Walk through the autumn garden

Got to spend an hour or so in the garden this afternoon. I hardly went into the garden this year - not a mistake I will ever repeat again. No matter how hard I am working daily nature connection is vital for a happy soul.
So walk with me down the garden path. It's a dull late autumn day but it's mild and very quiet and we have the place to ourselves...

The way is guarded by lions and mysterious fungi grow on piles of old logs, home to beetles and slugs and one day, maybe, slow worms.

The beautiful Quince tree guards the way into the heart of the garden flanked by buddlia, heleniums, geraniums, thymes and hyssop.

next years strawberry bed (above) and next years' raspberries (below)

The vegetable bed. It may not look like much now, but there was a compost heap earlier in the year so the ground is full of worms and goodness. Still making up my mind what to grow here, probably salad crops and peas.

Then we come to the arch, which is the demarcation line between the growing garden and the wild garden. The arch is made by weaving suitable bent hazel poles together. Honeysuckle and jasmine are growing up it on the left and a young clematis is planted on the right (not visible now). In front of the picture you can see the beautiful blackcurrant bush, which is growing in a freally crappy place, but seems to love it there!

A close-up of the woven top of the arch. It contains willow, hazel and dogwood all from plants growing in the garden for this purpose.

The rusty cauldron in which many fires have burnt and several loaves of bread have been baked.

My favourite bit of the garden, the compost pile is just visible at the bottom, the woodpile behind it and behind that, the hazel tree, long over due for coppicing, I'm going to have a go at cutting it this winter.

The pallets. One day these fellas might form the basis of a self-built studio (that's the dream anyway)

 The chair at the end of the garden, hidden behind the cotoneaster, a peaceful haven...

...that looks out to this view, the park is huge and we sit at the scrubby, overgrown, wild-life friendly end of it. We have watched a buzzard sitting in those trees and listened to a Tawny Owl hooting here.

And this is the entrance the fox, cats, and hedgehog use...

 Every foray into the garden is accompanied at some point with a cup of tea. Cheers!