A third reasonable day (i.e. dry until later this afternoon) forecast. What have we done to deserve this?

Francine had a hankering to see the sea so we headed for an area of dunes on the north-east Norfolk coast between Horsey and Winterton-on-Sea. Somewhere in the 3-mile stretch of dunes between these two places, we’d been told, were some freshwater pools supporting the rare Natterjack Toad (Bufo calamita). Knowing no better, we made for Horsey, parked and spotted a sign advertising a wildlife reserve and Natterjack Toads, amongst other things. We began scaling the grass-covered sandy dunes in anticipation.

Walking on soft sand is hard work. A mile on this sort of ground is worth at least two miles on terra firma, possibly more. I confess to being a little confused, nay troubled, by our information which suggested that the pools were to be found “on the seaward side of the dunes”. Unlikely, I thought. Firstly, any fresh water in any depression here would very quickly soak into the very porous, soft sand. Secondly, the only thing here “on the seaward side of the dunes” was beach and saltwater in the form of the North Sea. I could not escape the thought that we were hunting in the wrong place. From our vantage point atop the coastal dune, we did spot a seal’s head making occasional appearances in the surf but that was all.

After about 1½ miles (i.e. 3 miles worth) of sandy trudging, we descended on the landward side of the dunes to head back to our car before our 2-hour parking ticket turned into a pumpkin. Lo and behold before us, another sign advertising the beginning of the nature reserve, which seemed to be decidedly on the landward side of the dune. Alas, with thoughts of a pumpkin ripening, we had stumbled across the reserve too late. It seems the reserve is nearer to the Winterton-on-Sea end of the dunes. We began heading back to the car on a firmer track when Francine spotted orchids in the grass. I left her happily snapping away while I returned so as not to miss the pumpkin harvest.

Back in the car park, I discovered more orchids which I pointed out to Francine when she eventually returned about 15 minutes B.P. (Before Pumpkin). Further snapping ensued as did further confusion.

Right, orchids. When we arrived and first found orchids, Francine was of the opinion that they were Southern Marsh Orchids (Dactylorhiza  praetermissa). Back at base she delved into her WildGuides  book, Britain’s Orchids (David Lang) and discovered to her consternation that there were a couple of v. similar species, the Early Marsh Orchid (Dactylorhiza incarnata) and the Narrow-leaved Marsh Orchid (Dactylorhiza traunsteineri). To add to the confusion, the Southern Marsh Orchid is “a complex” with several different subspecies. Making matters even worse, it appears that these tricksy little plants are prone to hybridize with each other. Now Francine was tearing out fistfuls of her not inconsiderable hair.

We left the car park, without a pumpkin but littered with Francine’s discarded locks, and headed for Winterton-on-Sea via the National Trust’s so-called Horsey Mill which, as far as I can tell, isn’t a mill at all but a pump. Some of the wind “mills” in the Norfolk Broads, maybe even all of them, are actually pumps which drained the land by raising water up into rivers. Go figure!

After disturbing a nesting Swallow by buying an ice cream at the NT kiosk – it was nesting right beside the serving hatch and flew off every time anybody bought anything – we made it to Winterton. Avoiding a second parking fee, we found a legal place in town to bail out and walked just a little further once again to trudge through the dunes. We went “ooh, ah” at a Little Tern colony nicely fenced off on the beach for protection [excellent idea but a boring stretch of sand that we couldn’t approach closely – unphotogenic] before thinking, once again, that we were hunting the Snark. Becoming tired of walking on soft sandy dunes for a second time in one day, we turned to return via the most direct route we could find whereupon we stumbled across a fenced off small pool [keen on fences around here] bearing a sign announcing the presence of Natterjack Toads. Could we see one or hear one? No!

We got back to Guillaume just as the forecast rain started. Very accurate, well done Met Office.

