Back to 2017 and my comments on rain. Perhaps I was mistaken?

Wearing the same gear but in a different place. Long Lane – a gently descending farm track , stony in parts, but now oh so muddy ¹. The solution – to deliberately choose the puddles and the small stream that is eroding the stones laid at expense down the lane. It’s fine with field boots and Hugo can’t really get any dirtier. The next stage through the gate onto the fields and to the beck is another matter. Sucking glooping mud that cakes to boots. You will have seen pictures of Flanders battlefields from WWI – no, not the same, but approaching the reality. Boots carry extra weight. An extra sole of boot mud becomes the interface between the ground and the boot. Clay and mud glide on one another and progress becomes hard. The watch activity app has no setting for mud.²

Four legs is an advantage here.

Back home to the garden hose and a spray clean of my dog and my boots. The cold spray is partly forgiven by a brisk rub down with a dog towel and a rawhide chew.

A chance to relax now until the whole process is repeated this afternoon

1. But not as bad as described in ‘Song of the Mud’ ↩
2. Or for snow either – see the tweets by Rene Ritchie ↩