Meeting up again

We are all cheered by the news that lockdown is to be eased from Monday. We drove out to our old sailing haunts of Woolverstone and Shotley to enjoy a change of scene and the fresh sunny air, watching the newly awakened boating fraternity getting ready for a delayed season. I had prepared a picnic which we ate in the car, on obedience to the rules, but Shotley was already too busy to walk the dogs without closely meeting people.

In the evening, an arranged visit by one of our neighbours to share a beer and a whisky in the garden. To try and keep the Hundon men's group going, he had invited me and several others round for drinks in his garden, but not feeling ready to meet a large group I ducked that one. This was by way of compensation.

Busy bees

We continue to see large numbers of bees, generally busying themselves in the fruit trees. Today however a huge queen landed on our window, mounted by a drone busy in other ways. They remained occupied for about 15 minutes, before he finally fell off exhausted. She preened herself for a few moments then flew off through the trees, presumably to found another colony somewhere.