As we hurtle non-stop towards autumn, we can reflect back on the crazy summer of floods, followed by heat-waves, and then more floods and what we thought was going to be a rather pleasant Indian Summer. That was, of course, until Storm Nigel showed up like a petulant child and made the last few days of summer feel like a monsoon in a rain forest.

The autumn equinox represents all things mystical. Druids, witchcraft, high-priests and taboos from heathen times. Someone painted the Star of David on one of our round picnic benches a few years ago and burned a few tea lights on it. Whatever sort of heathenry worship happened that night will be a mystery. We will never know.

Maybe there were pagans, chanting and scantily-clad, dancing around the bench whilst sipping goat’s blood from a golden goblet. That picnic bench holds a lot of secrets, so it does.

Today, in our wisdom, we installed the first of two more round altars, err, I mean picnic benches, towards the northern end of the path.

It started off quite warm and we thought we had copped the 20% of the no chance of rain, rather that the 80% chance of heavy rain.

It was all fun and games in tee-shirts and dry ground, but Storm Nigel rolled in and brought drizzle, which quickly turned into a horrible and continuous downpour.

But we were committed and had to finish what we had started.

It wasn’t just building the bench. We had to dig holes and fill with concrete and then attach the bench to steel brackets set into the concrete. Amazingly, it was perfectly flat and required zero levelling.

It wasn’t long before we were able to give the bench a baptism with a much needed coffee and coconut macaroon.

As you can see, we are advertising the group to encourage people to find out who we are, and get involved if they want to. If you cast your mind back to the start of the year and remember our three pillars –

A Path For Everyone

A Wildlife Corridor

A Safe Place For Mental Wellbeing

Then this hopefully reinforces these three cornerstones and people can at least get a bit of friendly human contact as they walk past us on a workday, or actually join in on this great adventure.

Sustrans, our lords and masters (the land owners) are highlighting the need for connected habitats for butterflies and invertebrates, so we need to keep working on the grassy and wildflower-rich edges of the trail, before it closes up into scrub and tree canopy. This will be the thrust of workdays in October and November.

In other news… Yes, you knew it was coming – we have a person in another new country checking us out.

Yemen, in the Middle East. Another country torn apart by civil war and massive food shortages, in vast need for humanitarian aid and peace. Thanks person from Yemen for looking and taking our country count to 110.

And that really is that. Hopefully our new picnic bench will make it through the autumn equinox pagan rituals and worship, and be ready for service for years to come.

Until next week!