I know, you probably think all I do is go around looking at flowers. You’d be half right: I do spent a inordinate amount of time in spring and summer just looking at flowers. I blame English gardeners, starting with Capability Brown. There really is something special about the hither-thither-ness, the riot of color and shape that grows in English gardens.
But my latest flower viewing expedition was to see a specific type of flower: lavender. Turns out you don’t have to journey to Provence to see lavender fields! Just inside of Worcestershire, less than a two-hour drive from here, is the Cotswold Lavender Company, near Snowshill (which is near the inappropriately named town of Broadway).
The best time to go is in July, and since spring was late and cold this year, the lavender harvest is about three weeks late. They had just started the harvest when we arrived on Friday. We watched the tractor pulling the trailer full of lavender for several minutes, wondering what it must smell like inside that trailer full of lavender heads.
I’ll stop talking now and just show the photos. I only wish these photos could capture the scent of lavender, pungent, sweet, yet not too floral.