With the prospect of another reasonable day in our currently crappy weather pattern, we were expecting to be able to continue our Norfolk Hawker hunt with a visit to its well publicized breeding ground at the Norfolk Wildlife Trust’s site of Upton Broad and Marshes In this context, “another reasonable day” means a day with temperatures approaching the seasonal average, some sunny spells and rain that doesn’t arrive until later in the afternoon. After a few necessary camp chores, we packed some chorizo and tomato sandwiches for lunch and headed out for an 11:00 AM start.

We’d been given a map and directed to two areas of the reserve, the so-called turf ponds near the entrance and a water soldier dyke at the north-eastern extreme of the reserve. Being near the entrance, we hit the turf ponds first. This was an intriguing habitat different from any I’d seen before: small, roughly circular pools, each surrounded my a mown grass border to facilitate access, with taller grasses between them all. Whilst not what I’d describe as swarming, there was plenty of activity to keep us amused until lunchtime. A Norfolk Hawker or two were hawking about but not settling for photo shoots. Black-tailed Skimmers (Orthetrum cancellatum) and Four-spotted Chasers (Libellula quadrimaculata) were much more amenable.

Then we hit the boardwalks to head for the Water Soldier dyke. For some peculiar reason, the UK population of Norfolk Hawkers (Aeshna isosceles) has something of a fixation about Water Soldier (Stratiotes aloides). Water Soldier is a curious water plant that spends most of its year submerged until, in summer, it rises to the surface to produce a single flower. In the UK, the dragonflies seem to be tightly bound to Water Soldier for their reproduction, laying their eggs on the plant when it has surfaced. I said “peculiar” because the reliance on Water Soldier seems not to be the case abroad where A. isosceles exists without Water Soldier and where, naturally enough, it is not called a Norfolk Hawker. 🙂

We eventually came to the dyke which was, indeed, absolutely covered/choked with surfaced rosettes of Water Soldier. A couple of (presumably) male hawkers were cruising back and forth holding territory. A pair formed a copulation wheel – not a pair of males, you understand – right in front of me and zoomed off. Then we spotted a female ovipositing deep within the swathes of Water Soldier. She was mostly obscured by the leaf fronds but it makes an interesting shot.

On our return wander we came across our first/only perched male which makes an interesting comparison, for amateur odonatologists anyway, with a female that we also passed along the track. The female was being videoed by a man staring through a large movie camera, complete with furry microphone, mounted on a very large tripod. We paused at some distance and let him finish before advancing, for which he was very grateful commenting that, “very few people would have been so considerate”. I know only too well what it’s like to have a shot ruined by a passing stranger or a passing stranger’s galloping canine. We chatted awhile while I scared off the hawker. Though dogs are banned at Upton, it seems that dog owners bring them in anyway, particularly at weekends, despite notices being displayed. Our new friend had had several altercations with dog owners and was not shy about expressing his hatse of dogs. He proved to be a very willing recruit to my Dog-Free World Society. What a nice man! 😀

The sexes of the Norfolk Hawker appear very similar and I was having trouble with some of my identifications but I think I’ve got it now.

We’ve been looking forward to today. The weather forecasters have been suggesting/guessing that today would be good as far as England goes. This is not, you understand, good in the absolute sense. Good weather in the absolute sense means, in my book, a cloudless day with constant sunshine. In England, normally, good means no rain, with a few small, white, fluffy clouds occasionally obscuring the sun. This year, good in England means dry, with occasional sunny intervals in between quite large, threateningly black clouds that don’t actually discharge any precipitation. The latter is what we got, some decent spells of sunshine but a sky that was sometimes shrouded by vaguely threatening clouds.

Overnight, our visiting celebrity Norfolk Hawker (Aeshna isosceles) had disappeared from the hole/recess in the hedge surrounding our pitch. I was surprised, 08:30 seemed a bit early for it to have flown. After a simple breakfast, we kicked off the day by visiting the river at Ludham Bridge and doing a dragonfly survey. Several Red-eyed Damselflies (Erythromma najas) were our most interesting find.

