… and not a drop to drink.
This morning I woke up, tripped over the three amigos snoozing on the rug outside the bedroom door and stumbled into the bathroom. I turned on the tap. Gurgling. No water. The upside of living off mains is access to fresh, pure spring water. The downside of living off mains during “the big freeze” is just that, a big freeze. No water for washing. No water for coffee. Yikes. Option 1: take the truck out through the snow, head for Lampeter & buy bottled water. Option 2: trudge through the snow, sneak in the back door of the Ty Nant bottling plant and steal bottled water.
Being on a tight budget, we chose option 2 and headed off….
Only joking. We left Stevie & Nessa to their cabin fever play time, slipped the truck into 4 wheel drive and braved the lanes.
We only got as far as the end of the drive when we were confronted by the first obstacle - a frozen gate latch. Doh! Out in the lanes, driving through deep snow, with the sun glinting on field after field of snow stretching out from the Cambrians and a cloudless blue sky above, we could have been at an alpine ski resort where the skiers have been swapped for sheep.
On our return, the outside tap had defrosted so thankfully the toilet could be flushed with a bucket of water. Sighs of relief all round. I headed off to extract some brussel sprouts and leeks from under their snowy blanket, while Dave boiled the first of many kettles of water and began the task of identifying the frozen link in the maze of piping from spring to house. There were scary moments – the pump that runs the whole system inexplicably died and I paled at the prospect of weeks of no water. There were funny moments – the pressure tank squirted water into Dave’s face, Nessa fell into a bucket of water. Eventually there was success as Dave extracted lengths of frozen water from the pipes.
The spring water was flowing again. And if there’s one thing Charlie loves more than a muddy puddle of rain water, it’s ice cold running water!
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