“If it takes me 2 hours to get from my front door to my garage, how long will it take me to reach our meeting point!”
What a wimp!
Then, an enticing message arrived from Notchy:
“Can we tempt you out into Deepest Cheshire?
Here's what's on offer:
- Can't match the eye-popping beauty of last week, but at least our "slush" remains white(ish)
- Clear and treated roads all the way to our drive
- Coffee and biscuits at 10ish in warm kitchen
- Short circuit round the fields and lanes broken by a bar lunch
- Tea and cakes before heading home.”
So, by soon after 11 o’clock we had topped up with coffee and biscuits and were striding across frozen fields under a heavy, and rather loose, sky.
I stopped to say hello to these fine and friendly beasts.
It was hard to keep pace with Andrew and Sue, who strode on with great purpose.
The local ploughmen may be somewhat rotund, if they regularly partake of the lunches on offer here, and the Hydes Original and Kodiak Gold also went down very well. As did the roaring fire.
Sue is feeling a bit better these days, making a very slow recovery from her back condition and incurring a little less nerve pain than over past months.
Andrew proudly pointed out his local hill, on private land – so we couldn’t ‘bag’ it – rising to the oxygen deprived height of 102 metres.
Soon afterwards, with the sky exhibiting increasing looseness and the surfaces re-whitening, we were tucking into a pot of tea and some very fruity cake back in the warmth of Lower Withington’s Aga Kitchen.
Then Sue and I adjourned to The Ashlea for a most pleasurable meal with some TGO Challengers (aka The Backpackers Club).
Here’s an approximation of our route – 11 km, 77 metres ascent, 2 hours 45 minutes in the snow:
There are a few more images from today, here.
4 comments:
You all are so civilized! Walking from pub to lodge to inn!!! Unheard of out here in the sticks!
Hey, Ron
The 'Aga Kitchen' and the tea room are one and the same place - Andrew's luxurious kitchen!
The Ashlea did a reasonable meal last night, and Sue posted a picture of herself in the lunchtime pub with the roaring fire. Or was it one of her library photos from Alan Sloman's potting shed?
Was down that way a few weeks ago as I was best man at my mates wedding at the Swettenham Arms, we drove through the ford which always brings out the boy in me. There was an impressive railway viaduct en route from the M6 I remembered too. The area did look good for walking.
What a great day that looked like (especially the part with Sue in front of the fire with the beer)! And I've never before heard a sky described as "loose." I like it!
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