The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing.

Every year, in the Pyrenees, is seen the pastoral tradition where sheep are moved en mass from their winter pastures to graze the mountains.

The Transhumance. 

Sheep are rounded up into one large flock of like-minded (empty headed) individuals. Each sheep follows the rest. All are glued together by the promise of greener grass.

Each sheep thinks that it knows best. Each sheep lives its own dream. Each is unique.

Each does exactly the same as the other.
Each follows its own unique destiny, just like everyone else.
Ignore the sticks, ignore the shouting, it's just project fear.

This behaviour is not seen in all species, but is most prominently displayed in mankind. Thus the word Transhumance maybe?
This is the 'grass is greener' syndrome. Instead of staying comfortably in the green fields of Europe, how about we all bugger off to the middle of the Atlantic?
All we need is a leader....
Here's a likely looking sheep...

His name is Boris..
Here we are, arriving at our new destination about to be given our freedom.

We are free!!!

Free to roam.
Free to pay more for our food.
Free to have less choice.
Free to have less freedom to control our own regulations.
Free to be poorer.
Unless you are one of the wolves...

in which case; Eat the Sheep.

A Milestone

Of Bee-eaters and Bananas.

 Spring may have sprung early this year, but it has developed something of a leak as it has limped through to June.

Damp, cold, changeable. Sounds very familiar to this old Welsh inhabitant. Well, every cloud (and there has been a surfeit) has a sliver lining. Most of the plant life has loved it.

The miles of banking, previously likened to 'polka-dot bikinis', have filled out, bulging against their limits.

The plastic liner is gradually being devoured.

We have reached a milestone here. The planting has finally finished, with thousands planted, cataloguing them all will take months!

The vines planted here two years ago were then just ailing adult stems, shorn of their tendrils. Now it rambles with gusto over the pergola, stuffed with embryonic grapes.

This gives on to a view that is easy for anyone to relax to. 

But not all are relaxing. The flush of flower power has brought with it pollinators galore. These in turn have attracted some beautiful predators. The bee-eaters.

Last year we had our first pair. This year we have a flock of around ten of them!

All this pollinating, along with the mild weather, has produced my first ever bananas, growing deep in the already enormous banana trees.

There has been a second milestone reached. Deep in the deep dark wood, the treehouse has been finished and awaits is first occupants...

Ground floor; toilet.

First floor, bedroom and lounge.

Top floor, room with a view...

This is definitely Phil's Folly

See all of the garden blog here.

The Saga - Epilogue

The Pyrenean Saga (as recorded in the last few blogs) may have ended, but then... it may not have. Like Brexit, who the fuck knows?

Whilst most people are wondering what the hell is going on, we took one more look to see if we could find our nemesis, now known to be the Dark Lord Farrage. There is more chance here, I thought, than in the British Parliament. Sod all happening there...

Things were looking bleak, the snow almost gone, the lifts shut, the bars closed. Now we're talking serious stuff...

One of the little people came with us on this dangerous mission. (Spoiler alert, no children were damaged in the making of this blog. A couple of adults, however, were a little worse for wear...)

We set off up to the lofty, grassy, heights hoping to spot one of the architects of the demotion of Great Britain to Little Britain; a 'Lesser-Spotted Boris', a 'Endlessly-Spotted Mogg' or, hopefully, an 'Excessively-Spotted Farrage'.

With what little snow remained, a likeness of our nemesis was made. 

However, we were alone. We resorted to fighting amongst ourselves, with yours truly getting the worst of the barrage.

The mountainside was scoured for evidence of life, or failing that, a politician.

But to no avail. Our nemesis had escaped again...

We retired almost gracefully to a local drinking establishment where Lyzëa hit the beer.

 Then sunk her teeth into raw flesh.

On returning home, she hit the rock 'n roll scene....

There is no stopping this kid...

War

Somewhere, everywhere, there is a war going on. Always. All the time. Every minute of every hour.
And it is somewhere near you right now.

We humans consider ourselves to be war-like, aggressive and dangerous (except for me). But the nature all around you is far worse. Every tree is fighting upwards for a greater share of precious light, every blade of grass is fighting for an unfair share of the land around it. Nature is a fight. Nature is war.

