The Lodge Sandy

Today I took a bit of a break from the continual hospital visits and went out with Colin. We did not have a plan as such but were hoping to do some autumnal scenes. Colin had his new Pentax dslr so wanted to give it a whirl.
He arrived at 0930, and after a quick in car discussion decided to go to the Lodge at Sandy as we have had good results in the past. There had been a lot of overnight wind, though the day was largely sunny and breezy but many of the trees have yet to colour up, and others are almost bare.
I was a bit surprised when we got to the Lodge car park and spotted a couple of familiar faces-William from Amwell and Kathy from LDAS. I found out that they were taking part in a fungal foray and over the course of the morning bumped into them from time to time.
The feeders in the car park were attractive to a number of species-mainly tits and a vocal Nuthatch but a nice bonus was the male Brambling. Shame I did not have any birding lenses with me.
We made our way down to the ornamental gardens and spent some time there looking at the shrubs and herbaceous plants, before walking through the woods and onto the old heath. Apart from a few more tit flocks, crests  and a single calling Chiffchaff the only things I saw were a queen Hornet and a male Common Darter.
Despite the fungal foray, we did not see much of interest from a photogenic point of view (not that I know anything about fungi) , but some of the trees and shrubs were excellent, as was the landscape in general. The breeze was a bit of a problem at times and I was glad to have the flash available in the more shady parts of the grounds.