To the hills...

A lovely day dawned and Tom & I seem to be on the mend from our coughs, so we decided to get out for some fresh air. We drove the 4 miles or so to Clapham, left the car and headed for the path up to Ingleborough Cave. Which was closed for pheasant shooting. Ho hum. Fortunately, I'd had the presence of mind to download the OS Explorer maps for this area onto my iPhone, so we managed to find an alternative route. We let Tom walk the bit around Clapham but, being Tom, he got distracted by anything and everything around him, mainly a cat that followed us up the road. The cat seemed to be called "Daddy", but then again, so is almost everything these days; cars, trees, toast...

The walk was lovely, and once the path levelled out alongside the river, we got His Nibs out of the rucksack for a walk. Total refusal. He remained rooted to the spot and screamed his lungs out. Even raisins wouldn't placate him. We're starting to wonder whether he's outgrown his current shoes and walking hurts his feet, so we'll be putting him in his wellies next time. So, back into the lad lugger for the trip back down from the cave to Clapham, but he still seemed very dissatisfied with things. We thought he'd just got a cob on, until we realised after about 15 minutes that we'd put him back into the rucksack wrong and he was effectively in a half-nelson. Partly his fault if truth be told. He makes it as awkward as he can.

Anyway, we got back to the car without further drama, drove "home" and then wandered into Ingleton for a spot of lunch. Settled on a tea room, which turned out to be not a patch on the one we've already become quite fond of. To make matters worse, Tom refused his sandwiches and then got proper stroppy when we didn't give him any of our lunch. We seem to be going through a difficult eating period just now, and we're hoping that being a bit strict with him now will pay off in the long run. Any thoughts folks?



We're now back in the cottage, while Tom has his afternoon nap and, I hope, thinks about his actions. Ha ha. Nik has discovered that a pub just outside the village stocks 300+ malt whiskies, so a trip is more than likely on the cards.

Well, what a difference a few hours makes. It's now 5.30, and we've just watched Tom eat half a large Christmas sausage, several chunks of sweet potato & carrot, a handful of blueberries and, as a reward, a piece of date slice. This was a great relief to Nik & me, as we did wonder whether this evening would be a battle too. I hope this isn't just a one-off. We made sure that Tom realised we were very pleased with him, so perhaps this will sink in via a sort of osmosis in the end.
Anyway, the day has ended on a far better note than we feared it might. Now looking forward to bath time and more lovely-looking stuff from the award-winning Pearsons of Ingleton (butchers) for our dinner. Snow forecast for tomorrow, so I wonder what we'll all get up to.

One slightly worrying note though: Nik seems to be developing a taste for fine malt whisky.


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