On one of our days out with Paul's parents, we went to another National Trust site called Wicken Fen. It's an area of Cambridgeshire that still looks like this area of England did before the marshlands were drained to create farmland. Just as the land was drained with the use of windpumps, Wicken Fen stays marshy now with the use of the windpumps to pump water in when the levels get low. It was a nice place to take a walk on the boardwalks and enjoy the marsh flowers.
The hawthorn trees are especially pretty right now. I learned that in medieval times, it was thought that to bring hawthorn blossoms into the house was a harbinger of a death in the house. It's now known that there is a chemical in the blossom that is one of the same chemicals first formed in decaying animal tissue -- kind of a stinky tree, really. So that's probably the basis of the myth. (The more you know!)
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| Mom & Dad H standing next to the "old style" windpump. |
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| Looking out the window of the "hide" (like a blind) with Dad & Grandpa. |
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| Blooms of the hawthorn tree |
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| Pretty tiny blue blooms of the California Lilac. |
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