A Fox In My Bedroom

Dartmoor on Thursday night, can you hear the hounds baying?

Well from continuous sun to continuous rain. We are now experiencing a typical Devon Summer, the Summers we used to enjoy when I was small staying at out friend’s farm Dunsbeare year after year since I was 3 up to the age of 13 when my Dad bought the cottage. Nice. Not.

A Peppered Moth and friend, on cottage wall outside

Grass Eggar - a rarity! Comes every year and sits by my bedroom window

We had a busy few days with Shirley. She came 2 hours early, for ages she told me the train arrived at 2:03pm but it was actually 12:08, so we were a little late, just a tad. She was there waiting for us. Then we drove to the garages and picked up my Dad’s car and got rid of that rotten VW polo! On to a garden centre, then Waitrose in Okehampton, then home . . . Finally. That evening (this is Friday) we went to The Duke of York at Iddesleigh for dinner. Had to wait ages for a table but met Peter Walters there with his wife and so had a long chat with him. Really nice food and great atmosphere.

The weather, typically, went down after a starry night. We were going to have a walk by the sea but the rain wouldn’t stop so we went to The National Trust’s Castle Drogo, England’s last built castle, completed in 1945. The family still live there on the top floor and they are now into their 3rd generation, when they have all passed on the castle becomes sole National Trust property. It was built in Dartmoor granite and has been leaking water ever since and is now part of a £5 million restoration. It’s a very dreary looking place; it looks a little foreboding and would be great as centre stage in some haunted film or ‘Hound of the Baskervilles’ dramatisation. It worked especially well with the weather! We came home wet and tired and had a sleep. Mum cooked an amazing dinner and we ended up going for a walk at 1am to look at the stars.

Castle Drogo

No photography allowed inside

The next day the sun shone but it didn’t last. As soon as Shirley lay on the bench to sun bathe the heavens opened and that was that. We dropped her off at the railway station, had a disgusting coffee and then went on to Exeter city centre for shopping.

Exeter Cathedral

Today it has rained constantly. I’ve done nothing. Just reading and sleeping.

On Friday night I had a very strange dream. That night Dad and Shirley saw a fox run up the garden in the garden light. The Lampers too were out with their big beams scouring the field for poor defenceless animals in their pathway. I stood by the gate watching them, chanting, ‘Fuck you!’ For once I heard no gunshot so they left empty handed. I know the animals are there, I’ve seen foxes, rabbits, hares and deer, and they were lucky that night. I’ve also been reading a book called ‘Gone to Earth’ by Mary Webb, which features a pet fox. It’s about a gypsy woman who loves nature and is against all animal cruelty. She is so naïve and ignorant about the life around her and gets entangled up with the local squire who falls in love with her. He is a cruel, beast of a man, although he’s too late to ask her to marry him, she marries the parson. She has a half blind cat, deaf rabbit, blind blackbird and a pet fox called Foxy. To cut a long story short she falls to her death in an old quarry pit holding Foxy as the hounds were after the fox. It made me cry. So Friday night I dreamt that there was a fox in my bed. I woke up sweating at 3:30am and felt something furry and tried to get it out. The next morning . . . Well, this is where it gets really spooky; I found a muddy paw print on my bed.

Eeeeekkkkkkk!

Oh my God.

That’s too frightening. I’ve always known Devon was strange, but this takes the biscuit!

And Dad was my witness. He’ll tell you!

So. . .

I hope you all enjoy the pictures. I can’t say anymore tonight.



Emy xxx

P.S What pictures you may ask? Well, I'm missing at least 10 more all because blogger photos won't upload tonight. So tomorrow it is as I've lost ALL patience!