This photo was taken in late summer on Dartmoor. Its Mendip Hills Rangers on navigation training way back when!
No matter how much you try not to, the weather will always creep into any conversation you have with people in the countryside. After all why shouldn’t it, its the weather that controls everything in our lives be you countryman or towns person. We may have amazing technology but thankfully, we have no control over the climate!
Yet again this summer the jet stream seems to be well below us, pulling down the most anti social weather. No BBQ, no picnics, no sunny stroll that ends in an amazing sunset seen through the bottom of a wine or beer glass from the garden of your local pub. Then there’s the land related problems of silage and hay, ripening cereal crops and sugar levels in the coming apple crop.
When it does stop we have short memories, and for a few blissful moments we languish in the warmth of an English summer with all it familiar sounds and smells. These have changed as well. For me summer sounds were the buzz of insects and the cooing of wood pigeon; today its the car alarm going off and the ice cream van chimes. As for smells, well that had to be new cut grass but today it’s more likely to be the neighbours BBQ firing up as they take advantage of the short dry spell and cram in as much outdoor living as they can!
