Cherry Blossom and Magnolia

 

Today I managed to combine a pharmacy errand with a sunny walk + checking up on the progress of spring in the city centre. The first blossoming tree that I've seen this spring caught my eye outside a hotel I passed on my way into town (above). After my errands, I took the way through the city park and along the river towards home.

 Magnolia tree, and flowerbed with hyaciths in the foreground. 
(The round black building in the background is a restaurant/café.)

If memory serves me right, the big tree to the left is a maple tree.

More cherry blossom at a parking lot by the river.

 

A cherry blossom, or sakura, is a flower of Japanese cherry trees. (The cherry fruit is from a different species of tree.) Most of the flowers are white or pink with five petals. There are about 400 different types of cherry trees.

Magnolia is a genus of at least 210 species, or more; named after a French botanist, Pierre Magnol. They existed before bees, so are believed to originally having been pollinated by beetles. Fossilized specimens of magnolia have been dated to 20 million (!) years ago.

(Facts picked from Wikipedia articles.) 

Progress of Spring

Most of last week was sunny and warm, and it almost became a tough job to keep up with the progress of spring! 

Last Thursday, April 3rd, I found that the wood anemones had shown up in a half-wild woodland spot that I sometimes walk by.

 

Scilla could also be seen here and there, and I also spotted the first dandelions.

And freshly painted park benches turned up here and there around the estate where I live!
 

On Friday I walked into town for a dentist appointment, and in the city park, I found various bulbous plants in bloom in the flower beds along the river, and also the big old magnolia tree.

 

 

Alas the pollen season is also here... (witch hazel tree in the park)

On my way back, I found cemetery staff busy planting pansies.

Another sign of spring is that the sea gulls arrived from the coast on 1 April.

 
Two gulls zoomed in from home, sitting on the roof of a neighbouring building. 

Over the weekend it turned a lot colder again, though. Still sunny, but frosty nights, and it was back to wearing a winter coat for walks in the day time, too. (Typical of April here: Almost summer temperatures sometimes in the afternoon, but still high risk of frosty nights, and might even snow a bit, even if it won't stay long on the ground...)

Magnolia

 

Spring is still very slow here, and as some of you will have noticed, I "went away with the fairies" over the weekend, visiting the distant land of Eldoria. (Previous 5 [!] posts...) Yesterday, however, the rain had stopped and the wind died down. I called my hairdresser and asked if she could fit me in some time during the day. She could; so I went for a walk into town around noon. And walking through the park, I was happy to see that in spite of the rough weekend weather, the big magnolia tree there is starting to blossom - one sure sign of spring, after all...

After my haircut (as usual long overdue, but once I get there it does not take very long for my hairdresser's magic scissors to fix it), I went to "have a look" in a few clothes shops in the city centre. Somehow my two pairs of jeans seem to have mysteriously shrunk in the wardrobe over winter. No doubt the healthiest way to deal with that problem would be to shrink myself a bit too - but alas that's always easier said than done... On the other hand, the same ("easier said than done") goes for finding what I want in the shops. One might think those little labels with size numbers would be helpful; but more often than not, especially with trousers, it seems to me that sizes too keep changing with Fashion (even those years when I haven't changed much myself). Anyway... I did not manage to find any new jeans that "felt right" this time. But I did find one pair of thinner ('recycled linen blend'), wide, straight, black summer trousers with legs 'cropped' - which for me (not among the tall and slender) meant full length, and no need to crop them further... So I bought those. (The fact that they're black means they'll go with just about any top in my wardrobe.) 

Some day when the spring weather matches my mood, I might also take a trip to the shopping centre "across town" to see what they have to offer there.

Pretty in Pink

Magnolia tree

 

 

I don't know the name of these.

(I don't think I ever saw the movie Pretty in Pink. The title just came to mind when I tried to think of a heading for this post...)

 

Straight Out of the Camera Magnolia

Straight-out-of-the-Camera Sunday

Saturday offered a perfectly blue sky…
Back to cloudy today.

If you’re in the mood, listen to Paul Simon singing “Was A Sunny Day”: http://youtu.be/_NrqA9MbzKI

Sunday Summary

Magnolia tree in the Town Park (30th April 2012),
for Straight Out of the Camera Sunday

The past week we had some really glorious pre-summer days with afternoon temperatures above +20 C, and clear blue skies like in the photos above.

Besides all the lovely pink cherry blossoms and white magnolias, the birches are turning green – and letting go of all their pollen with a big boom… well, not audible perhaps, but not unnoticed by all us allergics!

(Photo from last year)

So really hard just now to tell where my old virus-related bronchitis (since Easter) ends, and allergy problems begin! Yesterday we had a strong wind blowing all day and I knew there were lots of birch pollen in the air, so I stayed in (it was also rather grey and chilly so not all that tempting to go out anyway). Today the wind has calmed down and the sun seems to have come back out – so I suppose I shall venture a walk in a while.

Looking back in my photo archives, it seems spring sprang a little later this year than last year; but a little earlier than back in 2010. So I guess pretty normal! Somehow, even though we’ve been longing for it for months, it always seems to come as a bit of a surprise when it eventually does come.

Like how C.S. Lewis describes it in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe:

… Only a few minutes later he noticed a dozen crocuses growing round the foot of an old tree – gold and purple and white. Then came a sound even more delicious than the sound of the water. Close beside the path they were following a bird suddenly chirped from the branch of a tree. It was answered by the chuckle of another bird a little further off. And then, as if that had been a signal, there was chattering and chirruping in every direction, and then a moment of full song, and within five minutes the whole  wood was ringing with birds’ music …