Midsummer meanders on the Avon and the Trym

I decided I wanted to see some bee orchids, so one sunny morning last week we set off for Lamplighter's Marsh near Shirehampton, where they're reputed to grow, in Daisy Field. 

It's an interesting place to walk, lying between the Portway, one of the main arterial routes into and out of Bristol, and its predecessor in that role, the River Avon. 

In the past, this area was used as a grazing marsh, and when WWI broke out, the Army established a remount depot there. The depot requisitioned horses and retrained them before sending them to their deaths at the front. 

This sculpture was installed in Daisy Field only last year. The War Horse is made entirely of horseshoes, and is a memorial to the many horses that passed through the depot. 

Images of horses are also engraved on this rather rustic bench. 

During our wander in Daisy Field we saw our first Meadow Brown of the summer ...

... plus, crow garlic ... 

... common knapweed ... 

... this umbellifer which was new to me, and is the strangely-named corky-fruited water dropwort ...

... and comfrey, but sad to say, no bee orchids that I spotted. 

We then headed down Station Road to the Lamplighters pub and the river, with its muddy view across to Pill, which is one of my favourite places in Bristol. 

Pill

Looking up to the M5 bridge over the Avon

The tide was pretty low, exposing the salt marsh that gives the area its name and the rather more famous mud that characterises the tidal stretches of the Avon and Severn. 

viper's bugloss

wild carrot

hemlock

It was even warmer a couple of afternoons later, so we headed for the relative cool of Badock's Wood. 

by the round barrow

The lower part of the badger sett in the mini gorge hollowed by the River Trym

This upper part of the Trym runs pretty dry in the summer, but it was still nice to see Cwtch approach it on her own and with confidence after all the hard work water-walking we put in over the winter.

lovely magpie feather

A little sit-down on the bench that always reminds me of my late parents and my late collie, Ted

Walking back to the car through the upper part of the wood

some hoggin