Good Friday in Graves Park

It was an absolutely delightful day on Friday.  The sun was shining, the sky was blue, the temperature was in the mid 20s or so.  Freyja was off into town to do Roller Derby stuff.  Ross was off to church.  But Tabitha, Gareth and Cally weren't doing anything.  And neither were we.  So I packed up a picnic and we trundled around to their place.  From there we strolled down into Graves Park.

Now, I had never been into Graves Park, peculiar though this may seem.  We drive past the top end, where there is are putting greens, pretty much every time we come into Sheffield.  I knew there was a gate into the park further down, by the Woodseats shops.  But I had never been moved to go in, even though I knew there was an animal farm somewhere in the park.  Tabitha and Gaz have been in a few times since they moved back to Sheffield and suggested it might be a good place for a picnic.  And they were right.

In the first place - it's ENORMOUS. There are woodlands and parklands and playing fields.  There are ponds and streams and lakes. There is a rose garden, there are flower gardens and huge swathes of grass.  And there is the animal farm. It's really lovely.

And we had a lovely picnic.  We had chicken legs and hard boiled eggs and salad. We had wine and ginger beer and orange juice.  We had poppy seed rolls and ginger biscuits. It was all very lovely.  And lots of other people were having a lovely time too.  There were dog walkers and kiddy walkers and baby strollers.  There was a little train.  There were people playing ball and other people playing cricket.  There were loads and loads and loads of people in the animal farm - including one young man who greeted me cheerfully and said he knew me.  I looked a bit blank - I was fairly certain that I didn't know him!  Then he explained that I had been teaching a referencing class that he had been in.  That makes sense!  And I got into trouble when we were looking at tiny baby ducks bobbing about on the lake and I opined that they would make very tasty starters dipped into tempura batter and deep fried.  The woman in front of me turned around, shocked - and said: You can't say things like that!!!  She was even more shocked when her husband agreed with me but said you would need several threaded onto a skewer to get a decent sized starter!!!!!!!!!

We strolled back to Nettleham Road, from the top corner of the park and down through Norton, a suburb that I have not previously explored. Must go back and have a proper look at the cemetery.

And then The Builder and I went home again having had a really nice day out. Must do it again some time.