Potatoes and a bicycle tree

I woke with the sunlight this morning, and got up at 7.30am to see to the animals. Aware of the fact that Stuart had been very, very tired yesterday afternoon and last night, I tried to leave him in peace and quiet to have a mini lie-in. By taking Reggie with me to release the geese and staying with him in the living room afterwards, we managed to achieve a mainly quiet household. To pass the time, I started prepping vegetables for lunch (a Ligurian potato salad). When I came to put the potatoes on to boil though, I noticed that the gas was very low and unresponsive to the knob being turned up. I realised we had finally reached the end of our first full bottle of gas (which had cost us around €30 and lasted about 5.5 months). Handily for me, just after I'd I realised this, Dad emerged from the apartment and offered to change the bottle if I could find him a spanner. Finding things in the temporary man-cave (the office) is quite a challenge at the moment and I know that the disarray and lack of organisation is driving poor Stuart round the bend. I have to say I am not particularly enjoying sharing my office with power tools, bicycles, dirty boots, garden forks, spades, hoes, rakes, lump hammers, pick axes, boxes of screws, nails and the list goes on... (I'm sure you get the picture) either! Happily, after a few minutes of searching I managed to lay my hands on an adjustable spanner and took it out to Dad, who swapped the empty bottle for a full one, after which I was, quite literally, cooking on gas!

Dad then decided to turn his attention back to the vegetable beds and headed down with the pick axe, garden fork and spade, while Mum and I sat and chatted in the living room while the potatoes cooked.

Stuart managed to lie in until around 10am (which, to be fair, only felt like 9am after the clocks had changed last night), and once he'd showered and dressed, we all shared a coffee in the fresh morning sunshine on the patio. It was another beautiful morning - blue skies and sunshine, but with a fresh breeze.

After coffee, all four of us went down to the terraces for a joint effort at digging over the vegetable beds, pulling out dastardly bramble roots, and resorting to an axe for the particularly tenacious ones.

We carried on until lunchtime, when we broke for a lunch (that Ligurian potato salad) on the patio - and for the first time this year, the garden umbrella made an appearance to shade us from the glaring sunshine. I'm not sure I ever imagined needing to use it in March!

After clearing lunch away, we decided to take Reggie for a proper walk and to try out a new one. Mum had spotted a walk on one of our maps that looked like it was worth investigating, so we all piled into the car and drove to Stiappa to find the footpath that leads from just outside the village to 'Molino del Grillo', and then on to Pontito beyond.

The footpath was delightful, really pretty and very different from our usual dog walks, and definitely one that we will come back to again.

Some of the highlights of the walk were the beautiful primroses dotted all over the banks, the horse shoes (or, as Mum and Dad decided was more likely, mule shoes) carved into rocks all the way along the path, the fish and the serpent carved into rocks next to the mill building, and the 'bicycle tree' - which can really only be explained in a photograph.

 

Mule shoes in the rocks along the path.

Pontito from near the start of the path.

Fish.

Fish and serpent.

Mule shoe.

A bicycle tree (this was a new one even for my botanist Dad).

 After having got as far as the mill, which looked like it was about the halfway point to Pontito, Stuart and I decided to turn back and take Reggie back to the car, leaving Mum and Dad to walk on up the track to Pontito, where we would pick them up.

We duly returned to the car and drove to Pontito. As we drove along the road, we could see two little figures making their way along the track on the opposite hillside from us - we blew Reggie's whistle and waved, but we were too far away for them to see us.

That's Mum and Dad circled in the photo!

Anyway, we found the other end of the track (complete with sign pointing to 'Molino del Grillo') just outside the village, so we pulled over and waited. And waited. I even walked partway down the track to surprise Mum and Dad and walk with them for the last part of the trek, but there was no sign of them. So we waited some more. Eventually, after about 20 minutes, Stuart decided we should drive into the village in case there was another footpath that had brought them out in the village itself. As we turned into the square at the bottom of the village there were two familiar faces sitting on the wall waiting! Oops!!

The weary five of us then headed for home and cups of tea for Mum and Dad and a glass of beer for Stuart and me.

After their tea, though, Mum and Dad headed straight back to the lower terraces to plant potatoes. It had been their mission today (self-imposed, that is, not a mission set for them by us) to finish digging the first vegetable plot and plant up the potatoes, and so they did! Stuart was under strict instruction to take it easy this afternoon, so he sat and read up on composting and other useful topics.

Feeling like I ought to do something constructive, I headed up the terraces to saw down a couple more acacia trees (which, I guess, could be considered destructive rather than constructive), but before I knew it the clock was striking 7pm. This daylight saving hours malarky (a.k.a. British Summertime to those born and bred in the UK) has taken us all a bit by surprise today, so we all hurried inside to clean up before dinner.

It has been another lovely day - a real treat to spend so much time with Mum and Dad, and the beautiful spring weather has made it even more enjoyable.