January 26 – I’d prayed to Thor, the god of meltwalter, but not much happened. We had heavy rain, then it refroze; but skipping out mid day for a sandwich and a brew, there was a sharp ramp-up in temperature, and the thaw set in with some urgency. It actually felt tropical.

I had to admire the British stoicism of the picnickers with flask and camera. They didn’t even have a dog.

Even the sailing club got their boats out.

The riding was terribly poor; the ice on the paths around Chasewater was unridable as it was too mobile; it was like riding on pea gravel.

The bird life is booming at Chasewater; we recently had the largest gull roost in many years, with upwards of 10,000 birds, and the waterfowl on the boating lake are as persistent as ever. I love the domestic white geese and the way they hector me for food.

The water level continues it’s inexorable rise; on January 11th, the water was at 75com from the top of the scale, it’s now 64cm, a rise of 11cm or just over 4 inches. With the huge increase in lake surface area, that’s a immense amount of water.

The 9-foot pool has now joined the main lake through the new bridge, and it won’t be long until the water overtops the weir into the spillway – that is, if it’s allowed to.

It’ll be interesting to see the effects of the thaw.