Brass Monkeys and Golden Balls

I have just returned from a weekend trading at the St George’s event at Wrest Park and I couldn’t have wished for a better start to the season. Wellies were left at home and there was this wonderful, shiny, golden ball thingy glowing hotly in the sky all weekend. I’m not sure what it was, (I certainly didn’t see such a thing last season), but I liked it a lot! It was mostly particularly welcome to thaw out from the overnight temperatures, which were minus lots. See the silver grass? That’s frost –>

To give you an idea of just how cold it was: the water (boiling at 9pm) froze in the kettle overnight and before 8am it was too cold for the gas fuelling the cooker to work properly. (Butane doesn’t work properly below about 4C) Here is a half finished mug of tea with a small skating rink:

We survived the nights somehow…

and the days more than made up for it in warmth, blue skies and fun. We thawed out, we traded, we caught up with old friends and made new ones, we basked, some of us even climbed trees, we also shopped, bartered and had (a little) fudge. The public flocked in to experience the various delights on offer – Jousting, Victorian Gymkhana, George and the Dragon and the usual things that go bang very loudly.

And the very, very best bit was not just the dry weekend, but packing up without getting rained on or the tent getting covered in mud. Unless you have ever had to pack up a proper (and fairly large*) canvas tent in the wet and then drag it all out again to dry and clean off the muck so that you can pack it all away again, you have no idea what a joy…really…no idea.

In all, a corker of a weekend and if the rest of the season is anything like this, I will be a happy bunny 🙂

*This was the first outing for the new 12′ square tent – slightly smaller and easier to put up – so it was particularly gratifying that it didn’t get covered in mud first time out.