Spring And Colours

Spring And Colours

All the evidence says that spring is definitely here now. In the open daffodils, narcissi, muscari, forsythia, japonica and violets are all in bloom and friends Steve and Jo's lawn is carpeted in primroses. My garden is too exposed for primroses to take hold but I have one that has sown itself in the front, nestling in the shade between two pots. In the markets and shops there are local asparagus to be had, expensive for the moment but they will reduce in price by a third over the next two to three weeks.

Spring and Easter always gave me a psychological boost in England and they do even more so here because I know that so many of the things I like here are about to appear. There are already Charentais melons from Morocco, which are good, in the shops and the local ones won't be far behind, followed by apricots, peaches and nectarines. My lilac and roses will start blooming, eating outside will become the norm and there will be warm evenings when I can sit on my balcony with a Calvados to hand.

Spring does, however, seem to be rather late this year, somewhat surprisingly after a mild winter. We have had really cold weather, plus the customary one day of snow, for only a couple of weeks in December, since when temperatures have held up during the day. And most of the flora blooming now would normally have been in bloom a couple of weeks earlier. At the beginning of April the hillsides would normally be blue and yellow, the yellow of coronilla and the blue of irises; but the coronilla is just showing signs of coming into bloom and I haven't yet seen an iris blooming anywhere. Anyway, my back garden and the pots in the front are pretty much ready for lift off so there is much to look forward to.

As for colours, blue is the colour, as every Chelsea fan knows, and I have been trying to capture the blue of the skies here on camera, with little success to date. It's the quality of the light that drew impressionist painters here in the past and that comes from the blue sky. I've been tempted to describe the blues in the sky as deep blue but that is inaccurate as the blue is not necessarily dark. Rather it is an intense blue, light or dark, and it tends to have a slight shade of violet within it. It varies from what I would call a pale Wedgewood blue to an intense violet and the deeper shades are generally apparent when the temperature is at its highest. On some days you can see the gradations increase from early morning as the day heats up. And the intensity of the blue tends to be emphasised by the frequent lack of even a whisp of cloud in the sky. One day, hopefully, I'll capture it in a photo.