After a few days of rain and cold weather, such that the mountains were covered to below 2,000m (6,500ft) with a dusting of snow, I decided to take a walk down the west side of the valley to Sion. It’s a drop of 900m (3,000ft) but there are sufficient undulations to rack up a height gain of over 600m (2,000ft).
As you will see from the first few images below, it was a bit of a gloomy day to start with, but the sun soon came out. However, I was just beginning to think that there were very few flowers in bloom and therefore very few butterflies, when I came across a ‘hot spot’ (see pics 13 to 18), which included a first for me – the Cardinal Fritillary. And, just like London buses, where you haven’t seen one for ages, 2 or 3 came along at once. The Dryads were in abundance too.
When I reached the river bed, just before Bramois, there were two Buddleia plants doing there best to grow. As you might expect, this also proved to be a good place to capture a few more butterflies – including yet another Cardinal! Even though they are widespread in southern Europe, they seem to be confined mainly to the Valais region of Switzerland. Click here for a distribution map.
Alittlebitoutoffocus 
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