A Duck A Day #2 Hawaiian Dusty . . . .

. . . designed by Martin Hughes-Games, a presenter on the BBC's Springwatch series.

Hawaiian Dusty has been placed within the WWT Arundel's area housing the Nene (or Hawaiian) Geese, which were saved from extinction by Sir Peter Scott who founded the WWT.

I bet he can do a cool hula with those colourful tail feathers!

A Duck a Day #1 Springtime Dusty . . .

. . . by Michaela Strachan, presenter of the BBC's Springwatch

We went along to WWT Arundel this afternoon as June and December were very keen to begin spotting the Ducks on the Celebrity Dusty Duck Trail, which runs until 5th March. 

All 15 of the ducks have been made for WWT by Aardman studios and 14 of them have been designed by celebrities.

I'll be sharing the rest over the next couple of weeks - hope you enjoy them as much as we have :)

A Walk in the Dark

"In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan, earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;  .  .  ."  These are the first few lines from the carol written by Christina G. Rossetti (originally as a Christmas poem for the American magazine, Scribner's Monthly, in 1872) and, as I stood in the dark, silent woods with a small group of people and only a few paraffin lanterns to cast a weak light around us, I became aware of how much light there still was in the evening sky.

Through the branches of the trees, now mostly bare after the gales of last week, I could see a faint twilight over the hills and, overhead, there was already a fantastic display of stars. Nearby, I caught the faint smell of woodsmoke as well as the gentle noise of someone shuffling their feet, whilst we waited for the walk leader to begin speaking.

He told us about a time, almost 1000 years ago, when people in this part of Britain knew that there was nothing 'out there' in the dark that would eat them (the remaining brown bears and wolves having been driven North by hunting) and that they would have been comfortable to navigate around their local area without light of any kind, which was very important given that their only portable light source was inefficient tallow candles. 

We moved onwards through the woods, the deep litter of leaves rustling and crunching under our feet. When my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I could see the glitter of frost riming the top layer of leaves and glittering on bare earth and stone.

As we passed the new Anglo Saxon hall house I became aware of the red glow of firelight in the trees ahead and shortly, on our right, we were lead to an area with a campfire glowing red, orange and white with heat and a small canvas tent with a lantern in the entrance close by.  Here, we were told, was the camp of a charcoal burner who would have had to maintain a round the clock vigil whilst 'the burn' was taking place. The speaker, a Woodsman himself, went on to explain that charcoal burners only lived in the woods from Spring to early Autumn when they were working to produce charcoal and that, at other times, they lived in houses which were comfortable and well furnished as they earned good money from their trade, as shown in Wills and other legal documents.

Walking further through the woods I slipped on an icy patch whilst navigating a slope and was very glad that my husband was stood next to me and caught me before I fell.  Eventually we reached Pendean Farmhouse and entered, grateful to be leaving the deep cold behind us. The fire and a few candles cast a welcoming light though reading and sewing would have been out of the question and our guide explained that whittling was a pastime that would have been carried out during the darkest months of the year.

Outside again, I stopped and gazed up into the heavens slightly awed by how crystal clear the stars and constellations looked in a night sky unpolluted by electric light. 

In the dark, I walked tentatively down a cart track made slippery by the build up of several day's frost, glad for once of the need to use walking sticks which gave me extra support.

The next stopping point was Bayleaf, a Tudor framed hall house. Whilst the high-ceilinged hall was much darker than the much smaller rooms in Pendean, we were told that spinning and tool making/repairs were important jobs that would have been done by the light of the fire. We also discovered that, before artificial lighting was widely available, people's sleep patterns were very different from now and usually consisted of two periods of sleep with an hour (or so) or wakefulness in the early morning hours, known as biphasic sleep.


When we left the warmth of Bayleaf's open hearth fire behind, I was aware of how intensely cold the night air had become. We were walking in a very spread out group and this meant I could get a greater feel of walking in the dark as I did not have a lantern. Moving away from a sparsely candlelit environment I noticed how quickly my night vision returned.

I heard the sound of hooves stamping on cobbles and realised that the museum's three heavy horses were in the fenced paddock on my left and, in doing so, I glimpsed their outlines as I passed by on my way to Whittaker's Cottages. These were constructed in the Victorian period and so the interior appeared very modern, compared to all the other houses we visited. The most useful innovation we saw here was the paraffin lamp which meant that all sorts of handiwork as well as reading would have taken place well into the night.

Our last house of the evening was Walderton, a short step across the green from Whittaker's Cottages. The three steps up to the front door were tricky in the almost total dark so it was a relief to find a fire in the hearth and a comfortable chair to sit in.

In this photo you can see how dark the room was, with only the embers of the fire casting a glow (the paraffin lamp in the corner is very much not of the period!).

We were the last people to leave the house and one of the guides shone a light to help us down the steps, though inexplicably turned it off as my husband was mid-step which lead to him falling in a rather dramatic, though apparently casual, fashion as he had his hands in his coat pockets. Afterwards he told me that he didn't see much point in panicking as there was nothing to grab onto, so he harnessed his stage training to fall as well as was possible. At the time we thought he had completely got away without damage, however the next morning he discovered a huge purple bruise on his right side. All in all, he still felt (and I agreed) that he came out of it well all things considered.

