It's still too early for most flowers, but I photographed the lesser celendine (main picture) growing on a stony bank and being visited by an early insect. There were catkins too on the leafless twigs.

The sky was totally cloudless and it could have been a day in late May or even early June, were it not for the leafless trees. Soon I reached the cross roads and the field where I used to keep my ponies. According to legend, the cross roads is haunted by the ghost of a woman seduced and then murdered (along with her dog) by an ancient Lord of Nannau, but despite years of feeding ponies after dark, I never saw anything at all spooky.

The unusual cottage shown below was once the gate lodge for the Nannau mansion and just opposite is a delicate wrought iron gate, with the V for the Vaughan family who lived at Nannau for generation after generation. It was not far from here, up on the Nannau Deer Park that the best known story of Nannau occurred.

Owain Glyndwr and his cousing Hywel Sele, Lord of Nannau quarelled violently because Hywel was a staunch king's man and Owain Glyndwr was leading a rebellion against Henry IV. There are various versions of the story, but according to one, the Abbot of the nearby Cymer Abbey managed to reconcile the cousins so in 1402, Glyndwr paid a visit to Nannau. Hywel Sele and Owain Glydwr went for a walk in the Deer Park and Hywel was never seen alive again. For many years no one knew what had happened to him; it wasn't until forty years later that his skeleton was found in the hollow trunk of an enormous oak tree which had been blasted by lightning. It was assumed that the men had fallen out again and that Glyndwr had killed Hywel and found the tree a convenient place to hide the body. When Hywel's remains were finally discovered, he was given a splendid funeral at Cymmer Abbey, though no trace now remains of his magnificant tomb.

There's another interesting, but far more modern, story connected to the cottage. It was used as a location in the film Last days of Dolwyn, about a village which is to be flooded in order to make a reservoir for Liverpool. This plot later became reality when the village of Tryweryn near Bala was drowned under the waters of Llyn Tryweryn, for this very reason. Last days of Dolwyn's other claim to fame is that it was Richard Burton's first speaking role in film.

At the cross roads, I turned for home, which was now downhill all the way, and was soon back downloading my photos and making pizza for tea.

Technical note: Until now, all the Photos of the week have been taken with our first digital camera a Kodak DC5000 Zoom bought in November 2000. This batch was the first taken with my new Olympus µ 400 (all weather). As you can see, I've been experimenting with the macro setting and I'm now quite pleased with the results. The Olympus is tiny compared to the old Kodak and so I can easily carry it with me at all times. Very convenient.