Sunny.

And still the sun shines.

Having missed the last get together with our fellow Welsh learners it was good to meet up again in the library in Mach. Much discussion about how to tell the time which even involved questioning our friendly librarian on how to say 35 minutes past 11, which comes out as 5 minutes and (10 and twenty) past (1 after 10) using the alternate numbers. Though of course you can say 5 minutes and twenty before half (mid) day. Not forgetting to mutate the number names but only if it is after and not if it is before. We also went through the homework which most of us had barely looked at. 

I'm so keen to get on with the wall, and concerned about losing the good weather, that as soon as we got home I rushed out to the garden to carry on laying the next row of blocks. Because I'm trying to match the new blocks to the heights and widths of the existing wall I've had to use lots of mortar rather than the neater work I did on the first wall. But I think I'm winning and won't have to buy any smaller different blocks to fill up the space which is a relief. I was pleased but very worn out, to finish the whole row. So it will be back to chipping out more blocks for the next three or four sessions before I can return to my mortar mixing. After that all I could do was sink into the sunlounger and watch the sea while waiting for my evening painkillers to kick in.

   

The hardy geraniums I planted in the raised bed last summer are doing well. Above is my favourite, Mrs Kendal Clarke and below are three very different varieties.

I haven't got round to getting the photos off my phone but here are some taken around the site of the now demolished mansion. You can read about the history of Hafod here. If you read it you will see that even in 1807 Welsh builders worked at a very slow pace.

Above is the entrance to the mansion high above the River Ystwyth on the left.

The solid rock here had been blown up by the army so that the roadway could run through it.

Although now seen as a nuisance the display of  purple rhododendrons was amazing. For an idea of scale that's a full sized tree on the left and the grey blob in the middle is a stone cottage.

The mansion once stood right in the centre of the photo but was demolished in 1958.

Rolling meadows below forested hills.

The ice house. Originally the entrance was like a tunnel. The collapsed walls were rebuilt in the 1980s by one of our group of walkers. He got a blacksmith friend to make the gate as beyond is a deep pit, I had a look and it was about 10ft deep.