Heating Dumblehole isn’t a matter of turning up the thermostat, the oil central heating just can’t cope even if it’s on 24 hours a day. What seems to work is to have the wood burning Rayburn in the kitchen and the ClearView log burner at the other end of the house fired up. Between the two of them it keeps the temperature pleasant, probably cool by most people’s standards. As a consequence we need a lot of firewood and I do mean a lot, the load in the photo will last just over a year! I don’t have a gym membership but I do have a chainsaw and will cut and split the cord wood by hand.

Usually the wood is dropped off in a neighbours field and I have to move it with the loader. This year with the ground being so dry I though we could get the lorry to drop the wood where I need it. Amanda wasn’t convinced but I was pretty sure we’d get the lorry over the bridge and round the corner, it was close!