Low as a kite

The Association Culturelle Dizannaise planned the second Sortie Nature (nature trail) of the year for yesterday; this time it was an evening outing. The weather had become strangely unpleasant, but it went ahead anyway. Unfortunately my winter clothes were put into storage in preparation for holiday-rental, so it took me much of the afternoon to excavate a fleece, warm socks, and waterproofs.

It was very windy out on the marshes, so windy that the dark clouds hurtling overhead had no time to lose any of their water-load, except for a brief drizzle. One person had brought an umbrella which promptly turned inside-out on opening. Swallows gave amusing displays of flying sideways and backwards; the funniest moment was when one of them, flapping madly, managed to turn, and suddenly found itself whizzing away on the wind with its little wings still whirring as it disappeared in the direction of St Fort with frantic squeaks.

Most of the smaller birds were in hiding or only visible if their nests were in clear patches, but the storks seemed unworried and there were herons and egrets and curlews and falcons aplenty, plus a busard cendré and a bird with pink markings whose name I missed. At one point I was a little ahead of the group and noticed a huge dark bird of prey: it came towards me, so close I could no longer focus on it with the binoculars, and just over my head it veered off along the estuary embankment. A black kite!

As usual there was a meal after the sortie, with much merriment and conversation (topics at our end of the table: education, nutrition, nuclear power, power outages, alternative energy, international finance, and of course politics). I was the only anglo present this time so there was no English, and I was pleased at how much I could take part in the discussion even when it all got rather noisy.

Between the second and third course the wind dropped and so did the rain. It pounded down for a few minutes. Before dessert I realised it was time to leave because Broomstick had no lights (I couldn't remember which box they were packed in); just as well, as the diet had already suffered. A little way down the road the rain started again, the road flooded, and Broomstick experienced surfing. My waterproofs gave up.

I was very wet and rather cold, but replete with good food and good company; and I'd been only a couple of metres from a black kite!