Yachts, bees and home-made hanging baskets

Another gorgeous day out yesterday, this time to Cowes.  There is always something happening on the water off Cowes, and yesterday was no exception, in fact, we were able to enjoy watching some proper racing as it was Cowes Classics Week.  

From our vantage point on the beach, we had a good view of one of the marker bouys (the yellow bouy on the right of the photo above), which the yachts had to tack right around and head off in the direction they had just come from, but, with the wind behind them, spinakers needed to be hoisted.  Always fun to watch. 

There was a bit of shouting as these three negotiated the bouy and spinakers got twisted but they sorted themselves out and with wind in the sail, they made good progress back up the course.  There were quite a few larger yachts racing, with fairly professional-looking crews who made tacking back and fro look very slick indeed.  It was great to watch.

We had a lovely picnic of filled bread rolls (home-made), fruit and shortbread biscuits (also home-made), and squash we had brought with us.  We sat on the shingle beach and took in the view.

There were some black-headed gulls that kept us amused with their strutting and posturing; they are very used to people on the beach so came quite close to us, probably hoping for a share of our lunch!

The bees have been out and about in force back home in our garden.  They seem to love the veronica, stachys and lavender and it is a joy to see them busily drinking nectar and collecting pollen on their legs to transfer to the next plant they visit.

I spent ages this afternoon trying to get a good photo of the bees at work but every time I had one in focus, it flew off!  This is the best I managed.

This year N has added some colour to the side of the potting shed.

Any ideas what our home-made hanging baskets started life as?

An excellent use for the 4-pint (2.27 litre) plastic milk bottles.  I saw the idea 2 or 3 years ago on an edition of Gardener's World and thought it a brilliant idea so we saved lots of the plastic bottles, cut them as shown, and stored them in the shed.  Finally we got to use them this year :)  By inverting the top section into the lower section, you are able to water the 'basket' through the hollow handle.  It really is quite an ingenious set-up, and I wish I could credit by name the person who thought of it.

There were a few clouds in the sky today and the possibility of rain drifted through our minds.  Briefly.  Then the clouds disappeared again.  So we're still baling out the shower water from the bath and carrying the buckets to the garden.  One or two of the plants are beginning to look just a tad thirsty now.

The first tomato is turning orange/red

Hiding among the foliage are three cucmbers, supported by a clever arrangement of plastic trellis and canes

Finally, as a note to myself more than anything else, we harvested the last of the peas and cut the plants down.  The roots will die back into the beds, and we have donated the cut plants to our neighbour for his compost heap - lots of good nitrogen to rot down.