Making hay

Its been a crap summer, that said we were lucky with what seems to have been our last Gower holiday (Peter is moving back to his house) but it is record breaking dull weather time 

But today the weather broke for 7 hours wall to wall sunshine 

so yours truly collected the kids

after school and 2 hours later 

we were on golden sands

almost by ourselves

with Ivy and Roscoe

for some fun in the sea.

It was idylic 

and the dogs grew in confidence in the water

which was just as well as the tide was coming in,

They had icecreams from the nice man who also has Berners

RRMK2 practiced his pilates

MBAOSPW caught the sun

twice

while yours truly got all arty before Roscoe cocked his leg and demolished the structure.

I was proud of my beach bod

but 2.5 hours after we arrived, the sun started to set and rain clouds gathered

hence the wander

back across the dunes 

to find 

Angus where we left him. And so another micro adventure ended in the chip shop. 
 

2022 to 24

This is the apprentice on his first day at big school.

This is him about to start year 9, the signs shrunk, so has everything else.
 

Cheltenham 10k

In a flash of rash decision making yours truly decided to enter and "run" the Cheltenham 10k

so after a stupidly early Sunday morning start the apprentice and I turned up with some 5000 other wannabe athletes and ran 10k. 

Which went better than I expected, 1 hour 6 minutes 44 seconds later I got a medal and a t shirt. 

Just because I can I then walked the dogs in the woods

to show that I was not dead yet. 

Dinner was welcome with my first glass of red wine this year :)
 

Things to keep you occupied

After a fab mountain day the reality of country life and the jobs list came home with a bump. Several.

MBAOSPW has decided that the black hole is a waste of space and could be made into a really useful space which requires quite a bit of work to get it so. Hence the start has been made. 

Not as much progress as I would have liked but to be fair, in the 2 hours allocated, a fair bit done. Foxed the vermin cats anyway as they had a secret entrance into the cottage through a hole in the ancient wall, no blocked. 

The horses, well, here is what they have done to 40 quids worth of fresh served hay. Not sure why they thought is a good idea to throw it over half the county, obviously tastes better. 

In the world of small wins, and in 20 minutes of down time, I can now confirm that the petrol tank from the RD400 project (there will be an update on this later) does not leak. I know this as I filled it with water and checked. I can now get the rust out of it, seal it and send it for repainting! Only the rest of the bike to fix now. 
 

Rhyd Ddu path

I'm lucky enough to have some friends of long standing, like Dale whom I have known since we were 18 and on an archaeological dig together. We had met a while earlier as he recalls I was the first police officer ever to talk to him nicely and he was the first hippy I had ever met. 

So as we are both 60, we have a few adventures together over the years. Ben, number 1 son was the first baby he ever held, we shared a cottage in the countryside for a while together.

Its been an ambition of his to climb Snowdon so on a perfect day, last friday, we set off up the Rhyd Ddu path with Ivy the apprentice action Berner.

I like this path as its quiet, the hordes go for the shorter easier accessible route. 

Here we were alone, well nearly, about 30 others all day.

Dale found it all a bit taxing so he sat and contemplated life, the universe and everything and whether or not his mobile phone would still be in his rucksack that we had emptied of essentials and hidden behind a wall lower down, his gear in my bag. Except his phone. 

Ivy was amazing, this being her first mountain and second longest walk. 

The views were probably wasted on her 

and at one point she did look like she would vote with her paws and set off back to the car!

On a lead she had no choice but to reach the summit

where we celebrated with coffee and sausage rolls

before turning our backs on the train loads who crowded the summit for selfies

and headed back along the trail. 

Ivy cooled off in  a stream

and in less than 1.5 hours we were down

and back to the 

sleeping Dale in the truck.

A great day out

topped off by an all day breakfast pouch and coffee, and a swim
 in the lake. The thing about a good mountain day is not the sights or the peak bagging but the company. Dale and Ivy were both brilliant, one a bit more talkative than the other though to be fair. 

Back in the game

 Good news, finally we can post pictures again so the blog can resume.

This is Ivy, my new trainee action Berner. 

More to follow.