Walking and sketching in and around Hemel

I walked 35 miles last week, all from my doorstep - no driving involved! Most of those miles were unplanned routes following our noses, a couple of miles were impromptu socially distanced chats, about 5 of them were down to wrong turns!

These sketches are from an 8 mile walk from Apsley, through Shendish and around Kings Langley and Langleybury.

A few days before I'd done that route in the other direction and got disoriented (hence the extra miles!)

We saw so much wildlife and plants even on this one walk.

Here's an incomplete list!

Blossom, parakeets, robins, magpies, all sorts of members of the tit family, sparrows, various finches, pheasants, kites, deer - doe and muntjac, fresh new hedgerow leaves, especially hawthorn, primroses, bunnies chasing each other, and over the fence looking into the children's farm, a cute little donkey!

On other walks this week I've seen the wild garlic shooting up. Snowdrops are fading while the yellow flowers are blooming: primroses, daffodils and bright star shaped flowers on the banks by the fields, whose names I don't know.

There are catkins everywhere (and I think they are to blame for my newly acquired hayfever symptoms). Huge crowds of crows - and foxes on our twilight walks!

These sketches are from walks in the last month: