13 April 2014 (Sunday)- Marsh Mosh

In a novel break with tradition I was woken by the alarm today. It had been set earlier than I suspect most people would set their alarms on a Sunday morning, but regular readers of this drivel would know that I'm not like most people.

A couple of weeks ago a rather large series of geocaches went live on the Romney Marsh. Two days later was the county meet-up of hunters of tuppeware. It came up in conversation that several of us were interested in doing the series, and today was the day. We colllected Gordon Tracy and Suzy and then, dragging Lisa out of retirement, we set off to Old Romney where we met up with everyone else.

My phone did give me some gyp to begin with, buut before long eleven of us (accompanied by two small dogs) set off on a rather god walk across the Marsh.

Romney Marsh is somewhere I've been to countless times, but it was only today that I realised that I've always driven past, across or through it. I've never really taken the time to have a good walk about the place. I was glad we did so today. The route led us thought some wonderful scenery; we saw butterflies, caterpillars and even a little lizard. We saw a pair of nesting swans, and saw their eggs as they changed over on the nest. We saw newborn lambs taking their first tottering and faltering steps. And I did feel sorry when my silly dog shoved his nose through an electric fence and got far too many volts through it. He did yelp.

Our walk took us past a derelict cottage. What was once a charming little house in beautiful surroundings is now a collapsing tumbledown wreck. It amazes me that anyone would ever have let the thing fall into such disrepair.

We also walked through the array of wind turbines. I had no idea how big those windmills are; they are huge. And we also discovered acres of solar panels that I never knew were there.

We started walking at 9am; we finished walking shortly after 6pm having found over fifty caches along a route of more than sixteen miles. It was a really good day out with friends. Some of our number were new to this silly hobby and today found their one hundredth cache. I found my three thousandth, and having done so sat down in a clump oof stinging nettles.

And on the way home we stopped off to collect a puzzle cache I'd solved months ago.

I took a few photos whilst we were out and put them on-line when I got home. Once home I washed the mud and fox poo off of "Furry Face ^TM" who promptly went to sleep.

We then had a rather good bit of tea. It was at that point that my face started glowing and my back started aching. It is just possible that I overdid the walking today. Again.