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Saturday 11 March 2017

Jeranto and the first wild orchids

Taking advantage of a free Saturday morning, the bright sunshine and crystal-clear sky, I left my house to clean itself and took myself off to the Bay of Jeranto on a mission. I hoped to find the first wild orchids of the season.
The hike down to the bay was a delight. The
strong wind had cleared the skies and the views were spectacular.  Spring was definitely in the air with flowers galore to distract me along the way and the lizards were out in force.
I walked down through the grounds of the FAI, past the few buildings and onto the open scrubland of the erstwhile quarry. Rather than following the official path overlooking the sea, I cut in towards the rocks, vaguely remembering where I had found the orchids in previous years. 
It looked very much that I was too early. I could see the first signs of the plants pushing up through the ground, but they were still very, very small and nowhere near to flowering. However there were  a couple of surprises along the way:
a rather long black snake (biscia) that crossed in front of me and slithered into the rocks (sadly I wasn't quick enough to get a photograph) and several bushes of bright blue lithodora that I had never realised were there. I began to think that I would have to be content with these and come back in a few weeks' time.
Never one to give up, I continued searching and all of a sudden found what I was looking for: a bee orchid in full flower. A dozen photos later I carried on my quest and found some more. More photos.
Pretty satisfied, I reached the end of the clearing, admired the views of Capri and Punta Campanella, before zig-zagging my way back through the bright yellow bushes of euphorbia in the vain hope of finding a few more.









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