On to the main event of the day and our first real Norfolk Hawker hunt. Acting on recommendations from none other than the president of the BDS, whom I’d emailed before leaving on our trip, we headed for Alderfen. Alderfen is a Norfolk Wildlife Trust site with absolutely no signs whatsoever advertising its presence from the road. Maybe they don’t want people to go there? Fortunately instructions and a map got us there and we fell in love with the place almost immediately, a delightfully rural location that was very tranquil and peaceful courtesy of there being only ourselves and the Odos in residence. Perfect!

Alderfen proved to be the mother lode of Azure Damselflies (Coenagrion puella). The trouble was, I’d been told that the place was also home to the not-so-common-but-very-similar-looking Variable Damselfly (Coenagrion pulchellum), which meant that I needed to study as many as possible to ensure that I knew what I was looking at. After countless Azures, I finally found a few Variables, including this very exhibitionist pair in cop.

I’d just finished suggesting that our campsite celebrity visitor might be the only Norfolk Hawker (Aeshna isosceles) that we saw this trip when one whizzed down the Alderfen track we were on. We subsequently found one, perhaps the same one, perched near to the ground in the grass.

Shortly afterwards, we found several more Norfolk Hawkers holding territory over various stretches of water, flying back and forth, frequently chasing off Four-spotted Chasers (Libellula quadrimaculata), occasionally tussling with each other and very occasionally settling, though not terribly conveniently. They really were quite entertaining and Francine swung into manual focus mode to grab an in-flight shot, clever old thing that she is.

Well satisfied, later in the afternoon we set off on our bikes to investigate some of the local lanes. A couple of miles got us to the Broads Authority’s How Hill where there is a wildlife walking trail. Here, three generations of one family joined us watching yet another Norfolk Hawker hunting over the grassland near the entrance and they began quizzing me about Norfolk Hawkers and dragonflies in general. How satisfying it was to find people interested enough to ask questions and to pass on a little knowledge.

A little way into the wildlife walk, something was attracting a lot of attention from a group of four or five people. Norfolk has another insect celebrity, being the only place in the UK where Swallowtail butterflies (Papilio machaon) can be found. We’ve seen them in France and Spain but here was our first in the UK. So intent on trying to snap it was I that I lost yet another expensive pair of sunglasses whilst doing so. Fortunately, I realized shortly afterwards, backtracked and found them in the grass near to where the Swallowtail had been. I still managed to get a blade of grass over one wing tip, too. Darn!

Our route back to Guillaume took us by the ruins of St. Benet’s Abbey which, owing to a large amount of restoration work, are currently completely unphotogenic, being surrounded by ugly metal fencing. The River Bure beside it, however, delivered a very photogenic Great Crested Grebe (Podiceps cristatus) and its chick as they drifted downstream in the late afternoon sun. [Sun? Yes, sun. Unbelievable.] Grebe chicks really are painfully cute in a stripy, fluffy kind of way.

Following yesterday’s False Start with our bikes securely fastened to their carriers and yours truly being sans key, the embarrassing lack of key having been rectified, this morning we thought we’d have another go at getting going. Yesterday having begun with our traditional fried breakfast (why is it that no other country in Europe fully understands breakfast?) but having been disqualified for leaving the starting blocks incorrectly, today’s second start required a second fried breakfast. [Thinks: must leave keys at home more often.]

We weren’t the only ones breakfasting. Guillaume is pitched in a blackbird family’s territory and family Blackbird was out foraging, the two parent birds feeding two youngsters who stood out looking decidedly gingery up front. Shooting pictures through Guillaume’s plastic windows is never very satisfactory, especially in abysmal light. However, as I left Guillaume to do some camp duties, I caught one of the young ‘ns using Francine’s now unlocked bicycle wheel as a perch. It seemed completely unfazed and let me click away at a relatively short distance. Mind you, I was using Guillaume’s porch awning as cover.

