I thought I knew why Windy Ridge was so called when we were standing outside in a brisk north-easterly at the follow-up TB test, but I was wrong – it was a mere breeze compared to the south-westerlies that blew in during my second week there! Not only were they fearsome in their strength, howling round the bungalow all day and night, but they were loaded with moisture, so that stepping out of the back door was like stepping into a garden sprayer – not pleasant. However, most of the jobs were mainly inside the buildings, so it was not too arduous, and once the Raeburn had been serviced, the bungalow was a haven of warmth and laughter. It was great fun watching Cathy using every ploy she could think of to get Glyn to let her drive his tractor – he would look as if he was seriously thinking about it and then say ‘No, I don’t think so – you need to practice more on the quad bike first’.
There was one unfortunate incident caused by the wind: a friend of Denise’s came for coffee, bearing freshly made scones, and as she opened the door of her Landrover Defender, the wind caught it and smacked it into the passenger door of my poor little Peugeot, causing two dents and a couple of scratches. She was mortified and immediately offered to pay cash to have it repaired if I would take it into the local bodyshop for an estimate. As this happened on the Saturday, I could not do anything until the Monday morning (when I was supposed to be leaving). I know it’s stupid to get upset over such a silly accident, but I felt disgruntled for the rest of the day and I’m afraid it was rather obvious to everyone that I was not a ‘happy bunny’. I duly took it in on Monday morning and got an estimate and the lady duly paid up, but I’m not sure when I can get it fixed – perhaps I can work something out when I am back at Launceston for a month in March.
On my last Sunday, Glyn and Denise took Cathy and me for a drive over Dartmoor to Widecombe and also Princetown (to show Cathy the prison!). It was as we were driving along that I heard Denise mention a name I knew – Bill Olding. He was someone that Barry and I used to meet frequently at horse shows all over the South West and in Wales as he also bred Welsh ponies and we were often up against him. It turns out that he and his wife, Dorothy, are Glyn and Denise’s oldest friends! I can’t believe these coincidences that keep happening, although it did start me thinking about the past again, which is not particularly helpful.
I finally left Ugborough on Monday afternoon and drove for just over half an hour to Saltash, just over the Tamar Bridge, in Cornwall. Although, Malcolm and his wife Miriam made me very welcome and invited me to supper, it soon became apparent that this will be a total contrast to the last two weeks. I am by myself in a small holiday cottage attached to a larger (empty) holiday cottage that is then attached to their house, and I am completely self-catering. This will be a huge challenge as there are not even the basics (salt, pepper, herbs, sauces, etc) and I couldn’t find any saucepans either (I was finally directed to a large cupboard in the other holiday cottage where I even found a pressure cooker!), plus there isn’t a conventional cooker, just a two ring hob and a combi-microwave. Thinking on my feet, I asked for a few essentials which duly turned up and then I started to make a list of other items. However it is very difficult to know what sort of things to ask for – what sort of meat are they prepared to provide? Vegetables? Fruit? I had no idea so asked for some mince, carrots and broccoli. The mince was an extra-large pack so I have had several meals from it so far – spaghetti Bolognese without tomato puree (bland), savoury mince (very similar, but served with potatoes) and homemade beefburgers that I coated in oatmeal and fried.
The actual cottage is very comfortable with under-floor heating, huge fold-back windows onto a deck with a lovely view, and a woodburning stove. At the moment I am partially living in the other holiday cottage, too as the painter has been decorating upstairs and the place is in turmoil. However, I should be moving into the bedroom upstairs later on today, so that should be better. The weather, apart from the day I arrived, has been pretty miserable; misty and/or raining for most of the time and as the sheep are all outside and most of the other work has been outside too, I have been very glad of my waterproofs and wellies.
My day starts at about 9.00am when I let out and feed the chickens (sadly reduced to only two at the moment since a recent fox attack) and then I go to feed the pregnant ewes and check on the lambs from last year. The farm is quite large (about 80 acres, I think) and the sheep are in fairly far-flung fields so it involves quite a lot of walking – I have been very pleased to have the thumbstick that my Uncle Tony made for me, it has definitely helped me on the hills and in the slippery mud. In addition to these jobs I have also been helping Malcolm with construction jobs; digging a trench to run some drainage pipe to pipe a spring in one of the fields, patching some holes in the stone hedgebanks (a bit like dry-stone walling but with a bank of earth behind) and digging post holes for a new tractor shed and also for a lean-to on the existing barn. I hasten to add that I haven’t physically had to dig the trench or the post holes – we borrowed a mini-digger with an augur for that, but it has been quite hard work in adverse conditions. The weather was so bad the other day that I had an enforced day off, which allowed me to catch up with my journal and some reading, but by mid-afternoon I was going slightly stir-crazy, so in a break in the weather, I went for a walk round the farm going downhill to the wildlife pond where there is already a large amount of frogspawn, then along the banks of the estuary, where a lot of the trees are covered in grey-green stagshorn lichen (used to make a purple dye when mixed with ammonia) due to the moist, mild conditions. The tide was out revealing a large expanse of mud flats where I hoped I would see some birds feeding but, although I heard curlew and geese, they had flown by the time I got near enough to see them. However, I did see a large flock of mallards and some shell ducks, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. I also found what was, I think, some otter spraint on a patch of ground right next to the water and, further along, some opened mussel shells as if something had been feeding there. Then the weather set in again, so I made my way back to the cottage and lit the fire and drew the curtains.
I really don’t like feeling quite so isolated as it gives me far too much time in my own company and I was never good with that. However, I suspect that the next place I go to will have more WWOOFers but will also be self-catering (I could be wrong) as it seems to be a more commercial, organic vegetable-growing enterprise – it is very difficult to form an accurate picture from the ‘blurb’ that the hosts write. Ah well, back to planning today’s menu – will it be rissoles, cottage pie, spag bol again.........?
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