Checklist

On Thursday I listed the ingredients for the perfect walk. This is how today's walk measured up:

- Good company - check
- Comfortable boots - check
- Dry clear day - dry for the first half of the walk but then light rain for most of the rest of the way, but not enough to have spoiled the walk
- Beautiful natural scenery - beautiful views across the Cheshire Plain
- Hill to climb - we started on Helsby Hill and the walk took in Frodsham Hill. Enough to raise the pulse and a bit of a sweat as well as afford good views as far as Liverpool.
- Flowing fresh water, a river or a burn - the Mersey!
- Good sighting of a bird species or a wild mammal - we saw a jay, a buzzard, goldfinches, grey wagtails, bullfinches and a couple of woodpeckers. There was bird song most of the way round as a lot of the walk was through woods and forest.
- Ruined building- apart from a little tumble down shed the only other ruin was me.
- Tunnock's Caramel Wafer - check

We also had a special moment. Passing though a wood we came across a 100 year old silver birch. Tucked away in the knotted trunk was a notebook inviting passers by to leave a memory of their walk. We wrote a verse of a poem which summed it up for us.