We’re still in that strange few Christmas and New Year holiday days when we don’t really know what day it is. Feeling sort of relaxed and lazy with a gnawing guilt starting to set in and nudging me to get on with some jobs that need doing around the holding.
A hard frost overnight meant that I still couldn’t get on with the paving work that’s currently on hold awaiting some frost free nights so we decided this morning to head out for a walk. We’re aiming to complete The Wakefield Way whilst I’m off work over Christmas so got up early and togged up nice and warm and headed out. The Wakefield Way is a 70 miles circular walk around the rural outskirts of Wakefield. We’ve split it into 11 walks of around 6 to 8 miles each and today we tackled the second section, walking from Notton to the Sculpture Park at Woolley. Leaving a car at each end we can get a section knocked off before lunch and get home in time to do a few jobs before darkness sets in.
The cold crisp air and rock hard, frozen solid ground made for a brisk and refreshing outing this morning. Samson, our lovely Parsons terrier got a good run out and we enjoyed the company of a cheeky robin that joined us for a while. We also had the pleasure of a brief encounter with a heron fishing in a drainage dyke running alongside a field that lifted off into flight as we passed
Returning to the outlying car rosy cheeked and ravenous (we had headed out without breakfast) we were surprised by a few large flakes of snow fluttering down. There’d been no mention of snow when we checked the forecast last night but the few flakes quickly multiplied and within minutes we were in the middle of heavy snow fall. It’s always surprising how quickly the world changes when it disappears under a layer of snow. What should have been a short 10 minutes drive home was suddenly a struggle to get anywhere. The roads had not been salted or ploughed and rapidly became difficult to drive, cautious traffic crawled along following each others tracks and we slipped and skidded our way up hills. Our 10 minute drive took us an hour to reach home, and living in a valley bottom, the last stretch is always a challenge in snow on the steep descent in. We parked up our cars with a sense of relief at being home.
The layer of snow covering everything meant that there wasn’t much I could do outside today. So checking and filling the bird feeders was pretty much the only job that looked doable. We’ve got quite an array containing sunflower hearts, wild bird seed mix, black nyger seed and peanuts along with a bird table we use for bread and scraps. I also recently bought a squirrel feeder after many years of watching the local grey squirrel population decimate my bird feeders. Many hours of scheming and planning various ways to stop then nicking my bird food always failed so with the wisdom that comes with getting older I’ve decided on the more pragmatic approach of deciding to enjoy living with them instead. The new squirrel feeder is now topped up with their own supply of peanuts in the hope they will now leave the bird feeders to the birds. My squirrels haven’t worked out how to use their feeder yet but I doubt these intelligent and adaptable characters will take very long to master it.
So that’s it for me today. I’ve filled up the log rack, lit the log burner and dug out a book I’ve been meaning to read for a while. Samson is curled up on the hearth and Michelle is reading Monty Don.
2021 is off to a good start
