For Mother's Day this year I made Kata some blueberry pancakes and decided to go on a small hike and picnic. Last weekend our Forest Tasting Tour guide Ildikó mentioned that this year's flower of the year, the snake's head fritillary (Fritillaria meleagris), was in bloom in Esztramos, near Aggtelek National Park's Rákóczi Cave.

The snake's head fritillary is a Eurasian species of flowering plant in the lily family. Its common names include snake's head fritillary, snake's head (the original English name), chess flower, frog-cup, guinea-hen flower, guinea flower, leper lily (because its shape resembled the bell once carried by lepers), Lazarus bell, chequered lily, chequered daffodil, drooping tulip or, in northern Europe, simply fritillary. The name Fritillaria comes from the Latin fritillus meaning dice-box, possibly referring to the chequered pattern on the flowers; although this derivation has been disputed. The name meleagris means "spotted like a guinea fowl". The common name "snake's head" probably refers to the somewhat snakelike appearance of the nodding flower heads on their long stems. Vita Sackville-West called it "a sinister little flower, in the mournful colour of decay." The flower has a chequered pattern in shades of purple, or is sometimes pure white. It flowers from March to May and grows 15-40 cm (6-16 in) in height. The plant has a button-shaped bulb, about 2 cm in diameter, which contains poisonous alkaloids. It grows in grasslands in damp soils and river meadows at altitudes up to 800 m (2625 ft). Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritillaria_meleagris

The cashier from the Rákóczi Cave kindly accompanied us to show us where to look. Unfortunately, we were a week late and the flowers had already bloomed and been swallowed up by high grass. Next year we will know to search for them around the same time we pick wild garlic. We decided to see if there was anything interesting going on in neighbouring Bódvaszilas for May 1^st, but it only amounted to a double row of stalls selling crap plastic toys. In the end, we continued on to Haj/Aj to see the ruins of Torna Castle (Turňa nad Bodvou) across the border in Slovakia. Unfortunately, we could not locate the access road, and consequently travelled through the village of Háj/Áj to the Slovakian National Park to walk along the babbling brooks and see the waterfalls again as we did two years ago around Easter. There were no other visitors when we parked and began walking through the splendid gorge. Despite the dry weather, significant water was still flowing in the stream and over the several waterfalls. We picnicked on cornbread and raspberry cordial at the last waterfall before heading back.

Kata wanted to see if the lilies of the valley were blooming yet in the forest glade we know about. It is still a few days away, but we did find some shield pink gill mushrooms among the sloe bushes lining the trail. Back home we lugged the piles of small tinder I had made from all our pruning to a storage area by the house. In the process, we discovered a few mushroom surprises, not the least of which was a large black morel in a leaky bag of sand left by the stonemason last year. I was telling Kata that I wanted to get the sack out of the front garden and somehow put it in buckets when I opened the sack and there was this large morel. I could not have been more surprised.

After eating a delightful cheese pie made from several kinds of sheep and goat cheese from the Gonda family farm in Erdőbénye, we bottled our palinka. Last year we sent our 110 litres of brandy mash for distilling but it had to be thrown out with 0% alcohol. This year no one would take it because we did not have the minimum of 200 litres. Luckily our colleague Jáni threw in his 100 litres of grappa mash with our pear-apple and we finally had our first successful 10 litres of palinka! It is a bit strong at 50%, but with time it should mellow a little, nor does not have that kerosene aftertaste that so many do.

The next day, Norbi came around to start putting up the fence around our planned orchard area. He was able to borrow a post digging machine, but even so, the ground was rock hard and full or large black locust roots and stones. The machine requires two to operate, each holding opposite sides of the machine as the giant screw digs the hole. However, one or both of us went flying on several occasions when the screw hit an unmovable object and the top part we were holding whipped around in the opposite direction. I should have contacted Sally Field for a cameo appearance.