Radio Silence

So, where were we? About to set off South to Gloucestershire on the 18th of November and here it is, the 8th of December. What happened? Well, for one thing, I wrote a post on the 23rd November that failed to Publish and to add insult to injury, it lost the text along the way!

Rather than write it all out again, I’ll send you over to Two Snails to read a post about the journey down and another about preparing to swap vehicles.

There are precious few photographs from the past few weeks and those that I do have are from my little bridge camera, the Canon having resided in my camera bag for the duration. I’ll catch up on the remainder of the tale over at Two Snails within the next few days but tomorrow I must attempt my OU assignment, which is already a week late. The new van does not accommodate my studies very well and I think that I need to withdraw this year.

We returned to Winter Base on Monday afternoon. Since then we have continued getting our van act together. We had stopped at Gretna to visit the outlet there and were lucky enough to find a half price mattress topper that could be bought with Mr L’s retirement vouchers, so the first thing that we did on Monday evening was to extend the bed to its full size and then add a layer of  extra comfort. On Tuesday we were very busy rationalising belongings and creating space and we even got so far as to try out one of the van’s two tables. Now that I have some table space I hope to be able to deal with images and to write blog reports more easily. Yesterday I tackled some of the laundry generated by our trip and caught up on some computery stuff.

Finally, today gave me an opportunity to stretch my legs and walk to Colvend for supplies. The forest was very still and quiet, smelling of damp wood and deer musk, and looking more wintry, with almost all its leaves shed. The day was warm and by the time that I reached the first picnic table I was more than ready to shed my fleece and strip down to my polo shirt for the remainder of the walk. The beech wood is now less dark without its canopy of leaves but no less magical – there was a light mist wreathing the tree trunks and a feeling that nymphs and fauns might be lurking in its shadows. When I reached the loch it was completely shrouded in mist, as was Colvend, where I whipped round the shop in ten minutes flat and then hastened to the bus stop.

The bus home was running late and Nell and I had a long stand in the diminishing mist, feeling the strength of the sun growing minute by minute. Eventually I was returned to the bosom of my beloved. We created a Tesco order this afternoon and then settled to a pleasant meal of cheese (a locally produced smoked brie) and wine.

This means of course that we entirely forgot to go down to the pub for the weekly quiz this evening! We’ll try again next week. In the meantime, though SUMS does not appear to be happening yet, we have Pablo’s Armchair Treasure Hunt (formerly Logica) to look forward to.