As we continued to watch through Guillaume’s optically imperfect windows, Francine excitedly declared, “there’s an Odo”. Even with my new bionic eyeball I was having trouble locating it but I did see a streak as it zoomed about in the corner of our field along the hedge that borders it. Francine thought the culprit had settled on the hedge and went to search for it. She got very close to the hedge, so close that I suggested it must have flown through because, had it been there, she’d surely have spooked it by now. “I thought it went into the hedge”, she said. I peered into a very dark hole/recess in the hedge and, sure enough, hanging at the back, I could just make out a dragonfly. (The culprit was at the back of the recess indicated by the arrow in the picture.)

Francine’s camera was to hand and with a decent lens mounted; I peered through it and focussed. “Bugger me, it’s go the tell-tale yellow triangle – it’s only a bloody Norfolk Hawker!”, I exclaimed profanely. 1/8th second didn’t look promising for a picture though, so dimly lit was the recess in the hedge, but nonetheless Francine fetched my camera complete with macro lens as I kept watch. Somehow, I loosed off 75 monopod-assisted shots using a variety of combinations of settings including ISO 800, ISO 1600, F8 and F5.6, in an attempt to get something recognisable from the appalling light level. Unsurprisingly, F5.6 and ISO 1600 were the only shots that really worked and, after a little extra noise reduction, I was happy that I’d got a usable shot.

Then I woke up. “Wait a moment, this camera has a built-in flash.” Flash can look terribly false and I hardly ever use it. However, needs must. After all, this was the main purpose of my trip here. I tried a mixture of dedicated flash and fill-in flash, the latter producing the best result and I finally had what I think is a really decent shot of my intended Norfolk quarry. I think this individual is female and I’m wondering, given its behaviour, if it is a recently emerged female that was looking for somewhere to shelter. The temperature was an Odo-unfriendly 12°C, or thereabouts. (Our maximum today was a blistering 14°C. Pitiful!)

Eventually I managed to tear myself away from Guillaume’s latest friend and Francine and I went for a bike ride through Horning and into Wroxham. In the same way that Padstow in Cornwall has about a dozen establishments in the Rick Stein empire, Wroxham is famous for its plethora of stores, also about a dozen, bearing the Roys name. In the Roys supermarket we found some dressed Cromer crabs for lunch which we destroyed with brown bread, mayonnaise and a little mustard, though I’m ashamed to admit that the mustard was French Dijon. Don’t tell anyone, we’d be thrown out of Norfolk. 😀

I can’t believe it. We drove the 125 miles up here, added to that a 250-mile round trip home and back to retrieve our missing keys, we haven’t been out looking yet and a Norfolk Hawker has come and found us and hung up beside Guillaume in his campsite pitch. I’ve been wrong all along – there IS a God!

Our celebrity guest is still hanging in our hedge this evening as I write this. Clearly it’s there for the night. It’ll probably be there until things warm up a bit. Odos are like me, they like warmth but they really need sun.

Let’s hope it does warm up ‘cos Francine and I both went and bought some warmer clothes today.

When we went for a long weekend to Shropshire recently in search of the White-faced Darters at Whixall Moss, we opted for a different approach. Normally when travelling avec Guillaume, I bring him round to our house where I give him a swift-ish wash and brush up and load him up with clothes before setting off. Since he was already reasonably clean and we didn’t need very much loading up for a long weekend, for Shropshire we just took everything we needed in the car and set off from the Champ de Guillaume [Guillaume’s field].

For this Norfolk expedition, since the Champ de Guillaume is 10 miles closer to Norfolk than our house, we decided on the same approach. On Friday, I loaded the car including sticking our hardly-used-this-year-because-of-the-crappy-weather bikes on the roof bar bike carriers. On Saturday morning we loaded the final stuff – camera bags, food bags etc. and set off to collect Guillaume. Eventually, we hit the road with Guillaume in tow and the bikes atop the car looking as though we were heading for France. However, as planned we ended up in Norfolk three hours later. That fooled Guillaume! 😀

This morning, Francine stared at our OS map and planned a cycling route which we might manage hopefully before the advertised rain hit. It was still windy but what the hell – at least Norfolk is flat. It was then that Franco realized his calamitous mistake. I had a set of house keys with which we’d locked up as we left home, I had a set of keys for Guillaume to keep him secure on site (or at least as secure as a caravan can ever be), I had a set of car keys with which we’d driven up here. What I categorically did not have were any keys to the bike carriers. Our bikes were securely locked to their respective carriers mounted atop our car on the roof bars. The roof bars were securely locked to the car. Francine produced her spare set of keys containing a car key, two Guillaume keys and a roof bar key … but not the bicycle carrier keys. Bother, or words to that effect!

