Now and again I walk with R from our Ramblers group, she only lives a few miles away so it's convenient for both of us. She likes me to organise the walk, so yesterday I mapped a route from Kirk Langley using the OS app on my phone - 11.45 miles with easy options for shortening it.

I hadn't done the route before, well not the majority of it anyway, and a good portion was on awkward ground, ploughed fields, herds of cows and a very long field of a sort of 2ft tall, very wet brassica!

I was quite enjoying this adventure over new ground, but after a while it was obvious that R wasn't as keen. She works from home for the NHS and she's finding it all quite stressful, added to which she has problems with her house at the moment. Usually she's a very bubbly, upbeat sort of a person, but not today, so I suggested we shorten the walk by about a third.

I'd like to do the complete route again, but there were four fields of cattle, one including a bull, and I'm not confident that I'd be up for going through them on my own. Perhaps I need to get my poles out!

When I got home the smell of brisket in the slow cooker hit me, but I had an hour to take it easy before my son and partner arrived and I had to finish off the meal.

And relax............