Dear Readers, after our walk around Coldfall Wood yesterday we took a stroll back, and spotted this amazing car – you certainly wouldn’t miss this one in an underground car park, it’s unique! I love the decoration, and I wonder if the Mongul Rally is actually the Mongol Rally, which finishes in Mongolia. It looks as if the owners might also raise money for the Macular Society, which is close to my heart as Mum had macular degeneration in the last years of her life. At any rate, there is no mistaking this vehicle, and it really cheered me up.

I paused next to All Saints Church on Durham Road to look at this house – if you look closely, you can see that it would have had black and white mock Tudor woodwork on the upper elevation, and it still has its original terracotta tiles right at the top. The glass in the small panels on the first and ground floors is coloured, something that you can see on several houses on this part of the road. I love how individual the houses are here, with the style varying from one small block to another, which reflects the tastes of the  different builders who were developing the area.

Elsewhere on Durham Road, this beautiful magnolia is just about to burst into flower…

And then it’s time for a look at the pavement plug-in points on Bedford Road. There are certainly a lot of them…

But they seem to come in two different types, or maybe the one above hasn’t been finished yet? Looking at them, I suspect the latter. They are mostly at either end of the road rather than in the middle. It will be interesting to see how they work out.

And another thing that always cheers me up are the lovely glass creatures outside this house, and the many containers and baskets full of flowers. A nice front garden is such a gift to everyone who walks past (says she, thinking of her very-much-inbetween-season containers in her front garden).

I love this moss ‘forest’ growing on one of the old brick walls…

And how come I’ve never noticed this plaque before? How things change in a century and a bit…

And finally, as I get back to my house I notice that the catkins on the Kilmarnock Willow are finally fully open – I love all the individual spots of pollen. If you look closely, you can see a tiny fly – not the pollinator that I had in mind when I bought the tree, but an underrated pollinator nonetheless, and I suspect it’s still too cold for many of the bees. Still, this catkin is a thing of beauty, and I’m so pleased that it’s providing sustenance to someone.