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18 January 2020 (Saturday) - In The Mud


I slept like a log; it was nine o’clock before I was sitting eating toast. As I scoffed I was intently watched by Fudge and Pogo. Treacle (on the other hand) was intently rummaging in "er indoors TM"’s handbag.
I had a look at Facebook; despite having had a serious fiddle with the settings I was still being bombarded with adverts that didn’t interest me.
It was at this point that Karl phoned. We weren’t due to meet until later, but with his morning’s plans having gone west, they were at a loose end, so we got our arses into gear and got a move on.

We got ourselves and the dogs together in surprisingly good time, and set off. As we drove so Treacle was squeaking and whimpering. We stopped as soon as we could (there are surprisingly few places to stop on the A28) and all three dogs tiddle like things possessed.
It was at this point that we realised that we’d left "er indoors TM" boots behind…

We came home for boots, and then headed back west-wards. As we drove we found ourselves stuck behind a succession of people who (quite frankly) could have gone faster had they got out of their cars and pushed them. We eventually got to where we’d agreed to meet Karl, Tracey and Charlotte only forty-five minutes later than planned.
We got boots on, we set off in the wrong direction, we came back again and set off in the right direction. There was a minor hiccup as we tried to determine whether the designated start point was where we thought it was or whether we’d just found a random hole in a hedge. But we took a chance, and we had been in the right place. We had a rather good walk through the woods to the south of Bedgebury forest, our route being dictated by a series of geocaches. Being in the woods and inland there was nothing like the wind we had last weekend. It was a tad cold, but not *that* cold. Mind you, with all the rain we’ve had recently it was muddy. *Very* muddy. So muddy that three miles of walk felt much more. We had planned to carry on walking after this route, but at the end of it I was worn out.
Geocache-wise I can’t praise this walk highly enough. There were some very clever hides, and most were plenty big enough to put in geo-tat and trackables (if that sort of thing floats your boat).

Once back at the car we scraped the mud off of the dogs (and ourselves) and took a short drive up to the A262 and the Peacock inn. This is a place I drive past every day when I am working in Tunbridge Wells, but had never previously visited. The place is seven hundred years old and was very welcoming. We were able to sit the dogs in a corner out of harm’s way whilst we had half a pint of weak shandy. The pub was serving “Bishop’s Finger”; you very rarely see that on the hand pump.
You can see photos of the walk and the weak shandy by clicking here.

We came home (with me snoring for much of the way) to find "Daddy’s Little Angel TM" waiting for us. We were to look after Sid overnight whilst she went out with her mates.
"er indoors TM" boiled up a rather good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching a film on Netflix. ”Edie” was a rather good film about a little old lady who, following the death of her husband, wanted to climb a mountain. Possibly like "er indoors TM" might well do when I croak…

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