I had my tool kit. I examined the bike carriers but, alas, could see no way of disassembling the bike carriers. The bikes were locked to the carriers and the roof bars were locked to the car but the bike carriers were not locked to the bars, so at least I could remove both bikes still locked in their carriers.

After the air cleared, we listed our options:

1. Live with it.
2. Phone a lock smith.
3. Phone neighbour Liz and get the keys – I knew exactly where they were -mailed to our campsite.
4. Drive the 250-mile round trip home and back to collect the keys myself.

Evaluation of options:

#1 for two weeks in an essentially flat Norfolk was decidedly unattractive.

#2 seemed possible so we hoofed it to the campsite management and secured the phone number of a supposedly mobile locksmith. Could I get a mobile signal chez Guillaume? Absolument non! I walked as far as Ludham Bridge where I secured an intermittent signal. I managed to phone the mobile locksmith on my mobile phone. He was now retired. Brilliant! I trudged back.

#3 was going to be difficult (see #2). Also, the earliest the keys might arrive would be some time Tuesday. What if they didn’t arrive? What if they were never seen again? Our bikes would be firmly fixed to their carriers forever, albeit off the car.

#4 it was then. I unfastened both bike/carrier combinations, discarded them on the grass near Guillaume – let’s face it, the bike carriers would stop anyone nicking them – and departed on my solo 250-mile round trip at 11:00 AM.

I got home at about 1:55 PM, collected the irritatingly small set of all-important keys and was back on the road by 2:00 PM. I knew where I was going – A14/A11/A47 etc – but I was using Sally Satnav for convenience. Good job, too, as it turns out. I’d just left Cambridge behind on the A14 when large illuminated information boards persistently announced, “A11 NORTH CLOSED”. Bollocks! Now look, there’s only one road into Norfolk and it’s the A11. How can you close it? What now? Sally, however, seemed to be aware of this major disruption and routed me via Bury St. Edmunds and Thetford to get back on the A11 apparently north of whatever the problem was. Incidentally, with whatever the major issue was behind me, the A11 was now blissfully quiet. I got back to Guillaume at 4:25 PM. Thanks, Sally! You earned your money today.

See what happens when you break your routine and do things a different way? Not a good idea. I only just remembered to bring Guillaume’s key at the last minute. Pity I didn’t remember the keys for the bikes, too. A 250-mile round trip may seem a bit daft but actually, the day was going to be iffy and any other solution, though saving the time and effort, would almost certainly have been more expensive than the £40-worth of diesel I used.

Francine used my 5½-hour absence constructively by going round some of the gardens in nearby Ludham, which was having a gardens open day. While I was driving back and forth, she found a few Odos (for some reason we’re having a hard time identifying them) but, more importantly for her, she added a new orchid to her collection: a Southern Marsh Orchid (Dactylorhiza praetermissa).

On her way back to Guillaume from her gardens tour, a phone signal must have appeared from somewhere approaching civilization and Francine received a text message from neighbour Liz (as in #3 above). The message read, “Have I just seen Franco? Is everything alright?” Francine called and explained to the amusement of everyone.

It’s good to have vigilant neighbours. It’s also good to have all the keys you need with you. Had we been in France as usual, #1 may have been our only reasonable option. 😉

No, I’m not going to do the old joke, “this is Norfolk and you’re welcome to it”. Norfolk may be one of the flattest counties in the UK but it’s a pleasantly rural  county characterised by flint cottages. Very picturesque in a flat sort of way.

