A Special Visit To WWT Welney

Hello there!  A very happy new year to you!

Before I get into the excitement of this post, I’d just like to take a moment to apologise for having not posted in so long.  You see I’ve had a very exciting December – I have moved house at long last!  There will of course be photos from the nature in the wonderful new garden but what with Christmas arriving all of a sudden in this household and time running away with me in December, I have a different adventure I’d like to tell you about first.

This is from a special visit to the Wildfowl and Wetland Trust’s reserve at Welney.  A short while after moving house I meet an elderly couple on one of my outings to the Ouse Washes close by who were telling me about the washes and also mentioned that I should go and visit Welney as it’s a lovely place and has a great display about the washes and fenlands.

So my boyfriend and I decided to go there on the 20th December 2015.  We got there mid-afternoon and decided to have a walk in as much daylight as was left.  Here are a few photos from this part of our adventure:

Whooper Swan

Entrance Display

Pochard

Lapwing

Greylag Geese

View from the main hide

Shoveller Ducks

Curlew

The walk was really lovely – if a little cold!  We saw a wonderful number of birds including mute swans, whooper swans, curlew, shelduck, lapwing, shoveller duck, greylag geese, pochard, wigeon, little egret and others!

Despite the sun setting, there was still more excitement to be had today.  We made a trip to the café to have drinks and a warm cup of soup.  After this, we headed across to the main hide (which is very big and amazing) to watch the swans in the floodlight before the evening feed.

It was so beautiful, watching the white swans move across the stillness of the dark water.  A magical moment.  But a magical moment made more beautiful by my boyfriend choosing that moment to propose to me in the quiet of the hide.  (I, of course, accepted – just in case you were wondering).  A very special moment.  It turns out that he had been planning this day for a number of months and meeting the elderly couple just made the idea of visiting easier to get into my head without raising suspicions!  The following photos don’t do the swans and the magic any justice whatsoever, so I’d thoroughly recommend heading across there if you get the chance.

We stayed to listen to the evening bird feed and thoroughly enjoyed the talk given about the swans.  I now know how to tell the difference between Whooper and Berwick swans (its the yellow on their bill, Whoopers have a triangle like bit of yellow whereas Berwicks have a blob).

I could be considered very biased in my opinion but I would thoroughly recommend a visit to WWT Welney (and no, I’m not being paid to say this!).  Thank you for reading the story of a very special day for me.

06 Jan This entry was published on January 6, 2016 at 10:42 am. It’s filed under Nature Reserves, Uncategorized and tagged birds, Curlew, Engagment, Fenland, Ouse Washes, Pochard, Proposal, Welney, Whooper Swans, Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, WWT Welney. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.