Janet's Blog – Winter 2026

Happy New Year!

The first week in January certainly reminded us what winter can be like – it’s once in a blue moon that we get snow around here. It started snowing on the Sunday evening and at 10pm I was throwing snowballs at daughter No 2’s bedroom window. Then ensued a mad snowball fight between her, her boyfriend, Angus and I – punctuated with 10 minutes making a snowman. It was a bit one side as she’s an exceptional shot and just as accurate with a snowball! Overnight the temperature dropped and we woke up on the Monday morning to a beautiful winter wonderland. I love the snow, well I do until we’re a day or two into carrying every bucket of water from the house to the horses, and I don’t even want to think about how difficult things can be with getting water to the stock on the farm – poor Angus was looking pretty tired.

At the marina we’d managed to get the water supply off on the jetties before it froze, to minimise the likelihood of bursts. At minus 6 degrees it’s just asking too much for even the best of our pipe’s lagging. We had a few days of ice on the marina which always brings a strange degree of peace.

Just before Christmas we were so saddened to hear of the breach on the Llangollen and really feel for the boaters and businesses affected by it. In true boater tradition, it was humbling to see how people pulled together, and Cheshire Cat Narrowboats and Norbury Wharf were amazing in offering accommodation to some of the people who were badly affected. We had no end of offers of help for the people who were decamped to the marina at such a difficult time. I can’t begin to imagine what the people affected had gone through, and just feel eternally grateful that no one was seriously injured or killed. CRT have been quickly on to securing the site, and as I write I believe the 3 boats affected are in the process of being retrieved. It will be very interesting to follow the restoration process and we look forward to it being completed hopefully later this year.

In the office my new year’s resolution is to clear my desk (realistically it won’t happen but it makes David happier) and we try to take the opportunity of the quieter months to catch up on things and plan for the new season. Every night it’s getting just a little bit lighter, and this morning when I walked to the marina the birds were singing to me that it won’t be long until spring!