My night was a lot less disturbed as can be seen from my Stand Ring today. It was another night with the door open. It was closed when I was watching TV and eating but I left it open later on. Fancy that for the time of the year?
The Early Walk was uneventful other than Charlie was a little slow at returning and Luis was to be found outside the gate into the camping pestering the large tom which invites himself at mealtimes and stays over if it’s raining. Dawn was a little later today as there was cloud to the east so it was still dark when we got back. By the time I’d fiddled about reacquiring Charlie and Luis, it was light so Skinny and I set off as usual. It was warmer so I was in just my running shirt and shorts.
There was the usual shower and breakfast preparation and Isabella was in her crate for most of the time sitting quietly waiting to be let out. She is a lot calmer and doesn’t seem to mind too much if I go off without her. I needed to get some camping and other admin out of the way so got on with this whilst my breakfast was cooking. Some bright spark had closed the padlock on the other barrier so the Finns needed me to unlock it so they could get out to go to Paleochora.
I needed to sort out the camping finances and offload some of the money to Georgia as I’d accumulated more than I was comfortable with. She probably has plenty to spend it on anyway, given the work going on at present. Having successfully cooked the books, I took the money up to the office and left it for Georgia to collect at her leisure.
I’d forgotten all about contacting Scottish Widows and so finally did so today. Looking back through my bank payments, I could see that no payment had been taken after April. We managed to find my account and was informed that the endowment I took out when I bought Court Road in 1999 had matured and they wanted to give me the money. I knew it was coming up soon so was pleased it was now rather than later.
I went down to see Peter to borrow his pump so that I could get my bike tyres up to the recommended 20PSI pressure. They can be run from 5(!)-30 PSI and were at the lower end of that scale when the bike arrived. It was a little like riding a blancmange with a particularly soggy and unresponsive performance. The range we achieved was disappointing too. The previous evening, I’d pumped them to 15PSI but only ridden the bike up the camping with its almost flat battery. Today was a different story when I went round the same 6km route which took in a variety of road surfaces as well as a climb up the mountain. The bike now has a much harder ride, is more responsive and should hopefully achieve a greater range once the battery has undergone a few charge/discharge cycles. The choice of seat and seat post works well and is a real benefit now the ride is harder. I completed the loop then let Peter go out on the same circuit. We both decided that it was a huge improvement.
The increased tyre pressure caused the front tyre to rub slightly on the mudguard so I went back to adjust the position before taking the dogs out for their Evening Walk. Peter had offered to join me but was unable to come as he’d not completed his work. The walk was as uneventful as the morning one however Isabella seemed to have plenty of energy to clown around with Fido and Charlie. It’s good to see that Charlie is more tolerant than previously and they play nicely together.
The day has been mostly warm and sunny with a high of over 22℃. It has also been cloudy and the sky looked rather angry when we went for the Evening Walk although nothing came of it. The forecast for Sunday night and most of Monday is not looking all that special so a trip to Petrakis might be in order tomorrow.
Charlie is doing battle with the virtually empty dog meat tin which I gave to him in the van so that he can enjoy it without complications.
Contrary to expectations, tomorrow is not the Winter Solstice as that occurs at 04:00 on Sunday. Such grepping information!
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