I have a feeling...

...that something is going on right under my nose, but I can't quite pin it down. I have found a couple of empty beer cans in the garden, and part of a Jaffa cake box pushed into a stack of empty flowerpots by the woodpile. Now Ruby-Lou has found herself a new pet; a beautiful bronze pine beetle, and the only way she could have caught one is by waiting for it to chew its way out of a log....and that means she must have been hanging around the woodpile. She isn't responsible for the beer cans, because she is a Port 'n Lemon girl, but something is going on....

Flotsam

I am sure you have all read about the boatloads of Africans arriving in the Canary Islands each day, often in a pitiful condition after being abandoned by the boat masters who took their money with the promise of an easy trip to the promised land. Aid from the EU has slowed down the Atlantic traffic with more sea patrols, but Mediterranean Spain is now becoming just as popular a landfall. The increased patrols by Guardia Civil boats along the coast of Almeria are forcing the traffic further north. Last week a boat was found abandoned on a small beach near Benidorm, and a couple of its passengers were later found, soaking wet, close by. How many more made it into the hinterland is as yet unknown.

This happened last Wednesday, and it was no coincidence it seems, that on our way back home about 9.30pm, we were stopped by the Guardia, just as we entered Carrio, and the interior of the car was checked. We were given the all clear and sent on our way. At the same time, Peter, who was leaving Carrio on the other side of the hill was stopped and asked where he had come from and where he was going. Had a boat been seen locally we wonder? Are there strangers in our midst?

Autumn colour

There are photos of autumn colours on so many of the Blogs I visit, that I thought I might follow suit. Then I looked around and realised that there really wasn't much evidence of the season's colour in my garden or the surrounding area. Palm trees, pine trees and rubber trees don't change colour in the Autumn, they seem to drop leaves on an ad hoc basis randomly throughout the year. My one splash of red comes from the virginia creeper, grown from a cutting smuggled in after a holiday in England, and even that didn't last long. The day after I took the photo, Bossman got out his stepladders and stripped the leaves off because he was sick of brushing them up every day! Bloody tidy Swiss!

My hydrangea, also grown from an imported cutting, is showing a tinge of yellow, and the pale pink blossoms have dried to a much deeper shade.

The bamboo stems have changed from bright green to straw, and soon I shall be able to harvest last years growth. The only other Autumnal feature I found was a group of Chrysanths. They had been a potted gift last year, and I split them up and planted them out on the off chance they would survive. The unusually wet Summer has been kind to them, and they are in full bloom.