Threatening clouds

I had a bad night with my arthritic knees playing up so at 5 am I had enough and decided no more sleep would be forthcoming.

We thought a walk might perk me up so drove up the Ingram Valley and walked from Alnhammoor to Salters Road. We’ve done the walk anti-clockwise before but there’s a wood about a mile from the end so we were concerned the path might no longer be accessible since Storm Arwen. We decided to try going clockwise to suss out the woodland path. Sure enough, there was no way through the wood. The devastation was immense. The next plan was to head up beside the wood on a quad bike track which made it easier in the snow. Eventually we lost the track and had to make our way over rough moorland and bog to reach the track back. The blip is just before we headed across the bog when snow was about to start falling.

It was only 5.5 miles but quite hard work, negotiating the slippy tussocks across the bog after climbing the steep track up. My pulled calf muscle seems to start shouting at me after a couple of miles, so a nice hot bath on our return was very welcome.

#2 daughter had a bad night with her Covid cough but later in the day felt well enough to finish decorating her office. The wall she faces from her desk has a jungle print paper with monkeys. The wall her clients will see is behind her, a pale green.

We were supposed to be going to Alex McGowan tonight with Lynn and Gavin but it’s postponed till June when we’ll be on our Jubilee Escape. Instead they have invited us to eat with them. Lynn is a wonderful cook so I’m looking forward to it - a reward for our hard walk!