After this bit of unexpected excitement it was a relief to reach the building from Lavant where hot mulled wine, warm spiced ginger cordial and mince pies were being served. When we left a short while later, we found our path to the car park illuminated by the paraffin lamps that had been carried around the site on our walk which was a lovely way to finish the evening.

The guided walk we attended was at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum .

Travels with a Trailer Tent #2

The morning of Thursday 18th August dawned bright and hot.

Leaving home took longer than expected, partly because our eldest daughter was dithering about whether or not to come with us - having initially decided that she was joining us only 36 hours previously. Ultimately, lack of food in the house made her mind up and so, at 2pm, we finally headed to the local garage to adjust the car tyre pressures before returning home to hitch up the trailer tent and set off to our first destination.

We were delayed en route by my needing to get some urgent paperwork completed. In doing so I had to attempt to reverse whilst towing to exit a car park and had my fears confirmed - it's a difficult thing to do and will obviously take some practice. In the end my husband unhitched the trailer - injuring himself in the process - and turned the trailer by hand. After I had staunched the flow of blood from his left hand (thank heavens I had thought to check the first aid kit in the car was well stocked) we finally got on the road at 6pm. Not ideal, especially as we had rather hoped to be at our campsite by late afternoon. 

We were heading to Postern Hill campsite for two nights, a Camping in the Forest site in Wiltshire, which we chose primarily because we wanted to visit Avebury stone circle. 

The rest of our journey was, thankfully, very straightforward and we arrived at Postern Hill at 8.30pm as dusk was turning into full night. The campsite Manager came out of their motorhome to greet us and explain that we could pitch anywhere without an electric hook-up supply, as long as we kept a 6 metre gap between us and our neighbours.

What followed was 15 minutes of increasing panic as the car windscreen kept misting over due to the dropping temperature outside, making it difficult for us to gauge suitability of pitches available in the gathering gloom. In the end, finding ourselves almost back at the entrance, we pulled over and putting on head torches my husband and I went for a wander. Having discovered where several large (and unexpected dips) were we found a fairly level pitch in a slight clearing and unhitched the trailer tent and set about pitching by car headlight (not recommended!).

Fortunately for us, within 10 minutes we were approached by a lady camped nearby, who asked us how long we'd had our Conway and said that she'd never seen one so small(!). Then she asked if we'd like a hand in setting up and we gratefully accepted, which we discovered was our best decision that day when she turned out to be an old hand at trailer tents and knew lots of things we didn't - such as the bedroom compartment frame needing to be extended up and out - we had no idea given that we only possess 3 pages of faded photocopied instructions from the original owner manual.

By 10.30pm December and June were able to go to bed whilst we sat down and had a much needed cup of tea.

Thoughts from the Shower #10

I'm wondering how the subject of vaccinations has become so controversial given that for so long they were considered, without question, to be life saving.

Perhaps it's down to the involvement of pharmaceutical companies (many now so large that they are considered global, rather than national) - no-one is ever going to believe that they have our health and best interests at heart as long as they are looking at their profit margins.

Carrot Cake Confusion - Averted

Thank you to all of the people who shared recipes and advice with me, very much appreciated. 

I have made two practice cakes; the first one with vanilla cream cheese frosting and the second with half vanilla/half orange cream cheese frosting.

Here are a few photos of my first ever carrot cake:

I was very encouraged by June's reaction to this cake as she was very anti a cake with vegetables in and she asked for seconds :)

After the taste test tomorrow the cake/frosting combo with the most points (out of 10) will be the one I make for the competition this weekend.

Carrot Cake Confusion

Hello!

I'm in the middle of a meltdown. A few months ago June and December sent off entry forms for a local Horticultural Show's fun competition for kids and I thought, 'What fun! I shall have a go too', and ticked the homemade jam and carrot cake boxes for the not-for-fun adult competition.

Roll forward a few months and here I am in my kitchen, with an increasing sense of urgency, searching through recipe books and scanning pages brought to me by Google.

You see, I've got a confession to make. I have never, in my entire life, made a carrot cake.

Let that sink in for a few moments.

Yes, I - a total carrot cake novice - have chosen a competition to be the first time I make one. Argh.

Apparently carrot cake is a simple recipe. Or not. In my research over the last few weeks I have been told to, 'keep it simple' (meaning only carrots, cinnamon and walnuts); 'make it tropical' (meaning swap walnuts for pecans and add pineapple - and possibly rum); 'make it vegan' (the meaning of this so overheated my brain that I had to sit down. How can a cake that is meant to be smothered with cream cheese frosting become vegan?).

Also, carrot cake can be loaf shaped; single tier; two tier - or more. Top iced only. Split and filled and iced on top. Or split and filled and completely smothered in cream cheese frosting. Sometimes with sparklers on top, too.

Anyway, I think you can all see why my brain is in a whirl over this.

So, if any of you lovely people who read my blog have any recipes to recommend, preferably ones that you know taste great, please share with me by next Wednesday (5th October).

Please.