Red sky at morning . . .

Shepherd's (or sailor's if you live near the sea) warning . . . How right it was yesterday!

The photo was taken from my office window. We were barely able to step outside to ttake photos, as the rain on top of freezing-cold ground, had turned to a thick slick of ice overnight. Even the tractors and landrovers of Next Door were unable to move an inch. A slick of ice covered everything, even these rocks on the top of the wall beside the front gate. I think he must have got his cattle in, finally, as the poor creatures were in free-fall coming down a steep icy trackway from the field the previous evening. They were standing at the top of the slope, obviously a bit worried about proceeding, and then they would begin to glide down. It looked really funny, but of course, was quite serious as several fell and could easily have been deadstock.

This was what faced us yesterday - ignore the slight thaw with water - it was the blardy Cresta Run. We had to VERY carefully take dolly steps to negotiate the lane as far as the gritting box, only to find that the "grit" (in actual fact, duff with a little salt added) was frozen solid and we couldn't stand upright to even put the little we could chip out across the road.

Below, is Next Door's yard - a bovine ice rink . . .

Of course, all the workers in the household had to phone in and say they were stranded. They were not alone. Listening to local radio, people were phoning in and one lady said under no circumstances attempt to drive down Allt-y-Cnap hill at Johnstown as she had just gone into free-fall down it, sideways all the way down, with a car behind her doing the same. The story was a similar one across the county, and the Kidwelly road was shut all day because of a multi-vehicle pile-up . . .


A thick layer of ice covered everything, leaving the grass looking like seaweed . . .


This was the path just outside the front door . . .

Today we "just" have freezing fog.

I have been throwing out frozen apples for the blackbirds - we have upwards of 20 in the garden at any one time, pecking at the small apples which we left on the tree for just this sort of weather (though we didn't expect it so early).

Off to make soup and more bread . . .