We enjoyed a week of glorious Indian summer during our break in Lincolnshire.
Rolling wolds and flat fen country were green and brown from crops and tilled soil, the skies were huge and azure with a light mist hanging on the horizon. We watched buzzards taunting a colony of rooks and jumped out of the path of tractors towing trailer loads of sugar beet.
At Gibraltar Point Nature Reserve black sheep eyed us suspiciously, keeping their distance, and on the beach wind-blown dead crabs waved harmless pincers.
As we drove back and came further south the trees started to show the colours of decline.
We have come home to autumn.
There has been a very early frost while we were away and the allotment is a sorry sight. Runner beans, courgettes, dahlias - all finished. Just shrivelled black leaves and withered fruits.
We might be able to salvage a few squash but they may not store well now.
The nice side to the start of autumn is the garden tidy.
Clearing away the summer finery - now looking very dilapidated - is always therapeutic and gives me that buzz of excitement from anticipating changes.
I can dig out that boring photinia 'Red Robin' and move the witch hazel, find places to plant all my latest treasures and especially make room for cercis 'Forest Pansy' - a little beauty that I hope likes my garden as much as I like it.