And my job is peace-keeper.

My job is to control the aggression and weed out the...erm... weeds.

And yet, despite my best efforts, despite acres of plastic liner, despite hours of herbal specism and manual removal, despite the occasional chemical and even biological warfare, I cannot rest.

The weapons of war are scattered around...

For now I am winning. For now my favoured plants are prospering.

Many have been quiescent overwinter, but with a little protection against the cold, some are already recovering with gusto.
The bananas, for instance, are going bananas.

Roses bloom despite constant regiments of aphid infantry controlled by their supreme leaders, the ants.
The ponds are surrounded by colour, each flowering beauty fighting to attract the most bees.

And in the murky depths, the lotus has obscenely burst forth, pushing aside all comers, like an alien porn show.

And in the duck pond, the winter of Cold War has now been blown apart, with each egg-layer believing itself to be the most important in the pecking order. The black swans have laid twenty eggs so far this spring. For some reason they do not appreciate these being turned into omelettes.

Approaching the nest can be a little fraught...

The peacocks are some of the few who are not at war.
Love.
Not war.

Although she may be more interested in food...

A mouse took a stroll through the deep dark wood.

Spring is early and I'm excited! Is it the hormones playing up? Have I finally lost it? 

Some of you may not understand how a garden can be exciting. It should be a place of tranquility and contemplation. Well, sometimes it is, but whilst the weeds are growing all around you, rest is but a fickle companion.

However, along with the weeds, the thousands of plants carefully put to bed last year are awakening and bursting forth.

Everything is growing, from roses to bananas, from willows to weeds. Even the lotus is stirring from its murky depths, the palms are reaching upwards, the fish are yawning and the birds are bonking.

This year the changes should be stunning. Starting here. Starting now.

Meanwhile, the forest is developing, evolving, growing. The ruined gates at its entry are becoming more ruined.

Inside is a new veg patch with tractor tyres for tomatoes and strawberries, plus table and bench for sitting and watching me dig it...

and on the bench...

A mouse took a stroll 

through the deep dark wood.

 A fox saw the mouse 

and the mouse looked good.

 On went the mouse through the deep dark wood.

An owl saw the mouse and the mouse looked good.

 On went the mouse through the deep dark wood.

A snake saw the mouse and the mouse looked good.

Erm. The snake's in the post. And it's a worm. The snakes were too scary..

"My Favourite Food!" the Gruffalo said.

"You'll look nice on a slice of bread!"

OK - So the gruffalo needs a bit of work...

Silly old Phil. Doesn't he know? 

There's no such thing as a Gruffalo?

Further into the Deep Dark Wood the Gruffalo tree house has gained a penthouse.

All was quiet in the deep dark wood.

The mouse found a nut, and the nut was good.

The Saga Ends

It seems that, as we plunge towards an uncertain future, we may have been wrong about the root cause of the terminal need of our Great British Empire to leave Europe.

It seems that Dark Powers may not have been behind this chaos. It now appears to be caused simply by normal people.

Normal people voted for leaving Europe and normal people voted to stay. Normal people are confused about what is or isn't going on, and normal people are right pissed off with it.

And so begs the question. What is a normal person? Who is a normal person?

Humanity finds itself spread over a wide bell-curve, from those at one extreme end whom love cats, to the other end that love dogs. One end that love life, beauty and sex, and the other end such as, erm, catholics. From terrorists at one end, to tree huggers at the other.

Right smack in the middle is the normal person. Dead centre is Mr Normal and Mrs Normal. Other options are available.

It was my job to find Mr & Mrs Normal and destroy them by public humiliation.

And so to our last chance to divert the Totally Bloody Dis-United Kingdom from its suicidal path. After much research, study and hanging around in Toulouse Airport, we picked the worlds two most likely candidates and took them deep into the pyrenees for further study.

Once more under the guise of a skiing trip. 

Only this time with added snow!

 Although not a lot.

Here are our likely suspects. Next to Soggy-bottom sits Mrs Cecelia Normal. They are both supping at perfectly normal mulled wine.

