Thursday,

Diana's day off this week,

I had a small surprise for her, which was blown out of the water, I had a trip today planned to go to a PYO sunflowers farm, but yesterday Diana arrived home with a bunch of flowers, with sunflowers, so I had to fess up about today, but a decision was made to still go the the sunflower farm, so glad rags on, I should say as usual with our days out I took way too many photographs so I am only making one post today,

we were off,

past the strange roundabout in Eltham,

and into Sevenoaks,

if this photograph looks familiar it was because we were here in July picking strawberries, the same day we visited the lavender farm, we did not know it then, but the same farm, Stanhill has a sunflower PYO area, and a maize maze it happens,

we will be buying a few soft fruits on our way home,

the sunflowers were at the far end of the farm next to the maze,

the winters pumpkins I am guessing planted already, thinking about it, they may be courgettes or perhaps marrows?

looking across to the strawberry fields we visited last time,

all picked out, no more I guess until next year,

in the distance a thin yellow line,

the entrance to the maze and the rows of sunflowers,

I should mention you should bring your own secateurs, although they are available to hire with a £5.00 deposit, but on busy days they might all be hired out already,

I was soon snapping away,

there were so many bees here,

mainly huge bubble bees,

they had plenty of choice!

there were several rows of sunflowers,

stretching to the tree line in the distance,

well,

I just had too!

as we walked uphill we looked back,

to see the sunflowers facing us,

so time for a few selfies,

with a few close ups,

although cloudy,

it was still a nice bright day,

as we moved further up the field,

there was no doubt the flowers were getting taller,

which gave me a better look at the bees,

as I mentioned, there were so many of them,

one of the problems of the taller plants,

was that it was easy to loose sight of Diana,

and it was so easy to photograph the bees,

without having to stoop down,

it was fascinating watching them,

I am sure Diana is in there some where!

well may be not,

we now started picking some blooms to take home,

a final look at a bee, as I mentioned there are lots of bees here but thankfully we did not disturb any of them enough to be stung,

selection made,

the cost is £1.00 per stem or 5 for £5.00,

and if you look carefully you can find a single stem with three or more flowers on it,

which we did,

looking across the field of maize with a maze made out of it,

here are a couple from previous years, well I would not want to spoil it for this year!

from the website:

This year's theme is the Queen's 'Jubeelee',  this summer and help Queen Bee retrieve the missing jewels from her crown! HRH (Her Royal Honeyness) Betty the bee, thinks she is the queen and has taken to wearing a crown around the farm!

The crown jewels have all gone missing in the maze, so Queen Bee needs your help to find them all and get them back to their rightful place...on her head! Search the maze to retrieve all the jewels and discover what is Queen Bee's favourite summer treat! Price includes a gamecard and map.

Prices

Adults: £7.00

Children (4-16): £7.00 (under 4s go free)*
Family Ticket (2+2 or 1+3): £24.00

*Maximum of two free under 4s per paying adult

Please bring a pencil to complete your game card at the end!

it all looks like great fun,

we made our way back to the car,  buying not only the flowers but some cherries and plums as well,

next stop Coolings, we did not have a breakfast before leaving,

we had visited here early in the month,

just after we had been cherry picking,

so we made our way to the restaurant,

outside it was a riot of colour,

the photographs,

do not do justice to how bright some of the blooms were,

and today was a cloudy day,

mini sunflowers,

in one of the greenhouses a really impressive display of hanging baskets,

breakfast/lunch is served,

coffee for Diana,

a pot of tea for myself,

a toasted cheese and ham sandwich for Diana,

and for myself,

scampi and chips,

eyes down,

and tuck in! the bill came to £20.00,

we made our way back to the car,

but looking at some of the flowers on the way,

these canna lilies were just so red,

I had to take a closeup of them,

Diana with the bee display,

the hanging baskets,

all looked just so nice,

and in so many colours,

if only we had somewhere to hang one!

the farmer taking a rest,

at first I thought there were bonsai, but there were just dwarf conifers,

we arrived at the koi section,

so a pose with the fishes,

we went up top looking down on the fish,

and nice they were too,

outside you could buy a handful of food to feed them for £1.00,

we started on our way home,

and we were soon going over Hayes common,

arriving home the flowers had wilted a tad,

so straight into water,

we will let them soak over night then tomorrow I will rearrange them, we watched a couple of quiz shows, then after our evening meal it was a couple from Antiques Road Trip, followed by a double helping of New Tricks, two episodes played back to back, after which we were off to bed.