Winter Solstice

I have never thought of Winter Solstice as being an event, but our lovely neighbours have and invited us along to theirs.

It involved a long walk in our wellies upwards through muddy fields and tracks to the highest point around - Kelston Round Hill.

We arrived a few minutes early and then at 4.03pm the sun set, although it was hidden by a rather menacing rain cloud.

The celebrations began and Simon cracked open a bottle of whiskey to be passed around. I don't actually like whiskey, but for some reason this one was very tasty, so I may have been converted. 

The whiskey was paired with strips of South African biltong and pieces of mandarin orange. I don't know if that's traditional or what they had in their fridge today. Embarrassingly we didn't know the etiquette for a Solstice outing, so took nothing with us.

There were other people on the top of the hill so Simon took his whiskey bottle to share it around while the rest of us had a cartwheel competition, and I managed to finish second out of three. 

On the way down the hill I refused to take part in the rolling down the hill event, and I think that was very wise. 

Afterwards we stopped for a couple of drinks in the pub and then strode home across the fields, avoiding the cow pats with the help of a couple of head torches.