It was a warm summer’s evening with the swifts in full cry, hurtling through the sky catching insects for the brood in the nest. It seemed a good evening to pop in for a quick half, which I duly did. Carley was in, on the right side of the bar for a change, along with Rog the Oil chatting to mine host, Ivor the Beer.

Rog has decided he’s had enough of blocking lanes and annoying people when he delivers oil, and his retirement is looming. We were offering helpful advice to keep him busy, as no-one thinks him sitting at home will suit him, and certainly not the long suffering Dawn. Despite some terse responses to the advice from the throng, he remained in good spirits, mildly abusing Mickey who had deserted him to sit with his mate, Spaghetti (no, no-one knows why).

Carley was excited as school is now out, and a long holiday looms; she likes to travel and will spend the holiday in Boscastle, working at the farm shop. Four miles is about as far as her snazzy convertible car seems to want to go. Perhaps one day she might get to Devon, but at least we get good service in the pub.

It was a lovely evening as I left, quite muggy, the air was warm and still and the sky full of swallows and martins. It won’t be too long before they are stocking up on fuel for the journey to Southern Africa. Some summer visitors are already leaving and the cuckoos tracked by the British Trust for Ornithology show most birds are moving south through Europe. One, Joe, is already in Africa, currently on the Niger/Chad border.

On July 13 he left Sardinia, crossed 150km of the Mediterranean Sea and then flew non-stop over the Sahara, arriving in Niger on the evening of the 16th. That’s quite some going and will be repeated by millions of birds over the coming weeks. It’s one of the most exciting times in the ornithological calendar.

• Fred Knobbit is a nature blogger. He grew up in the Pennines in Lancashire on the edge of an industrial town but is now safely in Cornwall. You can read his archive at www.bodminblogger.com