Spring Preparations

It is the first week of March, and we are already catching glimpses of evidence that, yes, once again, something like Spring will come to the countryside north of Beijing. Just yesterday morning, coming back to Changping from Mass, I was surprised by the green-yellow branches hanging down from the willow trees that line many of our Changping streets. Taken together, they appear to be a yellow haze at the tree-line, but a focused look reveals that the trees are readying their leaves.

Yesterday afternoon we went for a walk around the Ming Tombs. We don't do this very often, preferring usually to go to the Great Wall. But it was terribly windy, so we decided to go up into the Thirteeen Tombs area.

At one point, trying to find our way along what we hoped was a loop between the Yongling and Deling, we came across a beekeeper's camp. He had set his tent up, out there, in the middle of all the still-bare trees. His boxes of hives were laid out, single-layer, in neat rows. The site was ineffectively guarded by a cute, fuzzy puppy. And, of course, his satellite dish was set up already.



It made us wonder where or how he got his electricity. Unfortunately he wasn't around to ask.

Even though the trees around him still look like these next two pictures, that beekeeper is ready. Late winter cannot last forever. The flowers will come.