We decided to do a last walk of the year on a frosty day, leaving Sarah in peace to work from home. I suggested Cavenham Heath, a repeat of this walk I did in November. I thought it would be nice to see it in the frost and we wouldn't have mud to worry about... and I was right. It was very picturesque.
Here is our route. Just under 3 miles, but far enough in the cold.
Here are a few photos.
A brief history of the origins of these crosswords for those who are new to them. As a blogger of the Times Quick Cryptic Crossword on Times For The Times every other Friday, I have often had comments on the blog bemoaning that The Times only provides a Quick Cryptic on Mondays to Fridays. When I finally gave up work at the end of February, I decided that I would try my hand at compiling crosswords. It was with some trepidation that I published, in May, the first of these Weekend Quick Cryptics to fill the gap. Well it seemed to go down well so I did another. And then my fellow crossword solver and commenter on Time for the Times, Phil Jordan, volunteered to produce some too! So now we alternate, publishing each new crossword via my Friday Quick Crossword blog. You can find an index to the complete series of crosswords here.
Happy New Year to everyone! This time it is Phil's turn to provide the fortnightly weekend quick cryptic crossword. You can try and solve it interactively here or download a PDF to print here. Alternatively you can copy and print the image below. Comments and queries welcome here or with the solution post here. I will respond to them as soon as I can.
Dawn decided she wanted to do this Turkey and Pistachio Terrine recipe with some of the Christmas Day turkey leftovers, so I got her the ingredients. Her Mum used to regularly make a meatloaf and she was pining for some. It turned out great, but I think we'll be eating it for a while yet! The pickled nectarines go very well with it.
Very nice. Thank-you Dawn.
It was fine to start this morning, but then a fog rolled in. "Would you like to go for a walk?", asked Dawn. I suggested a walk to Great Barton Church and back, following the route I had done on my Snowy Walk earlier this month. This was our route..
We headed up the path behind the houses.
Tyhe building site for the new Lark Grange houses was looking a little spooky.
We stopped at Great Barton church to explore the graveyard.
Dawn found the graves of Sir Henry Bunbury, who achieved a place in popular history in the early 19th century when he was the foreign office official who had the job of breaking the news to Napoleon that he was to be exiled to St Helena, and his second wife Emily.
A few more foggy pictures from the next part of the walk..
This tree seems to jealously keep hold of its apples.
And then it was home again via the cycle track alongside Rougham Airfield, just in time to make lunch.
You can see more details of our route here on MapMyWalk.
This was another game we got at Christmas, this time thanks to Sarah. She found out about it from one of her friends in Leeds, who happens to be German, So we opened it and found the instructions... in German, Luckily a quick Google found the English version of the instructions. It is rather fun. You have to co-operate as a team to build "fireworks" in different colours. The unique element of the game is that you can't see your own cards and have to rely on other players telling which cards of a given colour or number you have in your hand to decide what to play. Recommended!
We were very lucky. Sarah and William home from University and Laura and Lawrence were able to visit us for Christmas Day. A family Christmas as we would normally have. A glass of prosecco before opening presnts and a traditional Christmas dinner...
...followed by games. This year the new game we played on Christmas Day was Mysterium, thanks to Laura.
Lawrence made a good ghost, but I found it a bit mysterious. LOL. Thanks to Laura and Lawrence for coming for the day. It's a shame they couldn't stay longer. Not sure when we will see them again now we are in Tier 4.
It has become a family tradition for me to take the 'kids' to Felixstowe for a walk on Christmas Eve. Sarah (21) and William (18) asked me the other day if we were going to do it this year. But of course.
This was our route, same as usual, although we parked round the corner from Sea Road as all the spaces there were taken.
Here are a few photos. It was a day of blustery showers and quite cold. It was sunny where we started but we could see rain ahead.
Those coats don't look very waterproof, but they assured me they would be OK.
This is new since last year. It should be opening next summer.
William just had to run about on the beach enjoying the waves which were a lot bigger than at Dunwich Heath on Tuesday.
Whilst we were in sunshine, there were clouds ahead.
But the rain had stopped before we got to our "drinks stop". We were pleased to see it was open.
Hot chocolate and marshmallows for these two while I had a cappuccino.
No seals today, but we did see this man readying to go swimming.
Looking back before we rounded Cobbold Point.
This was a far as we went before turning back. Here is the view towards the ferry and Bawdsey the other side of the river.
Climbing the steps.
On our way back now.
Sarah and William were discussing maths as we passed the Cafeole (sic!) van.
It was pretty cold to be sitting out, but at least these folk had some sunshine while they shared their bottle of wine.
Another blustery shower came over.
Lunch!
A last view of the sea and the container ship leaving port.
Well that was lovely as ever. We'll be back next Christmas Eve for sure!
You can see more of my photos here on Flickr and our route here on MapMyWalk.
