Oh dear, what weather, really violent squalls that turn you from a normal person to a drowned rat. Of course it could be frightfully good for the skin, all those icy bits lashing you, we can but hope. The alpacas, such stoics, seem to be fine. Chas and I spent a good part of Sunday laying out that special material that stops mud coming through and then heaving sleepers into giant ruts followed by a lot of stone shovelling to prevent the mule getting permanently stuck in a gateway with girls on one side and young boys on the other. Happily the boys just stared at us in wonderment and didn’t attempt a mass tresspass into the girl field. I remember a tragic work experience girl who left a gate open, whereupon the stud males, going down the track from the barn, found themselves in a lascivious heaven. The only way to retrieve the males was to run back to the barn, get some halters, put them on and heave the males off. As it happens they were a bit dim with up to three males on one female so relatively easy to catch.
My brother assures me we will not be under several feet on snow like last year. It came down the day Andrew left for his Christmas holidays in the Czech Republic last year. Chas takes him to Bristol airport tomorrow for a re-run…fingers crossed.