I clamber up the steep hillside behind the apartment, my feet slipping on dry leaves as I go higher into the olive grove.The red earth held in place by layers of flat white stones encircling the beautiful dark twisty old tree trunks, with their soft silvery grey green leaves. There are curled white feathers lying on the ground. Then I see him, the wonderful cockerel, strutting about, with his four hens around him. They eye me suspiciously as I sit down and open my sketchbook, but I have brought some bread as payment for my models, and I am touched when the cockerel picks up a little piece and places it carefully in front of a hen!

In front of me are the chickens and the olive trees, but if I turn around I can see the breathtaking view out across the Ionian Sea to the mountains of Albania. I have to pinch myself! I am in heaven! Corfu!

I settle back down to try and draw the cockerel, but he keeps walking away!

This is my little ‘cartoon’ painting I made in acrylics on a small canvas board that I had taken with me. I titled it ‘ The Golden Cockerel’. Just add reading glasses and knitting needles and they could be straight out of  the film’Chicken Run’!