On a cold, frosty, dry, sunny morning just 4c, we headed up north with the dogs in the car for our first visit of the year to Thorpe Perrow Arboretum on the outskirts of the market town of Bedale.

It is just under an hours drive from home, and we arrived in the car park for 11. o’clock. The sun was still shining, and it was a dry and bright, the morning sunshine had melted the overnight frost, making the ground a little slippery and muddy underfoot. After a takeaway coffee we headed into the arboretum, stopping to watch the Blue Tits, Robin and Coal Tits busily feeding on one of the bird feeding stations outside the café. We followed the fresh flowing stream passing the flower beds on our right which were full of Hydrangeas and Snowdrops, continuing along the ‘Streamside trail’, being careful where we walked as thousands of Daffodils were emerging through the mowed grass, intermingled with huge swathes of flowering Snowdrops which are in full flower at this time. Following the footpath adjacent to the stream I stopped for a few moments to photograph the wooden bridge leading into ‘Henry’s island’, the sunshine casting shadows which reflected nicely in the water below. Continuing around the corner and passing ‘Henry’s island’ on the right adjacent to the main lake several Wych Hazel trees were in full flower, their tiny yellow wiry florets providing additional colour to the bare trees. Clusters of Snowdrops littered the woodland floor, making the most of the winter sunshine. We stopped by the side of the lake for a few moments to watch a pair of Mallards feeding on the bottom of the lake, a little further along as we approached the ‘Main Avenue’ with the big house on the opposite side of the bank, a lone swan gracefully swam past just yards from us, staying close to the side of the bank. We stopped again at ‘Kate’s island’ to admire the reflections in the water and admire the sculpture carved into the old oak tree stump. Crossing the bridge leading to the ‘Milbank Pinetum’ I always stop to take a picture looking along the stream to the ‘Catherine Park Oak’ in the far distance, this view changes on every visit, today the autumn-coloured leaves, the cutback reeds and evergreen trees reflected nicely in the shimmering water ahead of me. On leaving the footbridge we turned left and followed the path towards the ‘Jubilee Oak’, swathes of Snowdrops mixed with emerging daffodils lined the grass path through the overhanging trees. We continued along the ‘Broad Walk’ bearing left slightly passing the stone ‘Acorn’ and ‘Bothy’. Several more Wych Hazel trees caught the eye, their lovely yellow florets looking radiant in the morning sunshine. Leaving the ‘Bothy’ behind us we headed along ‘Jennys Walk’ and onto ‘Broad Walk’ to ‘Sir Leonards monument’ where we stayed or a short while to admire all the emerging daffodils lining both sides of the ‘Main Avenue’. in a couple of weeks, weather permitting this will be a colourful picture, a blanket of yellow will cover the woodland floor. From here we continued our walk through the trees, crossing the stream which leads to the ‘Tearoom’ where we enjoyed a very pleasant brunch before the journey home, with two tired dogs in the back of the car.