 And then the apparently perfectly normal Mr Roger Normal...

 This was clearly going to be a difficult and exhausting task. The usual refreshments were required.

The four of us set off for a mornings skiing.

I carefully watched Mr & Mrs Normal for any sign of abnormal behaviour.

In places the snow was rather thin.

These were, perhaps, not ideal conditions for skiing, although it appeared that Mr normal skied as well as any normal man, earning him the nickname 'Reckless' Roger. Here he is steaming down a black run. Or maybe a green one...

 So far, so normal.

Psychological study was the first task. It is well known that inside the normal male head are lots of boxes. One for the car. One for the wife. One for disrupting the British Empire.
This is me explaining the theory to a recalcitrant audience...

Here's a box shaped thing as found in mens' brains.

(I sometimes have to go to extreme lengths trying to fit my photos into a some kind of a cogent storyline.)
The normal woman's brain, on the other hand, is more like this.

 And a dogs'...

So much for a cogent storyline.

By the afternoon the snow was classified as 'claggy' and skis were discarded. Instead we walked on a newly discovered route circling around our favourite bar. Always a safe choice.

Having studied Mr & Mrs Normal's psychological profile for a while, I began to have the slightest of doubts about my quarry, but I continued with my studies.

The next day, three of us spent the morning skiing, 'Reckless' having given up. This, I was told, was perfectly normal behaviour.
That afternoon we set out from our abode by foot, heading into the mountainous forest.

We made it as far a viewpoint over our valley. This was as far as we could get, as the sun was getting low. This was thought to coincide with oncoming nighttime.

 The last rays of the sun lit the distant monastery, the same one encountered in the previous blog,

thus showing what a bloody good camera I have.

As we turned back, I mentioned that, further into the mountains, lived a hermit couple, Mr & Mrs Hermit. This interested Mr & Mrs Normal who wished to visit them. We thus decided to set off early the next day, on foot, forgoing claggy skiing, and attempt the impossible. A complete circuit of the local mountain.
This is the sort of thing normal people do. Or so I was told.

 The initial climb was off piste, steep and covered by the wrong kind of leaves. Lots of them.

 'Soggy Bottom' was lagging behind, as soggy bottoms do.

After much walking, slipping and climbing, we arrived at the hermits watermill. Mrs Normal stopped for a rest, not realising the danger she was in. She was sat on a bridge known locally to be a troll dwelling.

 And Lo! The troll appeared! Horror!!!

It was a while before we realised that it was indeed (as the more perceptive among you may have realised) 'Reckless' Roger. My suspicions that, just possibly, 'Reckless' may not be perfectly normal, were beginning to be realised.

After further climbing, we arrived breathlessly at the hermit abode.

We stopped to pass the time of day. Mr & Mrs Hermit have lived in this god-forsaken place for many many years, and have already been the subject of a blog here.
It is fair to say that these people are not normal. I'm quite sure that they, themselves, would agree. To be even more fair, they would probably be found as far away from the centre of the bell-curve as is possible. Compared to these fine people, Mr & Mrs normal could be seen as extremists.

 We left this fine abode and headed for a nearby forest track to continue our walk.
The snow got thicker, our legs got more tired. How long can normal people go on in these conditions? We had, of course, been here before, when we had attempted this route in our car. Idiots. Blog here: Certain doom.

It was a total of twelve kilometres walking and climbing higher and higher, to reach the ski station (over four hours) where our beers were awaiting us. We stopped there for a while to watch Wales finish their superb six-nations rugby match.

Both Mr & Mrs Normal behaved absolutely normally by ignoring the match and playing with their phones.
Once refreshed we started our decent by road, a further nine kilometres of winding torture. We arrived home as darkness descended, coinciding nicely with the sun doing a similar thing.

And so, finally, thankfully, our saga comes to an end. Were these two fine specimens actually normal? Did they require humiliating? Was this the chance to save the empire?

 You can make your own mind up....

It was time to leave these fine mountains, knowing that they remain there for us, a permanent retreat in times of chaos. Somehow the hermits' life seems more and more attractive.

Thanks for reading guys. It's time I had a lie down...