A bit of a saga.

Meeting the cows.

We planned a visit to Woodwalton Fen; a place that obviously brims with wildlife, but the road was blocked and so we found ourselves at the end of a long, gravel drove at Upwood Meadows Nature Reserve. It didn't look much, just a field with cows in it, but we decided to take a walk anyway. The cattle field seems to only have one feature of interest, ant-hills: huge ant-hills made by yellow meadow ants. The second field was slightly more interesting with a scattering of yellow flowers including ladies bedstraw and birds-foot trefoil that attracted some of the smaller butterflies such as brown argus, common blue and small skipper.

Brown argus.

The third and largest field was a real joy with many more flowers including some unfamiliar ones and a lot more butterflies and dragonflies. The reason for the difference is that this field was never "improved" with herbicides and fertilisers like the other two which are on the way to recovery using seed from the big field.

We arrived back at the car at 5 pm to find that it wouldn't start. I knew this was due to mucky fuel as I had accidentally put petrol in it a couple of weeks ago. Despite draining it down and refilling it, I guessed some petrol still remained in there, but the addition of more diesel would sort that out.
I called home to catch one of our carers at the end of his shift, hoping he could pick up some diesel and get it to us. As our son Dan was playing up a bit, he decided to send another carer and stay on for an extended shift.

Small copper.

Eventually a little bright orange Fiat Panda bumped its way down the drive towards us trailing a dense plume of dust. We were rescued! (Or so we thought).

"This is diesel ins't it?" "No, it's petrol".

Another small copper.

Hanna jumped into the Panda and they set off to get diesel this time. Being that kind of day and this kind of saga, they got lost, then they bought more petrol, then remembered that they were supposed to get diesel and so, after a long wait while the combines hummed and the sun sank low in a dusty sky, the little orange car returned with two green cans of petrol and, (thank Goodness) two black cans of diesel.

Green-veined white.

 After a transfusion of clean diesel the car started first time and we were on our way home.
Meanwhile (back at the ranch) Dan spent an hour waiting in the front garden for what he thought would be his mum and dad's imminent return. Too anxious to go back inside, he took a very public "comfort break" on the front lawn, much to the surprise of a passing lady. She was so "surprised" she passed twice for a second look.

Every cloud has a silver lining? Possibly not.