Blue butterfly

The journey to the vet did not go well this morning! The tram that my rabbit Rosie and I had to take first was late but fortunately we still had enough time to get to the stop where we had to transfer to a bus. Imagine my shock when I spotted a notice that the bus would not stop there for some time because of road works somewhere nearby! Thankfully a Turkish woman managed to tell me half in Turkish which I don't understand and half in Flemish that I had to cross the street and take the bus at a temporary stop just around the corner. I'd only just managed to get to that stop when a bus did arrive and we got on it.

Unfortunately this bus did not go all the way to our destination and we got stranded at a stop half way where we had to wait another 15 minutes for the right bus to come along. During that time I phoned the vet to let her know that we were going to be late because of problems with the public transport. We eventually did arrive there but 45 minutes later than we should have! The relief was great when I was told that Rosie was ok after her check-up. She is a little overweight though so she'll have to go on some sort of diet from now on. Fortunately the journey back was considerably easier.

Once home I had just enough time to change into my dog walking clothes and have something to eat before riding to the artificial island to see if the swan would let me see her eggs. She was asleep though and it didn't look like she was going to stand up any time soon so after a few minutes I continued my ride to the park where I had a nice walk with Pacha, a Rottweiler-Staffordshire cross.

During my walk with Pacha I stopped at this shrub again to photograph its flowers because I wasn't very happy with any of the shots from the island. I had just taken a shot of a bee on one of them when I spotted a blue butterfly. I'd seen one the last few times that I'd been at the park but never managed to get a single shot. It looked like I wasn't going to get one this afternoon either as it flew away the moment I pointed the compact camera towards it. I could barely believe my luck when it came back and landed on a holly shrub just to my right. It's not a great shot but it's the only one that I was able to take before it flew off again.

After the walk with Pacha I picked a bag of dandelion leaves for Rosie and on my way home I stopped at the island again. I had to wait almost 30 minutes before the swan finally stood up for a few seconds and I could see that there were still only 8 eggs but no goslings yet in the nest. While I'd been waiting for the swan to get up I'd been able to see that the Great Crested Grebes still had their 3 grebelets and so far they seem to be doing well.

I had a lovely pizza when I got home and I'm now trying to relax a little with a few glasses of a very nice red wine.

Thank you so much for all your kind words and best wishes for Rosie's check-up. A big thank you as well for the lovely comments and stars on my Collared Dove blip from yesterday.