This past 2 weeks I've been out and about in the Forest a lot more with the dogs.  We now offer Bed & Breakfast in the Forest of Dean, and so I really want to get to know the woods a lot better, to be able to give great directions for walkers.  Plus once you get up into the Forest it becomes a little addictive....

The thing is, once you get just a little way into the Forest above the house, it's completely silent.  no road noise, nothing.  The hills and valleys are so covered with trees that between the ferns, trees and contours of the land all the road noise (or what little there is) is screened out.

I love the variety.  The Forest today isn't the same Forest of a month ago.   Then, everything was deep green on the ground, and with vast tracts of blue and white - bluebells that filled the air with perfume, and white wood anemones.  Now, everything is bright green.  The ferns are as tall as I am so almost 6 foot, and the colour splashes are PINK!  Pink rhododendrons, and large stands of foxgloves.  I wanted to pick some foxgloves for the lounge, but they're so huge and majestic, it just didn't seem right.  Rather like the lupins I planted in the garden - now they are all flowering it seems such a shame to cut them for the house!

There is a tall tree with a bees nest in along one path.  I like to watch the bees coming home in droves, and doing a little dance before they enter the hole in the trunk, high above the ground.  The noise is really very pleasant and soothing.  there are thousands of them so it must be a huge hive inside the tree.  Winnie the Pooh would have been up there after the honey...

And yesterday I rounded a corner on the path to find a huge deer standing in the way.She had her backside to me and looked at me over her shoulder for 20 seconds or more before crashing off into the trees in 4 giant bounds.  The dogs didn't even try to chase her.

I've now explored the whole stretch of Forest  above the house, and to venture further afield I'll have to cross a road.  The dogs are delighted that we go a different way each time, and they don't seem to care how much they know each path, every day they still love walking the same area.  They just seem to love the forest.

We have swallows nesting outside the living room window too, which is driving Gilly insane as they swoop at the window to get to the nesting site, and he keeps thinking they're going to fly in!  We also had a buzzard with a rabbit in it's claws fly over the house yesterday, which was a pretty impressive sight.  There's so much to see here, it's great to be able to offer guests in the B&B Forest of Dean wildlife as well as a decent night's sleep!