Tag Archives: mud

What about the weather?

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Digging channels and building dams in the sand on the beach has always been a favourite pastime for our boys at the seaside. They also enjoyed tunnelling in a friend’s back garden, until the passage got so deep and long it was turning into a small mine. But the day before the wedding I wasn’t expecting to see them on their knees, plastered in mud, examining the route of a drainage channel diverting water around a marquee in the Shropshire hills…

If oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure, then our son and his new wife have made a fine start to married life. Just five days before their wedding on Saturday they heard torrential rain had turned the field where the marquee would be pitched into mud. Their Festival style wedding reception was sounding more like Glastonbury every hour.

After an emergency journey from London to a very wet Shropshire to assess the damage they decided to go ahead in the hope the location could be salvaged. Two days before the wedding we arrived at the farm to help hoist the marquee and bang in pegs. The view of the Long Mynd hills was spectacular as the sun appeared at last. Although the forecast was mixed, there was hope.

Like every wedding there were a mountain of tasks to be tackled from arranging tables to cleaning toilets and stringing up lights. Later that night as we sat enjoying a home cooked meal we listened to the rain on the conservatory roof. Everyone was picturing the field and the marquee.

On Friday the sun came out and it was all hands on deck cleaning chairs, laying out plates and pouring water into jugs of flowers. The attention to detail and eco-friendly planning was evident in everything from the bamboo plates, each with a guest’s named soldered into it, to waxed wood cutlery bound with handmade pottery medallions with an initial on. The only thing we needed was for the weather to be kind. As forecast, the clouds gathered after lunch and the boys decided digging a trench around the marquee was essential to save it from being flooded. It wasn’t long before the ‘highly engineered’ trench was a fast flowing stream as the rain descended. The bride-to-be could be seen gazing out through a flap in the tent as water bounced off the canvas sides and ran in rivulets across the field. Everyone was praying for sun. But could it possibly dry out by the next day?

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It was time to leave for the church rehearsal. The digging brothers, who were the groom-to-be and a best man, were caked in mud from head to toe. All around their posse of digging friends leaning on spades began to laugh.
“I better wash my hands,” said one. His brother looked uncertainly down at his now brown jeans.
“Are we Ok going like this?”
Even if your father is the vicar, the answer is ‘No’.
Fresh clothes were borrowed from a faithful friend and they arrived at the church in slightly unconventional and ill fitting outfits, which included climbing trousers and board shorts.

We do believe in miracles. The morning of the wedding the sun was shining and the field had dried out enough to be transformed. A band of willing friends, along with the groom, his best men and ushers, charged around tossing grass clippings and hay in the air and generally having fun (without mud).

The field that was brown turned green and within a couple of hours it looked like the most wonderful country wedding reception venue.  Hay bales and fire pits were scattered around and pots of flowers and pretty lanterns lining paths of straw completed the scene.

Some hours later when the flower power Morris Minor chugged up beside the marquee and the new Mr & Mrs Farmer stepped out there were cheers and tears of joy as the bride saw the transformed scene for the first time.

 ‘Real love’ may be about weathering storms together, but sometimes that’s easier to see after the clouds have parted and the sun has broken through.

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Footnote: This blog isn’t aimed to thank everyone who helped make the day a success and there were so many of you! Neither can I cover all the highlights from moving and hilarious speeches to the service, the sermon and the flowers, but I must mention the members of Popup Opera who gave an amazing performance in the church – it was funny, it was beautiful and it was epic. Please do support this very special team and go to a performance soon https://www.popupopera.co.uk

 

 

 

 

that sinking feeling

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Devon has been seeping into my soul this week. Its hazy afternoon horizons, skeletons of trees lining hilltops and rocky coves where cliff outcrops rise out of ice blue water have been reeling me in. I’ve watched the tide licking its way up estuaries and curling its tongue around bobbing boats and buoys. The painfully narrow lanes have become less threatening, switch backing through rolling hills, as cars and buses breathe in and kiss wing mirrors to squeeze past. Pretty painted houses line the sides of steep estuary banks like stacked dominoes staring down at themselves in silver water snaking through the valleys. This land of white washed cottages, beam-laden pubs with log fires, sailing boats and fishermen is pulsating with stories and intrigue.

A few days ago, lunch and water carefully packed, we set off along one of these mesmerizing estuaries as the tide ebbed out. When we reached the sea an ancient smugglers’ pub provided liquid refreshment on a rocky island just offshore, reached only at low tide. I checked out the barman for eye patches and parrots – the tell tale sign of a pirate or a smuggler. He seemed fairly law abiding and even provided free blue plasters for customers with sore feet – a bit soft for a smuggler perhaps. As we’d diligently followed a footpath across fields on the first leg of the journey, we decided to make up our own route on the way back and follow the curving river inland. How hard could it be with the tide out?

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Gradually rock and sand gave way to mud and fallen trees. OK so far. The banks began to turn steep and the mud became stickier. “Stay close to the rock,” was the instruction passed back – apparently this mud was less ‘sinky’. Some time later we had gone a long way, too far to turn back if the mud became impassable. There were fallen trees to clamber over and it became a case of picking a route on solid ground wherever possible. Curves in the river threw up new challenges as we had to navigate streams and more sinking sand and mud. So far we’d made it and surely it couldn’t be much further? A particularly substantial barrier of fallen trees and undergrowth blocked our path and although we tried to follow a line of firm-looking sand, we soon began to sink and had to head back to the bank and battle through the trees to make progress. By now we were convinced we had passed the worst of the sinking mud, so we crossed a narrow stream onto a line of solid sand, striding confidently onwards. Gradually I noticed the stream between us and the bank was widening and the sandbank felt more like the middle of the river. It was time to cross back to the safety of the bank because the tide had now turned and gullies of water were filling up. I had visions of being up to my knees in mud waiting for the air sea rescue helicopter. But before I knew it I was on my own and the lead member of the party was safe on the stones at the edge, urging me to run and not stop until I reached solid ground. I took a deep breath and began running, pulling my boots and legs out of the squelching mud threatening to suck me down. Obviously, I made it. Just. Mud up to the knees of my lovely blue jeans and coating my walking boots, seemed a small price to pay for the walk up the river and along the tidal road… but never again. I won’t be trusting Devon’s river estuaries, which look like sand, but turn into sinking mud.

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I realized it was a very near miss, when a few days later we witnessed a full RNLI rescue of a dog up to its neck in the mud on the edge of another estuary. When he was eventually carried out exhausted and mud drenched by several firemen and RNLI rescue crew everyone breathed a sigh of relief and I thought… it could have been me!

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