When my father retired many years ago (35 years ago?), my parents made the classic mistake [for them] of leaving family and moving … up to Norfolk, buying a bungalow in the curiously named village of Repps with Bastwick, or Repps cum Bastwick, as the old decorated village sign says [Latin cum = with]. “Curious” because the village didn’t have a pub. What self-respecting village in those days would be seen without a pub? Nowadays, what sort of village doesn’t have an Indian restaurant that used to be a pub? Anyway, Repps is actually one village (sans pub) on one side of the main road and Bastwick is another village (also sans pub) on the other side of the same main road. I used to come and visit them up here for a week. Why, when neither village on either side of the road had a pub or an Indian Restaurant is completely beyond me. Not too long after – I can’t remember how long – they made the second classic mistake [this time for me] of moving back to my town, “to be close to me”. Bollocks! Why do parents insist on following their children around?

I have been to Norfolk since the days of visiting mes parents but it was still a very long time ago. This weekend we set sail to spend almost two weeks in Norfolk for the first time in many years, complete with new bionic eyeball, essentially in search of a dragonfly dubbed, by the BDS, the Norfolk Hawker (Aeshna isosceles). We [the Brits] call it the Norfolk Hawker because it used to exist in the UK only in Norfolk. Fortunately, despite our increasingly crappy climate, the Norfolk Hawker seems to be spreading and is now breeding in Cambridgeshire. Nonetheless, I wanted to see it in its home territory, where there might be greater chance of success, and, being now stuck in the UK as a result of recent eyeball operations, a Norfolk Hawker search was a good excuse to visit somewhere different.

Regrettably, the weather forecast is not Odo-friendly. In fact, the weather forecast isn’t particularly Homo sapiens friendly either, and we drove for almost three hours under black skies through downpours and buffeting winds to get here. We even drove past my parents old bungalow in Repps cum Bastwick to get here. And here we are, still under black skies with gusting winds but the downpours for the moment have ceased. Yesterday was the summer solstice with the sun at its northern hemisphere zenith. Today the temperature topped out at a paltry 17°C. It’s pathetic! I want to emigrate!! The trouble is my mother is still living three miles away from me [see above].

There are other forms of tourism than Odo-tourism, even for an Odo-nutter. One alternative form of tourism of which I’m particularly fond is gastro-tourism – the art of savouring the flavours of the world. For a gastro-tourist, Norfolk has its flavours to be sampled. On the north Norfolk coast lies Cromer, justly famous for its Cromer crabs. We will certainly be trying to savour of few examples of those. Norwich, the county town and most easterly city in the UK, is home to the Colman’s mustard empire. Colman’s mustard isn’t that namby-pamby mild stuff from foreign countries but is pungent mustard, the mustard that goes with roast beef, complete with vapours that get inside your nasal cavities and make your eyes water – proper mustard. Pork pies must also be accompanied by Colman’s mustard. I’ll certainly be on the look out for an opportunity to enjoy one with some of that essential bright yellow local condiment.

With a little historic insider knowledge I’m also acutely aware of another delicacy with which I’m especially keen to get reacquainted. On the north coast lies another village called Cley-next-the-sea [Cley pronounced Cl-eye]. Here there is, or at least used to be, a wonderful little smokehouse producing the most delicious smoked eels, amongst other things. I’ll be upset if I don’t see a Norfolk Hawker but, though eels are in serious decline and in need of protection, the gastro-tourist in me will be devastated if I don’t sample a Cley smoked one. That’s if the smokehouse still exists, of course. If it doesn’t still exist, I’ll be even more devastated ‘cos yet another skilful local producer of something very special, another cottage industry that should be applauded, will have disappeared. Watch this space.

Tonight, having got ourselves pitched and settled, we dined on something very much not Norfolk. This evening we ate Guillaume’s first ever risotto, a seafood risotto made with prawns, mussels and squid with a hint of fresh of fresh basil. And very good it was too, even though I say so myself. 😉

Tomorrow’s weather forecast is for much of the same, black skies with rain and wind. Isn’t summer in the UK a joy?