‘Climb in,’ he said, opening the door. ‘It’s going to be a bit bumpy, but you’ll be able to see more in here than if we take the Land Rover.’

He wasn’t wrong. From the elevated cab, which was thankfully blissfully cool, I was able to see the whole of the farm and the fields, as well as some of the coast, in all its glory.

‘This is amazing,’ I said to Joe as he took us right to the very edge of one field which had the most stunning sea views. ‘You can see for miles.’

Joe nodded in agreement.

‘This is my favourite spot on the whole farm,’ he said, ‘and it was Dad’s too.’

‘I can see why,’ I smiled, then I remembered the reason why he had returned to Wynmouth. ‘I’m really sorry the farm is in so much trouble, Joe.’

‘Me too,’ he sighed sadly, before stopping the tractor again and climbing out.

We ate a simple picnic lunch of sandwiches, fruit and lemonade and then walked around the field margins which were awash with wildflowers and separated from the land on either side by dense, high hedgerows.

‘Can you hear that?’ said Joe, cocking his head. ‘It’s too hot now for the birds to be singing, but the insects are out in full force.’

I listened to the thrum of intense buzzing, the lazy drone of a plump bumblebee and watched the progress of a pair of butterflies as they fluttered elegantly by.

‘Amazing,’ I said again, hoping there weren’t too many of the stinging varieties close by. ‘It sounds like a very busy spot.’

‘There are places like this all over the farm,’ Joe said proudly. ‘Dad was very keen on keeping the hedges when everyone else was ripping them out. He always had a respect for the land, and I’ll be the first to admit that that did sometimes mean compromising yields and profits, but he knew it was going to be worth it for the sake of diversity. We’ve even got a large pond taking up the middle of one of the fields further inland. Charlie was all for draining it and filling it in, but Dad dug his heels in about that too.’

I wondered if Charlie would forge ahead regardless now. Probably not if Joe had anything to do with it. He was clearly passionate about all that his father had achieved and even though I was no expert in farm management I could appreciate that it couldn’t have been an easy decision to sacrifice money in the bank for the benefit of flora and fauna.

‘Your dad sounds like a great man.’

‘He really was,’ said Joe, sounding a little choked, ‘and Mum was a wonderful woman.’