The spate has now gone through, or subsided, or reduced and one can now tell what has happened and what has changed – and always something is different.

The flood came through here and the residue can be clearly seen on the mini gorse bushes. Autumn leaves have been cleared out of the river and left here. The flow of the flood is directly in line with Rosie with the river taking a short cut over the spit of land which is about eight feet (3 metres) above the river.

Two additions to the riverscape are the half-tree beached on the gravel which itself appeared only four years ago, and stuck on a rock is a collection of bushes which look familiar.

The island is about 6 metres in length which isn’t obvious from this point, and the tree is about the same size. This is where they were prior to the spate…

The island was here when we came in 2016 and it was a substantial structure with trees maybe 12 – 15 years old and a variety of bushes. The trees were weeded out by the flood about three years ago which left the bushes which have now been taken downstream. So too has the tree which I spent time last summer cutting chunks off to give us firewood – I had planned to take more off it, but that won’t happen now! The spate or surge was about six feet (two metres) in height.

My Mother always used to say “if the gorse is in flower, love is in the air”. – first sign of Spring?