Keeping an eye on the daily posts on the excellent National Trust Large Blue blog, it appears were dropping rapidly. So I decided not to bother with Collard Hill until next year and would instead would meet up with up with Dan straight away.
After a crap nights sleep and following a long day in the sun on Saturday, I woke up feeling pretty weary. What's more, I was also unpleasantly surprised to find I had a bit of an upset stomach (I'll spare you of the gory details!). Despite feeling kind of fragile, I was still keen to see Dan and not let the lad down, so just set off a little later than originally planned.
I battled on as far as the Cotswolds, somewhere between Burford and Cheltenham, but it soon became clear it just wasn't worth it and was only going to make myself feel worse and more tired. After speaking to Dan, it dawned on me that I'd spoken to someone I know in Bucknell the previous day, who had been to another well known Large Blue site, Daneway Banks near Cirencester, just 20 minutes from where I was! He had seen still good numbers of Large Blues there, several very fresh.
Was it best to just get back home and get myself sorted? Probably, but it was a chance to at least not make it a completely wasted journey. It would also cheer me up a bit and get me Large Blue after all. Win win.
I arrived at 10am and parked up close to the Daneway Inn pub, located adjacent to the Daneway Banks reserve. It was already swelteringly hot and knowing how Large Blues tend to go to ground in the heat, I hastily made my way up the hill to the reserve entrance and began searching the lovely meadows before me.
There were immediately lots of Marbled Whites floating about barely pausing, clearly already supercharged by the hot morning sun.
Walking down the slope I caught the sight of something blue in front of me. It was not the vivid bright blue of a Common and had to be a Large Blue. The problem was it just wouldn't land and I ended up meticulously tracking it up and down the slope for a good 5 minutes. After bypassing numerous patches of Wild Thyme, it eventually found some to it's liking and FINALLY there settled was my first Large Blue!
It didn't settle for long and after another brief pause, it melted away down the hillside. Thankfully, I didn't have to wait too long for another one and walking around for a bit, I discovered an absolutely pristine female, in a much more calmer mood, slowly moving around the relatively abundant patches of Wild Thyme, both nectaring and egg-laying too!
Having spent a good hour there, it was getting super sweltering and so it was time to drive home, relax and get myself feeling a touch better.
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