Butterfly House

This Sunday gone, I went to North Anston Butterfly House with my fiance. We've been a few times, and enjoy it each time. You have your typical farm animals...

Beware the goats eat your sleeves

Sweet pigs

You can spend a good hour or two feeding the goats and chickens with the food sold at the entrance.

Then leaving the Farm Barn you walk around to the red squirrel enclosure...

Now these are so sweet, I love red squirrels. They are housed with a jackdaw that enjoys a nice piece of kiwi or orange.

Other animals you can visit include the guinea pigs and rabbits.

In his little cottage

Peacocks, chickens and the resident turkey follow you around, hoping you will throw a bit of food their way.

Even this peacock was enjoying the weather

Quite intimidating, but once you get past his appearance he enjoys the food too

Then it's onto the meerkat enclosure, and then around to the prairie dogs and chipmunks.

Sentry duty

This meerkat was more interested in the planes overhead than the food

Sunbathing

New and pleasing addition to the park

Friendly little fellows that enjoyed a long enclosure

Oh it's half past twelve? Time for the Bird Show!

More than just birds of prey; these two macaws Bonnie and Alfie showed off for us

Cookie the kookaburra

Flint the Harris Hawk, who was almost as old as me

What an enjoyable display; the birds don't mind flying right over your head, their feathers brushing your hair as they move around the arena. Plenty of opportunites for the kids to join in too, as it's the Easter Holidays.

 Then into the Tropical House, home to butterflies, bats, snakes, tarantulas, fish, ducks, terrapins, pheasants, hummingbirds and more!

Really?

Iguana chilling out

Unfortunately my photos of the bats didn't turn out as the humidity was too much for my camera at times. Although I did sneak in a little stroke!

Then round to the parrot enclosure, looking at the last few animals before we leave.

What attractive colouring

Sweet barn owl

I liked the hair-do in this picture :-)

Richard enjoying an ice lolly in the sun

Couldn't resist taking a few pictures of the tame robins that were hanging about the centre. No doubt on the lookout for an easy meal

 A really enjoyable day. Can't wait to go again.

Peak District

So I went to the Peak District on Sunday, got the train to Edale from Sheffield and decided to have a bit of a wander before I start my camping excursions. Well I found the scenery absolutely gorgeous and can't wait to get all my gear together to spend a night or two there.

First I found this stream

Then I went through the village to the Nag's Head, the start of the Pennine Way

Followed the signpost to the Pennine Way

Then promptly got lost. Looking back over Edale

Found a quirky bench to sit and have a sandwich on

You'd think he'd never seen a hiker before...

There were plenty of little waterfalls along the way

Looking back along the path I'd walked

My camera really doesn't do the place justice though. 

Drystone wall

I finally found out where I'd been walking for the best part of four hours

Definitely going again soon, might have to make it a regular Sunday thing (the train fares are cheaper on Sunday for some reason lol). However, all this walking (6+ hours) didn't half hurt my thighs and shoulders for the following two days, I'm well out of practise. The weather was fine for most of the day, apart from three showers of hailstones, the third shower lasting a lot longer than the other two and resulting in me taking shelter in a telephone box

Not this phone box though, it was one in Upper Booth

Had to jog back in time to catch my train home or face a two-hour wait, oh look wonderful, it's started raining. Ah well only twenty minutes to wait for the train :-/

Pictures from Scotland

I went to Scotland in September last year with a BTCV holiday. I was just looking through the photos and thought I'd pop them up on here.

Where we stayed (mine's the blue tent!) a few miles far from Inverness

Little stream near the site we were working at

Some rhododendron I was about to chop down

Burning the rhododendron

Quirky little mushroom

And I couldn't resist taking some photos out of the window of the train on the way home...

Mountain

Pretty little scene

Bit of a forest...wish I lived here!

The scenery was so amazing...the plan is to eventually go wild camping in the Cairngorms, but I have to "practise" in the Peak District first! I wasn't the only one taking photos out of the train windows :-)