Walking in a Winter Wonderland

We tramped 17 miles today, through a snow-covered landscape... tres pictuesque. Once again, though, the walk wasn't without its fair share of drama. It started off smoothly enough, walking out straight from home, along the towpath then across the fields to Braishfield. The ground everywhere was frozen solid, with snow in most places, and easy to walk on. All the way up through Parnholt Wood was still thick with snow and we accosted an innocent bystander to take a photo of us both.

Down the steep bit of Clarendon Way, still pretty frozen (on the north side of a big hill), then out towards Hoplands and that's where it started to get a bit sticky.. the landscape was defrosting around us!  Puddles and mud started appearing everywhere. We kept having to take to the field edge and clamber round trees to get past vast lakes in the path. Eventually we got back into the other end of Parnholt Wood and it got a lot more solid underfoot again. Then we ran into loads of people, vehicles, dogs and men with guns and hunting horns... some kind of 'country pursuit' going on presumably. Once we escaped that lot we headed down the "road past Howard's" thinking we were home and dry, but no, it wasn't to be... we got attacked by 4 massive turkeys (honestly they were the size of a labrador)!!

They waited for us to walk by then started following us, surrounding us, gobbling aggressively. What is it with us and dangerous birds?! Once they'd seen us off their land, they stopped following and I felt brave enough to stop and take a picture (in case it was needed for evidence).

It was a relief to get home in one piece.

Click to see our route.