Changing Seasons

In a splash of slate-blue the first swallow flew over our field yesterday. It was like a reconnaissance flight as it pulled up over the barn and came back across the pond for a second look and then disappeared over the fields towards Dominique's dairy.

It has been a cool spring so far, we had expected the leaves and blossom to be out on our return but mostly the trees are still in bud. The peach, nectarine and apricot are in flower but nothing else as yet.

La Basse Cour is aligned almost exactly East-west (the south wall faces 182 degrees as far as I can work out) and so the tiny postholes we glazed in the eastern gable end face nearly exactly East. At the Spring solstice the sun rises exactly in the east and so for a few days around the spring and autumn solstices we get a magical shaft of light shining into the barn in the morning:

Like the blossom, the cuckoo and the swallow it's a sure sign that summer is on its way.