Beltane and Bluebells
May 6, 2010 by Bird
Filed under Blog, Flora, Good Stuff, On My Travels, Spring, Summer
For May eve we camped out in a little East Sussex wood; we wanted to be out in the fresh new green and jump over our own mini Beltane fire to bring in summer. Also, the area is renowned for its bluebells, of which I am something of a connoisseur.
The weather was cool and damp, the humidity intensifying the depth of the colours and general sense of lushness and rampant growth. Birdsong seemed astonishingly loud, the only other sounds a constant dripping and the babble of running water. I felt I could almost be in a high altitude cloud forest anywhere in the world if it were not for the familiarity of the trees and vegetation around me.
There are so many wildflowers all blooming together right now, the harsh winter having telescoped the seasons down until the first late winter flowers stand shoulder to shoulder with summer blooms. And everything is giving it’s best after that winter, including the bluebells.
If you are lucky enough to have been in a bluebell wood in full flower you will know well the extraordinary sensual overload that this can provoke. You walk along thinking that you’ve already seen it all, it couldn’t possibly get any bluer. Then the trees open out a little more and they are swimming in an astonishing violet mist of overwhelming voluptuousness. This, I can tell you, you have to experience for yourself.
It’s not just the colour, the scent is vivid too – heady and exotic for something so British, but with a coolness that makes it bearable, like lilies crossed with violets. Sometimes you can smell the flowers long before you see them.
I remember my first sighting of bluebells as a child, and the wonder I felt at their unexpected beauty. My mother wisely told me not to pick a single one, they could never look better in my hand than standing exactly where they were and I understood and did as I was told. Coming back from our walk we saw a family who had not been so wise; they had greedily picked as many as they could carry and were already making disappointed sounds at how swiftly they had wilted. They bore my mothers rage with baffled indifference, but if they learned nothing that day, I had learned plenty.
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Oh what a wonderful sight, all those beautiful Bluebells! I don’t think we have that kind here in northern New York, so it was quite a treat to see them and read your account. I’m so glad you’re posting again, I have missed you.
Jackie thank you so much, and it’s really lovely to see you here at just the same time as I was reading your blog!
I should have mentioned, the bluebell in these pictures is Hyacinthoides non-scripta, and it’s native to a few countries in northern Europe but I think I read somewhere that the UK has the most. Which actually makes them quite rare things, so I hope anyone reading here will stop and think again if they consider picking or disturbing these lovely flowers. It might look like there are a lot when you see them flowering like this, but they really are a treasure to be protected.
Your photos are beautiful and the bluebells are gorgeous. Loved the story about not picking them too.
Thank you Cindy, and it’s lovely to see you here. Anyone who crochets should check out Cindy’s fantastic website, she recycles all kinds of things in to yarn and makes the most brilliant things. And best of all, she posts patterns too!
The bluebells are so beautiful as is the forest as a whole. Wonderful sequence of photographs and I love the story from your childhood.
Thank you Carver! I was so happy to be in the woods for this amazing show, I’ve missed it every spring for years. I think bluebells were my first taste of just how gorgeous the natural world can be.
Wow!! Wish I had been there, not seen a proper bluebell wood for ages!
We shall have to try and meet up this year
Me neither Claire, but this year I was determined I would! Oh and yes, that would be FUN!
Lovely post and the Bluebells are gorgeous! Great photos!
Thank you Eileen, and welcome!
Ours are not quite out yet……….lovely images and indeed they are a sight to behold. I may even be bad and pick one or two as well…………….but we have loads of them growing in our garden. We live near a bluebell wood and someone has either planted them or a bird has dropped a bulb.
You lucky thing, to have them growing in your garden! And you live near a bluebell wood? I am green with envy! A couple from the garden is fair enough if they’ve been naturalised, but from what I can make out they wilt immediately…
OMG! I’ve never seen so many bluebells in my life. How breathtaking! ~karen
Hi Karen and welcome – it really was breathtaking – I felt so lucky to see it.
What beautiful photos! “Sensual overload”…I think I know what you mean. Once I drove past a hillside on the highway that was covered with clover. A single clover blossom doesn’t have much scent, but en masse the perfume was heavenly! I can imagine the same in your bluebell wonderland. Their contrast with the gnarly old trees and moss-covered rocks is so magical. If fairies exist, I think they live here!
Oh, clover has a lovely scent! I’ve smelt it on a hot day… but nothing like how you describe, never so many that it was really strong, that must have been gorgeous. Makes me long for warm sunny meadows
The wood felt really magical, like A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Hello Bird and Happy Beltane… I felt like I was there with you…Just beautiful.. Thank you for posting to Nature Notes because this was a perfect post for May…Michelle
Hello Michelle! I was so glad to be able to post to Nature Notes as I haven’t blooged for about two months but I really wanted to write about this. Thank you for hosting such a lovely meme.
Hi my friend
wonderful post i remember when i was in the army in Germany i was on an escape and evasion in the Black forest .thre where two of us just wandering deep in the forest when i saw what i thought was a wee loch it turned out to be millions of bluebells and have alwasy remembered that night bivved there
spring is such a wonderful time
peace and light from the wee tin can
Hi Andy, wow it must have been amazing to camp there, I’m not surprised you never forgot it. You describe it really well, when there are so many it looks just like the ground is under water. I’ve never been to the Black forest – my brothers might have been there on exercise, they were stationed in Germany for a good few years.
Wow! Gorgeous, gorgeous place to camp! I’m a little jealous – we haven’t been able to since October, because it’s been too cold in the mountains here (soon, hopefully). That ground covered with purple is just beautiful!
Hi Jill, and welcome! It was our first camp of the year – been too cold here too, and to be honest it still wasn’t really warm enough for comfort. I guess the season must be short but very sweet in the mountains depending on how hardy you are (I’m much less hardy than I used to be). The bluebells were breathtaking, it was a fantastic bit of luck to have the chance to camp just when they were at their best – my pictures do them no justice at all.
It really was a fantastic camping spot, we weren’t in the thick of the flowers but still right in the woods with all the young birch leaves above you and the owls hooting and bickering all night. And best of all, too early for mosquitoes!
Wow…That’s just stunning!
It was so Lana, it really was!
Wow what a beautiful flower, spreads every where like our dandelions here, lol. I love color purple or blue like that, so nice. Thanks for sharing, and hope all is well. Anna
Hello Anna! I was lucky to see it as the flowers don’t really last very long and they were at their peak that very weekend
This post leaves me with a sense of longing, such a yearning to experience this great wonder that you describe. I have walked in fields of Texas bluebells in full flower, stretching under the vast Texan blue sky, but it’s not at all the same sort of experience as a bluebell wood like you’ve illustrated here.
“Then the trees open out a little more and they are swimming in an astonishing violet mist of overwhelming voluptuousness. This, I can tell you, you have to experience for yourself.”
Gorgeous, Bird- simply gorgeous. This post transports me. What a wonderful way to celebrate Beltane!!
Hello Kit, if I could send you a bluebell wood I’d do it this instant! We went for a walk the weekend after and if anything the bluebells were even more luxuriant – I’ve yet to share the photos. It’s one of the real joys of the countryside, and already the show is pretty much over – in the south, at least. I’m touched that you have such a sense of longing after seeing this, and I have to add that your description of Texas bluebells is pretty enticing to me