A perfect early spring morning, with a blue dome of cloudless sky and sunshine turning the sea into a blinding, gold-flecked mirror, contrasting with darkness of the Holm Oaks as I walked up through the woods.
Once again, a Great Spotted Woodpecker drums against the towering trunk of a London Plane in Sunnydale. The woodland floor is a carpet of fresh green leaves, with Snowdrops, Daffodils, Winter Heliotrope and Spring Crocus in bloom. Around them, the fresh leaves of Lords and Ladies, Herb Robert, Lesser Celandine, Dog Violet and Ramsons are starting to appear.
On Caravan Terrace, a handsome male Bullfinch perches at the top of the cliff-face, with a Great Tit practising his display flights from the scrub below, with Long-tailed Tits, Blue Tits, Robins and a Wren also seen.
On the short turf below the Globe, a single blue Greater Periwinkle flower is in bloom, with a few more along the hedgerow nearby.
Further along the cliffs, the bubbling growl of Guillemots rises up from the sea, as they straggle across the gently bobbing waves. A dozen or so Razorbills are mixed in with the raft – much blacker than the surrounding Guillemots and with a smart white stripe on their chunky beaks.
Fulmars wheel smoothly around the clifftops, with Herring Gulls, Great Black-backed Gulls and Shag also on the wing.
A Rock Pipit pops up from the clifftop vegetation near Tilly Whim, as a Peregrine Falcon cruises by.
Overhead, a twittering charm of Goldfinches make me look up – their crimson and gold feathers looking amazing in the morning sun, with a few fragments of song from a Skylark above the meadows.
In Saxon Field, the rosette leaves of Early Spider Orchid dapple the short turf, though a while yet before they flower.