A chill wind...

...across Exmoor, with scudding clouds. A family welcome, much talk. The curious mix of shops in a modern village - delicatessen and coffee-shops for visitors, jostling with a mini-supermarket. Local cider-tasting and hot sausages on sale at a Saturday afternoon village gathering. Then Sunday morning and the scarlet wreaths of poppies as a small procession winds its way through the village to the War Memorial, preceded by processional cross, choir and surpliced clergy. It all has a timeless feel,but also a sense of vulneralbility - rural life has taken a terrible bashing in recent years and there is no longer that sense of "everything just going on from year to year" that was always part of the English countryside...