heard the sound of children playing and squealing with fun and came across a gathering of about twenty people having a picnic on the grass with distant views across to Rodborough Common. A young mother walked up to us and I realised it was one of the party, Hannah, with her daughter in her arms, who I met recently in a meeting of the friends of Daisybank; coincidentally I met Hayley in the pub yesterday, whom I nearly blipped. The clothes in the background are drying after having accompanied children into the fast flowing stream.

Then Jess approached us, as she was with Hannah, and who we knew through her father Andrew. We last saw Jess in Cornwall when we camped to attend Andrew's summer party at Crackington Haven. We chatted for ages before moving on a hundred yards to the far side of the stream running down from the waterfall where the white blossomed tree stands. I took some pictures of the blossom to try and identify the tree grows out of the middle of a badger sett under an old hedge separating the fields.

Suddenly we were greeted again, this time by a near neighbour Colleen who was out on her daily walk around the valley with four of her six sons in attendance and a large black labrador dog. It was time for a chat with her too while the kids played in the tree and on top of the sandy mounds produced by the badgers. She also admired this tree and told me that it was a wild yellow plum, whose fruit she gathers to make jam when it is a good year for fruits. The tree is the first to blossom anywhere in the alley and suffers in cold springs like this year, because of the lack of bees to pollinate the flowers.

We said goodbye after about half an hour of chatting and standing admiring the views, and Helena and I walked back to the stream, where we were greeted by Rebecca, an old colleague and friend of Helena, who was visiting the valley to play with her three children. It felt so good to be out and about with so many others enjoying this wonderful terrain on such a beautiful day.

I am putting a folder in my Blipfolio, showing other pictures of the characters I've mentioned here.
Helena, aka Woodpeckers, has also blipped today with pictures of some of Rebecca's kids, but she has gone out to dinner and hasn't yet written about the day.